Another day working on wheels (and so on).

I built the front wheel for Nomu Lab Wheel No. 5
using a hub that came from a customer's old Shimano pre-built wheel.


WH-R501 front hub, 20H, CX-RAY
Built with reverse nipple radial lacing


Silver rim and turquoise nipples.

Shimano has never actually sold a 20H front hub as a standalone hub product.
The next spoke count below 24H is mysteriously 18H.

Aside from the 7801 rear wheel and current disc brake compatible front wheels,
Shimano wheels are just garbage tier—worse than standard hand-built wheels.
It's actually harder to build a hand-built wheel that doesn't outperform Shimano wheels.
Back during the rim brake era, if Shimano had only produced 20H front and 24H rear hubs
from Dura-Ace down to 105,
then shops capable of actually building proper wheels could use those hubs,
and shops that couldn't could only peddle "Shimano wheels"—
the punishment for the sin of not knowing how to build wheels—
which would expose their incompetence.
I always thought it would've been a nice way to stratify the market.