Another wheel day (and so on).
I received two Open Pro UST rims for rim brakes (with brake zones) from a customer.
Both are 24H, not one 20H and one 24H.
When I build front and rear wheels with the same spoke hole count,
if the rim weights differ,
I normally use the lighter one for the rear wheel.
But if these were my own wheels,
I'd definitely use the heavier one for the front this time.
However, the reason for that is probably something unique to me personally,
and the rim weight has nothing to do with it.
The reason is that only one of the rims had brake wear marks.
If I were to build my own front and rear wheels with this rim
using the one with wear marks as the front wheel,
the brake zone on the rear wheel
wouldn't develop wear marks.
I wondered if this customer might be like me—
someone who only uses the front brake—
but the cleaner rim had no rim tape adhesive residue at all,
so it appears to simply be brand new.
However, even though I think quite a few of these rims are in circulation,
the serial numbers
were, true to their name, consecutive numbers.
It seems the situation is that of the two rims purchased at the same time,
only one has been used.
The markings in the image above are laser-etched
and not removable like a sticker,
so I decided to use the fact that they're readable right-side-up when viewed from the right side of the wheel
as the basis for determining the rim's left and right orientation.
Built.
Evolite hub 24H black CX-RAY spokes in radial lacing
silver aluminum nipples.
The eyelets are silver-colored, so they probably matched the colors intentionally.
Traditional Open Pro rims have eyelets on both sides,
but there probably aren't any tubeless-compatible rims with eyelets on both sides,
so this rim also has eyelets on one side only.
However, it does carry elements from the lineage of traditional Open Pro WO rims
and Reflex tubular rims
(though these are now called Open Pro Tubular)
.
Mavic began manufacturing budget aluminum rims and aluminum rims for complete wheels
in Romania at a certain point,
and complete wheel rims also became Romanian-made even in higher-end models.
But Open Pro alone has remained French-made.
Whether it's a hassle to move the manufacturing machinery to Romania
or they just stock barely semi-finished rims without stickers
in the warehouse, I don't know the reason.
And hand-built wheel rims that are French-made and SUP-processed
(Mavic's proprietary smooth arc-welded)
have a unique feel where, aside from the rim seam having just a slight bulge or protrusion on the outer circumference,
they allow radial runout correction to be pushed to a very high precision limit,
and the radial truing itself is also easier to perform.
With this rim too, by the feel while I was building it,
I thought "this must be the French one"
and looked for the MADE IN FRANCE marking on the rim—
that's how much I was convinced by the building feel itself
that it was a rim made domestically in France.
※I wrote "hand-built wheel rim" because,
even if the rim is French-made,
in the case of complete wheels like Ksyrium and Aksium,
compared to Open Pro rims and Reflex rims
where 28H was once the minimum spoke count,
they have fewer spokes and higher tension,
so the runout roundness of the rim's outer circumference is slightly coarser.
That said, it's still quite accurate.
I received two Open Pro UST rims for rim brakes (with brake zones) from a customer.
Both are 24H, not one 20H and one 24H.
When I build front and rear wheels with the same spoke hole count,
if the rim weights differ,
I normally use the lighter one for the rear wheel.
But if these were my own wheels,
I'd definitely use the heavier one for the front this time.
However, the reason for that is probably something unique to me personally,
and the rim weight has nothing to do with it.
The reason is that only one of the rims had brake wear marks.
If I were to build my own front and rear wheels with this rim
using the one with wear marks as the front wheel,
the brake zone on the rear wheel
wouldn't develop wear marks.
I wondered if this customer might be like me—
someone who only uses the front brake—
but the cleaner rim had no rim tape adhesive residue at all,
so it appears to simply be brand new.
However, even though I think quite a few of these rims are in circulation,
the serial numbers
were, true to their name, consecutive numbers.
It seems the situation is that of the two rims purchased at the same time,
only one has been used.
The markings in the image above are laser-etched
and not removable like a sticker,
so I decided to use the fact that they're readable right-side-up when viewed from the right side of the wheel
as the basis for determining the rim's left and right orientation.
Built.
Evolite hub 24H black CX-RAY spokes in radial lacing
silver aluminum nipples.
The eyelets are silver-colored, so they probably matched the colors intentionally.
Traditional Open Pro rims have eyelets on both sides,
but there probably aren't any tubeless-compatible rims with eyelets on both sides,
so this rim also has eyelets on one side only.
However, it does carry elements from the lineage of traditional Open Pro WO rims
and Reflex tubular rims
(though these are now called Open Pro Tubular)
.
Mavic began manufacturing budget aluminum rims and aluminum rims for complete wheels
in Romania at a certain point,
and complete wheel rims also became Romanian-made even in higher-end models.
But Open Pro alone has remained French-made.
Whether it's a hassle to move the manufacturing machinery to Romania
or they just stock barely semi-finished rims without stickers
in the warehouse, I don't know the reason.
And hand-built wheel rims that are French-made and SUP-processed
(Mavic's proprietary smooth arc-welded)
have a unique feel where, aside from the rim seam having just a slight bulge or protrusion on the outer circumference,
they allow radial runout correction to be pushed to a very high precision limit,
and the radial truing itself is also easier to perform.
With this rim too, by the feel while I was building it,
I thought "this must be the French one"
and looked for the MADE IN FRANCE marking on the rim—
that's how much I was convinced by the building feel itself
that it was a rim made domestically in France.
※I wrote "hand-built wheel rim" because,
even if the rim is French-made,
in the case of complete wheels like Ksyrium and Aksium,
compared to Open Pro rims and Reflex rims
where 28H was once the minimum spoke count,
they have fewer spokes and higher tension,
so the runout roundness of the rim's outer circumference is slightly coarser.
That said, it's still quite accurate.