Another wheel day (and so on).
Unlike the front wheel, this one started with completely disassembling the original wheel.
The customer left me an OpenPro rim rear wheel to work with.
FH-9000, 28H, entirely radial laced,
but the freewheel side especially is loose
(the image below shows wear marks at the final cross point)
The wheel's way off-center.
The rim's shifted toward the freewheel side,
so centering it would only increase the left-right tension differential.
The spokes are Sapim Race #14 base,
but the front wheel used DT Competition spokes.
The front wheel spokes were short—none of them
reached the spoke slot on the nipples—
but I didn't photograph that.
Because of that, I photographed the rear wheel before disassembly.
↑Freewheel side
↑Non-freewheel side
The rear wheel spokes, conversely, were too long.
Beyond just being long, there's also the suspicion of corner-cutting.
But first. The sprocket lockring sits way too close to flush with the hub axle end.
This isn't from loose lockring installation;
it's from the largest cog being installed in the wrong position
relative to the freewheel body splines.
Normally this wouldn't happen, but since only the largest cog
has splines that don't go all the way through—they're a dead end—
and the dimensions are shallow, even if you mess up, the lockring threads
still catch on the freewheel body.
In the image above, depending on the phase, you can clearly see
the largest cog not seating properly.
I gently removed the lockring.
↑The one narrow spline phase on the freewheel body
doesn't align with the one narrow phase on the cog
↑The one narrow spline phase on the cog
doesn't align with the one narrow phase on the freewheel body
Plus, you can see aluminum shavings from the lockring,
where it got chewed up by the titanium threads on the freewheel body.
From the original wheel, I kept only the final-cross left-right pair
—four spokes total—without loosening any nipples.
↑Freewheel side
↑Non-freewheel side
They used the same spoke length for both sides—pretty lazy.
That's what I figured anyway.
If you absolutely must do this, you can get away with it
if the non-freewheel side has the nipple slot flush with the rim,
and the freewheel side has just barely a hint of thread showing past the nipple end.
That's barely tolerable. I don't do it.
It's built.
28H, black half CX Sprint, 4x laced.
I'll do the spoke twisting later.
I wanted to do Competition lacing on the freewheel side,
but it wasn't feasible.
It's not impossible if you push it,
but I actually did trial-assemble 14 black Competitions, so that was wasted work.
I didn't choose half CX Sprint because it's 28H.
Rather, I'm glad it's not 24H.
The non-freewheel side spoke twisting is essential.
Even if I'd built it with half Competition, I'd still be doing it anyway.
By the way, the hub had accumulated dirt so heavily that
just a light cleaning didn't get it off. The grime on the flange in the image above
is so stubborn I couldn't scratch it off with my fingernail.
The reason I gave up on Competition lacing is "proprietary knowledge,"
but I'll explain it to the customer.
As hints: it only happens under very specific conditions—
「Not brand new」
「With a Dura-Ace hub
(this is specific to Dura-Ace hubs,
not all Shimano hubs)」
「If you use DT Competition spokes」
—though I'm not certain if ALL those conditions are required.
It's rare enough that you need almost all of them to align.
↑This is DT Competition.
You can see the stamp: a capital D with a T stabbed through it.
↑This is Sapim Race.
No stamp on the spoke head,
but the SAPIM stamp is here.
Both are new stock.
↑Left is Competition, right is Race,
and you can see the elbow section is longer on the Sapim.
If this rear wheel's freewheel side had used Race instead, it might've worked.
I briefly considered whether the original wheel was built with Race
in anticipation of this, but given that the front wheel
used Competition spokes in a 6-spoke radial pattern
(outpoke radial lacing barely has this issue),
and the spoke lengths were sloppy and the wheel center was never even properly centered,
there's zero chance this builder thought that far ahead.
Probably just happened to use Sapim by chance.
Unlike the front wheel, this one started with completely disassembling the original wheel.
The customer left me an OpenPro rim rear wheel to work with.
FH-9000, 28H, entirely radial laced,
but the freewheel side especially is loose
(the image below shows wear marks at the final cross point)
The wheel's way off-center.
The rim's shifted toward the freewheel side,
so centering it would only increase the left-right tension differential.
The spokes are Sapim Race #14 base,
but the front wheel used DT Competition spokes.
The front wheel spokes were short—none of them
reached the spoke slot on the nipples—
but I didn't photograph that.
Because of that, I photographed the rear wheel before disassembly.
↑Freewheel side
↑Non-freewheel side
The rear wheel spokes, conversely, were too long.
Beyond just being long, there's also the suspicion of corner-cutting.
But first. The sprocket lockring sits way too close to flush with the hub axle end.
This isn't from loose lockring installation;
it's from the largest cog being installed in the wrong position
relative to the freewheel body splines.
Normally this wouldn't happen, but since only the largest cog
has splines that don't go all the way through—they're a dead end—
and the dimensions are shallow, even if you mess up, the lockring threads
still catch on the freewheel body.
In the image above, depending on the phase, you can clearly see
the largest cog not seating properly.
I gently removed the lockring.
↑The one narrow spline phase on the freewheel body
doesn't align with the one narrow phase on the cog
↑The one narrow spline phase on the cog
doesn't align with the one narrow phase on the freewheel body
Plus, you can see aluminum shavings from the lockring,
where it got chewed up by the titanium threads on the freewheel body.
From the original wheel, I kept only the final-cross left-right pair
—four spokes total—without loosening any nipples.
↑Freewheel side
↑Non-freewheel side
They used the same spoke length for both sides—pretty lazy.
That's what I figured anyway.
If you absolutely must do this, you can get away with it
if the non-freewheel side has the nipple slot flush with the rim,
and the freewheel side has just barely a hint of thread showing past the nipple end.
That's barely tolerable. I don't do it.
It's built.
28H, black half CX Sprint, 4x laced.
I'll do the spoke twisting later.
I wanted to do Competition lacing on the freewheel side,
but it wasn't feasible.
It's not impossible if you push it,
but I actually did trial-assemble 14 black Competitions, so that was wasted work.
I didn't choose half CX Sprint because it's 28H.
Rather, I'm glad it's not 24H.
The non-freewheel side spoke twisting is essential.
Even if I'd built it with half Competition, I'd still be doing it anyway.
By the way, the hub had accumulated dirt so heavily that
just a light cleaning didn't get it off. The grime on the flange in the image above
is so stubborn I couldn't scratch it off with my fingernail.
The reason I gave up on Competition lacing is "proprietary knowledge,"
but I'll explain it to the customer.
As hints: it only happens under very specific conditions—
「Not brand new」
「With a Dura-Ace hub
(this is specific to Dura-Ace hubs,
not all Shimano hubs)」
「If you use DT Competition spokes」
—though I'm not certain if ALL those conditions are required.
It's rare enough that you need almost all of them to align.
↑This is DT Competition.
You can see the stamp: a capital D with a T stabbed through it.
↑This is Sapim Race.
No stamp on the spoke head,
but the SAPIM stamp is here.
Both are new stock.
↑Left is Competition, right is Race,
and you can see the elbow section is longer on the Sapim.
If this rear wheel's freewheel side had used Race instead, it might've worked.
I briefly considered whether the original wheel was built with Race
in anticipation of this, but given that the front wheel
used Competition spokes in a 6-spoke radial pattern
(outpoke radial lacing barely has this issue),
and the spoke lengths were sloppy and the wheel center was never even properly centered,
there's zero chance this builder thought that far ahead.
Probably just happened to use Sapim by chance.