Another day, more wheels (and so on).
A customer left a Bontrager front wheel with me.
The rim is a WO narrow aluminum rim,
The hub is 20H large flange, laced in radial zero cross pattern with phase-narrowed flanges. The spokes are DT black aero spokes with reinforced section.
The flange width on the hub is quite broad.
While it's laced in radial zero cross,
the flange geometry doesn't permit true radial lacing. When you radial lace a front hub with an extremely small flange diameter, you can get sideways play in the hub axle. With hubs like Dura-Ace or Chris King R45, this barely occurs, and even if it does, you can take care of it with bearing adjustment. With Tni Evo hubs, if it does happen, there's a way to address it. But with EvoLite hubs, the ends are press-fit style and the bearing diameter is small, so if play develops, there's no way to fix it.
With a friend's front wheel, I once tried a "half-radial" lacing pattern instead of full radial to neutralize the flange deformation direction, but that comes with its own problems, so I didn't adopt it for Nomu Lab wheels. That one was an Evo hub, by the way, not an EvoLite.
↑This is a wheel that comes on Cannondale complete bikes, with a carbon tubeless ready rim. The "HG" is a hologram in the model name. The large holes on the rim side aren't really drainage holes—I think they're primarily for burst prevention, in case the tubeless pressure escapes inside the rim.
This wheel's front hub is the opposite of the one we're working with today—it's designed exclusively for true radial lacing.
The rear hub has equal spoke counts left and right with true radial lacing on the free side—very 20th century lacing—but since it's not designed exclusively for true radial, it won't obstruct the hub if we ever rebuild it into a better rear wheel.
Back to the main topic. Along with the Bontrager front wheel, the customer also left
an Easton R90SL
wide tubeless ready rim, and
wants the rim swapped. The Easton rim is slightly taller (meaning smaller inner diameter),
and the original wheel's spokes have a long plain section on the rim side, so by shortening them slightly—a one-way modification—we can reliably swap to the Easton.
The Bontrager rim had the spoke length written on it—how considerate. Who are they kidding? For a generic nipple rim with about 25mm height and radial lacing on an EvoLite front hub with super small flanges, we'd expect around 280mm, so there's no way this large flange hub would use 281mm. I suspect they're reusing a rim from a model that already exists with a different hub that uses 281mm spokes. The original spokes were actually 275mm.
All built up.
The customer wanted red aluminum nipples, so I used those.
The customer asked me to weigh the rim and wheel before and after, and while the rim weight difference was 53g, the wheel weight difference came out to 77g. The spoke shortening was a minor factor—the original brass nipples had large hex heads that could be turned from the outer edge too, so they were heavy both in material and volume, which accounts for the difference.
As for the actual weights, I see no particular reason to share them. ↑Wow, this guy's got a bad attitude
Thank you for waiting! Please take a look at this image!
Bontrager rim (no rim tape)!
Easton rim!
Wheel before work (with rim tape)!
Rim tape alone!
Wheel after work!
↑Stop that!
A customer left a Bontrager front wheel with me.
The rim is a WO narrow aluminum rim,
The hub is 20H large flange, laced in radial zero cross pattern with phase-narrowed flanges. The spokes are DT black aero spokes with reinforced section.
The flange width on the hub is quite broad.
While it's laced in radial zero cross,
the flange geometry doesn't permit true radial lacing. When you radial lace a front hub with an extremely small flange diameter, you can get sideways play in the hub axle. With hubs like Dura-Ace or Chris King R45, this barely occurs, and even if it does, you can take care of it with bearing adjustment. With Tni Evo hubs, if it does happen, there's a way to address it. But with EvoLite hubs, the ends are press-fit style and the bearing diameter is small, so if play develops, there's no way to fix it.
With a friend's front wheel, I once tried a "half-radial" lacing pattern instead of full radial to neutralize the flange deformation direction, but that comes with its own problems, so I didn't adopt it for Nomu Lab wheels. That one was an Evo hub, by the way, not an EvoLite.
↑This is a wheel that comes on Cannondale complete bikes, with a carbon tubeless ready rim. The "HG" is a hologram in the model name. The large holes on the rim side aren't really drainage holes—I think they're primarily for burst prevention, in case the tubeless pressure escapes inside the rim.
This wheel's front hub is the opposite of the one we're working with today—it's designed exclusively for true radial lacing.
The rear hub has equal spoke counts left and right with true radial lacing on the free side—very 20th century lacing—but since it's not designed exclusively for true radial, it won't obstruct the hub if we ever rebuild it into a better rear wheel.
Back to the main topic. Along with the Bontrager front wheel, the customer also left
an Easton R90SL
wide tubeless ready rim, and
wants the rim swapped. The Easton rim is slightly taller (meaning smaller inner diameter),
and the original wheel's spokes have a long plain section on the rim side, so by shortening them slightly—a one-way modification—we can reliably swap to the Easton.
The Bontrager rim had the spoke length written on it—how considerate. Who are they kidding? For a generic nipple rim with about 25mm height and radial lacing on an EvoLite front hub with super small flanges, we'd expect around 280mm, so there's no way this large flange hub would use 281mm. I suspect they're reusing a rim from a model that already exists with a different hub that uses 281mm spokes. The original spokes were actually 275mm.
All built up.
The customer wanted red aluminum nipples, so I used those.
The customer asked me to weigh the rim and wheel before and after, and while the rim weight difference was 53g, the wheel weight difference came out to 77g. The spoke shortening was a minor factor—the original brass nipples had large hex heads that could be turned from the outer edge too, so they were heavy both in material and volume, which accounts for the difference.
As for the actual weights, I see no particular reason to share them. ↑Wow, this guy's got a bad attitude
Thank you for waiting! Please take a look at this image!
Bontrager rim (no rim tape)!
Easton rim!
Wheel before work (with rim tape)!
Rim tape alone!
Wheel after work!
↑Stop that!