Another day with wheels (and so on).
A customer left me with a Chikuwa (budget wheel brand) rear wheel.
They said I could do whatever I thought would make it better.
Lightweight hub, 24H, black semi CX sprint spokes.
It's built in a forced two-cross pattern on both sides.
The rim is offset, but the deflection on the non-drive side is so loose I'd swear the spokes are all CX-RAY, and the spoke tension measured on the tension meter for the drive-side CX sprint was actually low, so I thought it could use a bit more tension.
Just to be clear, I'm not saying more tension is always better.
The rim was shifted toward the drive side and had lateral runout too.
Judging from the grime on the hub shell, you can tell it's seen decent use, so considering that, the amount of runout isn't too bad.
Center offset is something that shifts with age, but this wheel hasn't been used that heavily, so I suspect this offset amount has barely changed since it left the factory.
It's already built with different spoke tensions on each side, and under straight-spoke conditions it's already achieved essentially the best solution possible (if it were semi-comp or semi-race straight spokes, replacement spoke availability would be terrible), so I initially thought I'd just need to do a retension, runout correction, and center alignment—and since both sides already have the final cross lacing, I could just do the re-lacing on the non-drive side only, meaning I wouldn't need a full rebuild (past tense).
The rim depth is 50mm and it's a hookless rim.
I had my reasons, so I swapped out the two nipples next to the valve hole from the original Sapim 14mm red aluminum nipples to DT's 12mm silver aluminum nipples and refined the lateral and radial runout.
I can't explain why (trade secrets), but I decided it was the right call to rebuild with DT nipples.
The Sapim nipples had Secure Lock—a system where the threads are peened just below the thread shoulder to increase resistance and prevent loosening—but that alone wasn't the reason for deciding to rebuild.
For a 50mm-depth rim, it's quite light.
As I mentioned before, it's an offset rim.
While I'm at it, I'll note it's got true holes, which you can even see in the image above.
Built.
I changed to DT 12mm black aluminum nipples.
I'll do the re-lacing later, but even without that, I'm confident the customer will say this wheel rides better than the original state.
You might say "the spokes are the same as before, so if there's any difference, it can only be the spoke tension," and you'd be right.
The original condition was just that bad.
If I retensioned from the original state to match the finished tension and centering precision of this rebuild, you might say "it's the same wheel," and that's true too.
If you only compare the state right after assembly and don't consider what happens over time.
A customer left me with a Chikuwa (budget wheel brand) rear wheel.
They said I could do whatever I thought would make it better.
Lightweight hub, 24H, black semi CX sprint spokes.
It's built in a forced two-cross pattern on both sides.
The rim is offset, but the deflection on the non-drive side is so loose I'd swear the spokes are all CX-RAY, and the spoke tension measured on the tension meter for the drive-side CX sprint was actually low, so I thought it could use a bit more tension.
Just to be clear, I'm not saying more tension is always better.
The rim was shifted toward the drive side and had lateral runout too.
Judging from the grime on the hub shell, you can tell it's seen decent use, so considering that, the amount of runout isn't too bad.
Center offset is something that shifts with age, but this wheel hasn't been used that heavily, so I suspect this offset amount has barely changed since it left the factory.
It's already built with different spoke tensions on each side, and under straight-spoke conditions it's already achieved essentially the best solution possible (if it were semi-comp or semi-race straight spokes, replacement spoke availability would be terrible), so I initially thought I'd just need to do a retension, runout correction, and center alignment—and since both sides already have the final cross lacing, I could just do the re-lacing on the non-drive side only, meaning I wouldn't need a full rebuild (past tense).
The rim depth is 50mm and it's a hookless rim.
I had my reasons, so I swapped out the two nipples next to the valve hole from the original Sapim 14mm red aluminum nipples to DT's 12mm silver aluminum nipples and refined the lateral and radial runout.
I can't explain why (trade secrets), but I decided it was the right call to rebuild with DT nipples.
The Sapim nipples had Secure Lock—a system where the threads are peened just below the thread shoulder to increase resistance and prevent loosening—but that alone wasn't the reason for deciding to rebuild.
For a 50mm-depth rim, it's quite light.
As I mentioned before, it's an offset rim.
While I'm at it, I'll note it's got true holes, which you can even see in the image above.
Built.
I changed to DT 12mm black aluminum nipples.
I'll do the re-lacing later, but even without that, I'm confident the customer will say this wheel rides better than the original state.
You might say "the spokes are the same as before, so if there's any difference, it can only be the spoke tension," and you'd be right.
The original condition was just that bad.
If I retensioned from the original state to match the finished tension and centering precision of this rebuild, you might say "it's the same wheel," and that's true too.
If you only compare the state right after assembly and don't consider what happens over time.