I took in a wheel that I built about eight years ago.
Both front and rear hubs are 7700 Dura-Ace, the rims are Mavic GP4 final model,
and the spokes are DT black competition.
The front wheel is laced with inpoke, two-cross pattern.
I think what I'd call the "pseudo-Italian lacing" in inpoke two-cross is where you place the spokes in the porcupine direction more to the inside.
Where the spokes cross, with a CX-RAY rim that would fall on the aerobatted section, so really it would be better to lace with something like a CX-RAY.
The rear wheel is laced four-cross with anti-freewheel outpoke.
The 7700 is a hub from an era when radial lacing still wasn't permitted.
That said, the HB-7700 came with round-hole flanges in 36, 32, 28, and 24H options, and slot-hole flanges in 32, 28, 24, 20, 18, 16, and 12H. The FH-7700 had round holes in 36, 32, 28, 24, and 20H, and slot holes in 32, 28, 24, 20, 16, and 12H—basically anything went in the lineup. So insisting that you only do tangent lacing on the lower spoke-count versions of these hubs is unrealistic.
With something like an 18H front, if you laced it XXX-cross you'd actually end up with worse spoke balance anyway.
The Shimano 105 from the 7700 era—the later 5500 hub, model 5501 with the aero "A" designation making it 5501-A—that was Shimano's first radial-lacing-approved hub. But there are countless examples of radial lacing done before that, both professional and amateur.
Not that I'm going with the "if everyone jaywalks together it's okay" argument or anything.
I've got red nipples on half the wheel and gold nipples on the other half.
Not alternating—just one 180-degree phase all the same color.
When it spins, the rim shimmers with light.
Red and blue actually look better together than red and gold.
It's hard to see under fluorescent lights, but in sunlight it really glitters.
I forgot why I was taking it in.
"True the wheel and tension the tire" was it.
This tire—it's Lion Tire manufacture, no question.
The way the black tread gleams, the stitching below the base tape, the amber-colored sidewalls—I'd bet money on it.
Any tire marked "Made in Thailand," especially cheap tubulars, you can bet the actual manufacturer is Lion Tire regardless of the brand on the outside.
Oh wait, sorry—this tire is a Continental Giro.
Forget what I just wrote.
(Not saying I was wrong or anything)
The downside is the valve core won't come out—you can't extend it with an intermediate valve. Some over-cap type extenders won't fit through the valve hole in certain rims (Campagnolo, Fulcrum, etc.), so if the valve core can't be removed, it's basically locked into low-profile rims only.
Too bad.
Oh man, and looking at this valve I'm pretty sure it's a Lion tir—
Wait, who's that at this hour, a customer maybe?
Whoa what the qwert yfgh hjk lp
Edit: Apparently there are Giros where the valve core can come out.
I just checked and all the Giros in our shop have the non-removable version.
It seems unlikely they'd mix different specs in one batch, so either they recently switched to the non-removable design or switched to removable—one or the other.
(Our Giros are the stock we got from the distributor recently.)
Or it could be that Giro always had two valve core specs, and the version our Japanese distributor stocks happens to be the non-removable type.
Both front and rear hubs are 7700 Dura-Ace, the rims are Mavic GP4 final model,
and the spokes are DT black competition.
The front wheel is laced with inpoke, two-cross pattern.
I think what I'd call the "pseudo-Italian lacing" in inpoke two-cross is where you place the spokes in the porcupine direction more to the inside.
Where the spokes cross, with a CX-RAY rim that would fall on the aerobatted section, so really it would be better to lace with something like a CX-RAY.
The rear wheel is laced four-cross with anti-freewheel outpoke.
The 7700 is a hub from an era when radial lacing still wasn't permitted.
That said, the HB-7700 came with round-hole flanges in 36, 32, 28, and 24H options, and slot-hole flanges in 32, 28, 24, 20, 18, 16, and 12H. The FH-7700 had round holes in 36, 32, 28, 24, and 20H, and slot holes in 32, 28, 24, 20, 16, and 12H—basically anything went in the lineup. So insisting that you only do tangent lacing on the lower spoke-count versions of these hubs is unrealistic.
With something like an 18H front, if you laced it XXX-cross you'd actually end up with worse spoke balance anyway.
The Shimano 105 from the 7700 era—the later 5500 hub, model 5501 with the aero "A" designation making it 5501-A—that was Shimano's first radial-lacing-approved hub. But there are countless examples of radial lacing done before that, both professional and amateur.
Not that I'm going with the "if everyone jaywalks together it's okay" argument or anything.
I've got red nipples on half the wheel and gold nipples on the other half.
Not alternating—just one 180-degree phase all the same color.
When it spins, the rim shimmers with light.
Red and blue actually look better together than red and gold.
It's hard to see under fluorescent lights, but in sunlight it really glitters.
I forgot why I was taking it in.
"True the wheel and tension the tire" was it.
This tire—it's Lion Tire manufacture, no question.
The way the black tread gleams, the stitching below the base tape, the amber-colored sidewalls—I'd bet money on it.
Any tire marked "Made in Thailand," especially cheap tubulars, you can bet the actual manufacturer is Lion Tire regardless of the brand on the outside.
Oh wait, sorry—this tire is a Continental Giro.
Forget what I just wrote.
The downside is the valve core won't come out—you can't extend it with an intermediate valve. Some over-cap type extenders won't fit through the valve hole in certain rims (Campagnolo, Fulcrum, etc.), so if the valve core can't be removed, it's basically locked into low-profile rims only.
Too bad.
Oh man, and looking at this valve I'm pretty sure it's a Lion tir—
Wait, who's that at this hour, a customer maybe?
Whoa what the qwert yfgh hjk lp
Edit: Apparently there are Giros where the valve core can come out.
I just checked and all the Giros in our shop have the non-removable version.
It seems unlikely they'd mix different specs in one batch, so either they recently switched to the non-removable design or switched to removable—one or the other.
(Our Giros are the stock we got from the distributor recently.)
Or it could be that Giro always had two valve core specs, and the version our Japanese distributor stocks happens to be the non-removable type.