Another day with wheels (and so on).
I built the front wheel for Nomu Lab Wheel #8.
The rear wheel uses half CX Sprint rather than half Comp,
and I built that a while back.
I built the front wheel with an LW Super hub.
Since the customer is lightweight,
I decided we could get away with a 20-hole front wheel.
The spokes are black half CX Sprint,
rather than going full CX-RAY.
If this hub weren't such an ultra-small flange,
and if I had a neck-break spoke hub where building method is a choice,
and if it were 24 holes, I might have gone full CX-RAY.
Back in the day, ENVE said something that basically amounted to
"with tangent lacing, 2-cross and 3-cross are pretty much the same thing,"
and in terms of the magnitude of factors, that's actually true.
A 24-hole rear wheel (drive wheel) laced 4x4
versus one laced 6x6 with identical spokes on both sides—
there's no way you could reliably tell the difference
by feel while riding without looking at the wheel.
Though if it were a rear wheel with both sides radially laced (0x0),
you'd definitely notice the difference.
The point is, compared to the major negative factor
of bilateral radial lacing on a rear wheel,
the difference between 4x4 and 6x6 is quite small.
But ENVE didn't have the vision to think of bilateral different-pattern lacing.
They released a hub with a carbon flange where spoke hole phasing
was uneven rather than symmetrical, achieving spoke trajectory
closer to 3-cross when laced 2-cross
(which basically meant they thought bilateral 3-cross was better than bilateral 2-cross),
but if they'd made the uneven flange phasing only on the anti-freewheel side,
they could have created a hub where
"regardless of whether the builder understood the intention,
a rear wheel that's essentially 4-6 laced would practically build itself."
This front wheel is 20 holes, but
starting at 24 holes, 6-spoke lacing becomes possible,
which means on a front wheel you can do 6x4 lacing,
and on a rear wheel you can do 4x6 lacing.
When you tie the 6-spoke side, the final crossing point being farther from the hub flange
means the tying has greater effect.
Strictly speaking, tying reaches maximum effectiveness
when the final crossing is positioned halfway between rim and hub,
but unless you have an extremely small-diameter rim
or one of those oversized flanges seen on early electric-assist bikes
that exceeded the wheel radius, the final crossing position will be
much closer to the hub than the midpoint between hub and rim,
so the expression "the farther from the hub flange" is
practically without issue.
Compared to bilateral different-diameter lacing,
bilateral different-pattern lacing is
(excluding single-side radial) a minor factor
in reducing spoke strain asymmetry, but if you think in terms of tying,
there's significant value in making the n in n-spoke lacing on the tied side
as large as possible.
However, this hub is for straight spokes,
and both sides are forced into 2-cross same-pattern lacing.
With this hub structure, that's true even at 24 holes.
Only when both conditions are met—
"24 holes" AND "a neck-break spoke hub"—
can you use full CX-RAY and make up for it through
bilateral different-pattern lacing and tying.
So this time, I went with half CX Sprint.
I built the front wheel for Nomu Lab Wheel #8.
The rear wheel uses half CX Sprint rather than half Comp,
and I built that a while back.
I built the front wheel with an LW Super hub.
Since the customer is lightweight,
I decided we could get away with a 20-hole front wheel.
The spokes are black half CX Sprint,
rather than going full CX-RAY.
If this hub weren't such an ultra-small flange,
and if I had a neck-break spoke hub where building method is a choice,
and if it were 24 holes, I might have gone full CX-RAY.
Back in the day, ENVE said something that basically amounted to
"with tangent lacing, 2-cross and 3-cross are pretty much the same thing,"
and in terms of the magnitude of factors, that's actually true.
A 24-hole rear wheel (drive wheel) laced 4x4
versus one laced 6x6 with identical spokes on both sides—
there's no way you could reliably tell the difference
by feel while riding without looking at the wheel.
Though if it were a rear wheel with both sides radially laced (0x0),
you'd definitely notice the difference.
The point is, compared to the major negative factor
of bilateral radial lacing on a rear wheel,
the difference between 4x4 and 6x6 is quite small.
But ENVE didn't have the vision to think of bilateral different-pattern lacing.
They released a hub with a carbon flange where spoke hole phasing
was uneven rather than symmetrical, achieving spoke trajectory
closer to 3-cross when laced 2-cross
(which basically meant they thought bilateral 3-cross was better than bilateral 2-cross),
but if they'd made the uneven flange phasing only on the anti-freewheel side,
they could have created a hub where
"regardless of whether the builder understood the intention,
a rear wheel that's essentially 4-6 laced would practically build itself."
This front wheel is 20 holes, but
starting at 24 holes, 6-spoke lacing becomes possible,
which means on a front wheel you can do 6x4 lacing,
and on a rear wheel you can do 4x6 lacing.
When you tie the 6-spoke side, the final crossing point being farther from the hub flange
means the tying has greater effect.
Strictly speaking, tying reaches maximum effectiveness
when the final crossing is positioned halfway between rim and hub,
but unless you have an extremely small-diameter rim
or one of those oversized flanges seen on early electric-assist bikes
that exceeded the wheel radius, the final crossing position will be
much closer to the hub than the midpoint between hub and rim,
so the expression "the farther from the hub flange" is
practically without issue.
Compared to bilateral different-diameter lacing,
bilateral different-pattern lacing is
(excluding single-side radial) a minor factor
in reducing spoke strain asymmetry, but if you think in terms of tying,
there's significant value in making the n in n-spoke lacing on the tied side
as large as possible.
However, this hub is for straight spokes,
and both sides are forced into 2-cross same-pattern lacing.
With this hub structure, that's true even at 24 holes.
Only when both conditions are met—
"24 holes" AND "a neck-break spoke hub"—
can you use full CX-RAY and make up for it through
bilateral different-pattern lacing and tying.
So this time, I went with half CX Sprint.