Another day with wheels (and so on).
A customer left me a Rooval SLX24 wheel to work on.
This is totally beside the point, but it's probably rare to see the manufacturer name and model name text oriented in opposite directions on a single label.
It's a Rooval-branded wheel, but spec-wise it's just a standard, budget-grade wheel built from generic materials—the kind that comes stock on complete bikes.
In the sense of being a mass-market product without the manufacturer or brand's signature design features, it's similar to stuff like Fulcrum Racing 5 LG (which doesn't use 2:1 lacing) or Mavic Aksium (which doesn't use Isopulse lacing).
Rooval was once a French wheel brand that existed, but nowadays it's azombiebrand owned in name only by Specialized. I know the Japanese distributor uses the spelling "Rovale," but since it was originally called Rooval before that, I stick with calling it Rooval. For details on the original Rooval, see (→here).
Anyway, according to the customer, this wheel feels like it's sapping the power. So I decided to rebuild it using my method.
While feeling around the side of the rim, I noticed something: the brake zone has a thick, protruding machined finish, but the spot in the image above is thicker than other areas, and
on the opposite side at the same phase, it's basically flush with the rest.
↑Exaggerating it in a drawing, it looks something like this. The rim width doesn't actually change by phase, so there's no problem with building the wheel.
The original front wheel was: 20H hub, all-black, Campagnolo, reversed nipples, radial lacing, with black brass nipples. The tension was fairly decent.
Built.
Same hub as before—20H, black CX-RAY, reversed nipples, radial lacing, with black aluminum nipples. I built it to be crisper than before, though the weight reduction from the lighter spokes and nipples might be the bigger factor here.
The rim weight—I thought it'd be around 500g, but it was actually light for a rim used on a stock wheel.
The original rear wheel was: 24H hub, all-black, Campagnolo, 4/0 lacing (all Campagnolo spokes), with black brass nipples. If I were doing half-Campagnolo 4/6 lacing, I'd swap to aluminum nipples and disassemble it, but reuse the freewheel-side spokes. However, based on the customer's weight and preferences, I decided to go with 14-gauge plain spokes instead.
Yesterday's Crisking wheel used 14-gauge plain spokes (2.0mm), and this wheel's original spokes are 2.0-1.8-2.0mm butted, but this rear wheel is much crisper. It's not that it's more tensioned—yesterday's wheel was just built incredibly soft.
For a rear wheel built with a non-offset rim and equal-diameter flanges on the hub, using anti-freewheel-side radial lacing, the anti-freewheel side seemed unusually tight, so I suspected the rim might be shifted left. I checked and
that was indeed the case, but the offset wasn't quite as dramatic as the anti-freewheel side being cranked super-tight while centered. The reason the anti-freewheel side felt less flexible was simply that the freewheel side was well-tensioned.
Built.
Same hub as before—24H, black, half-Campagnolo 4/6 lacing with cross-lacing, and black aluminum nipples. Built it quite tight. Hehehehe.
A customer left me a Rooval SLX24 wheel to work on.
This is totally beside the point, but it's probably rare to see the manufacturer name and model name text oriented in opposite directions on a single label.
It's a Rooval-branded wheel, but spec-wise it's just a standard, budget-grade wheel built from generic materials—the kind that comes stock on complete bikes.
In the sense of being a mass-market product without the manufacturer or brand's signature design features, it's similar to stuff like Fulcrum Racing 5 LG (which doesn't use 2:1 lacing) or Mavic Aksium (which doesn't use Isopulse lacing).
Rooval was once a French wheel brand that existed, but nowadays it's a
Anyway, according to the customer, this wheel feels like it's sapping the power. So I decided to rebuild it using my method.
While feeling around the side of the rim, I noticed something: the brake zone has a thick, protruding machined finish, but the spot in the image above is thicker than other areas, and
on the opposite side at the same phase, it's basically flush with the rest.
↑Exaggerating it in a drawing, it looks something like this. The rim width doesn't actually change by phase, so there's no problem with building the wheel.
The original front wheel was: 20H hub, all-black, Campagnolo, reversed nipples, radial lacing, with black brass nipples. The tension was fairly decent.
Built.
Same hub as before—20H, black CX-RAY, reversed nipples, radial lacing, with black aluminum nipples. I built it to be crisper than before, though the weight reduction from the lighter spokes and nipples might be the bigger factor here.
The rim weight—I thought it'd be around 500g, but it was actually light for a rim used on a stock wheel.
The original rear wheel was: 24H hub, all-black, Campagnolo, 4/0 lacing (all Campagnolo spokes), with black brass nipples. If I were doing half-Campagnolo 4/6 lacing, I'd swap to aluminum nipples and disassemble it, but reuse the freewheel-side spokes. However, based on the customer's weight and preferences, I decided to go with 14-gauge plain spokes instead.
Yesterday's Crisking wheel used 14-gauge plain spokes (2.0mm), and this wheel's original spokes are 2.0-1.8-2.0mm butted, but this rear wheel is much crisper. It's not that it's more tensioned—yesterday's wheel was just built incredibly soft.
For a rear wheel built with a non-offset rim and equal-diameter flanges on the hub, using anti-freewheel-side radial lacing, the anti-freewheel side seemed unusually tight, so I suspected the rim might be shifted left. I checked and
that was indeed the case, but the offset wasn't quite as dramatic as the anti-freewheel side being cranked super-tight while centered. The reason the anti-freewheel side felt less flexible was simply that the freewheel side was well-tensioned.
Built.
Same hub as before—24H, black, half-Campagnolo 4/6 lacing with cross-lacing, and black aluminum nipples. Built it quite tight. Hehehehe.