Today was wheels again (details omitted).
I received 4 rims from a customer.
Three of them are PBP low-height rims with a polished finish from the Velo Orange brand.
They have a VO logo sticker on them.
As I'll mention later, this surface finish is more like plating than anodizing.
The plating work itself is extremely clean.
The fourth one is a silver Open Pro.
All are 36-hole.
I also have 4 hubs.
First, the front and rear hubs from Sanshin (Japanese hub brand).
The hole in the center of the hub shell is a grease port.
This is beside the point, but the hole on the rear hub is oddly positioned toward the inner edge.
It would probably even withstand radial lacing. But I won't do that.
The hub surface is more mouse-gray than silver,
because it has no surface treatment whatsoever.
That's about how old hubs were.
Aluminum with naturally formed anodizing.
You can bring it to a mirror finish by polishing or buffing.
You can make it endlessly shiny, but it has a constant clouding feeling.
I remember the pleasure of polishing up old Campagnolo hubs. Hehe.
Next is the Shimano FH-RM50.
It's a budget MTB model, but I appreciate that they've stamped the model name on it.
Finally, Velo Orange. The HiLow hub — a pretty straightforward model name.
↑This one also has a VO sticker on it.
The Sanshin and RM50 — the customer has already adjusted the over-locknut dimension and cone,
so the axles are sticking out with excess.
But apparently the customer will handle that later, so I can build them as-is.
There's no issue measuring with a center gauge.
Now I'll be lacing wheels. The front wheel is 4-cross,
and for the rear wheel they'd prefer 48-spoke if possible, or 46-spoke if not.
To cut to the chase: all three rear wheels came out as 48-spoke.
Because they're 36-hole. With true tangent lacing on 36-hole, it becomes 40-spoke anyway.
All spokes are DT Competition.
The polished finish is thick and applies well overall,
but when truing closely, the waviness of the plated surface registers as runout.
It's difficult to know how much to call runout.
The Sanshin rear hub and Velo Orange rim are laced.
All Competition, 48-spoke lacing.
With 36-hole, 4-cross gets pretty radial-like. Nice. But the point is it's not radial.
The RM50 hub and Velo Orange rim are laced.
All Competition, 48-spoke lacing.
The 135mm MTB hub is set tight on the non-freewheel side,
so the cone is tight and even with asymmetrical left-right lacing
I couldn't quite eliminate the left-right difference.
I shudder thinking what it would have been with regular 66-spoke lacing.
The Sanshin front hub and Velo Orange rim are laced.
All Competition, 66-spoke lacing.
By the way, beside the point,
the hub nuts were an incredibly rare 16mm.
Glad I had that 16mm hub wrench!
The Velo Orange hub and Open Pro rim are laced.
All Comp (details omitted).
The sticker on the Open Pro opposite the valve (actually hiding the joint)
and the hub's VO sticker are aligned on the same line, which means
if you look through the valve hole, you see the VO sticker dead center.
That's a performance-irrelevant quirk.
The customer's original request was to build them "loose,"
but they changed to "tight," so I'll lace them.
Actually, I hate lacing.
I hate it "as a task."
But after lacing I get more pleased than the customer, so
I do love "the result of having laced."
↑Looks like I need re-education! Come here!
Lacing... I... love it...
I received 4 rims from a customer.
Three of them are PBP low-height rims with a polished finish from the Velo Orange brand.
They have a VO logo sticker on them.
As I'll mention later, this surface finish is more like plating than anodizing.
The plating work itself is extremely clean.
The fourth one is a silver Open Pro.
All are 36-hole.
I also have 4 hubs.
First, the front and rear hubs from Sanshin (Japanese hub brand).
The hole in the center of the hub shell is a grease port.
This is beside the point, but the hole on the rear hub is oddly positioned toward the inner edge.
It would probably even withstand radial lacing. But I won't do that.
The hub surface is more mouse-gray than silver,
because it has no surface treatment whatsoever.
That's about how old hubs were.
Aluminum with naturally formed anodizing.
You can bring it to a mirror finish by polishing or buffing.
You can make it endlessly shiny, but it has a constant clouding feeling.
I remember the pleasure of polishing up old Campagnolo hubs. Hehe.
Next is the Shimano FH-RM50.
It's a budget MTB model, but I appreciate that they've stamped the model name on it.
Finally, Velo Orange. The HiLow hub — a pretty straightforward model name.
↑This one also has a VO sticker on it.
The Sanshin and RM50 — the customer has already adjusted the over-locknut dimension and cone,
so the axles are sticking out with excess.
But apparently the customer will handle that later, so I can build them as-is.
There's no issue measuring with a center gauge.
Now I'll be lacing wheels. The front wheel is 4-cross,
and for the rear wheel they'd prefer 48-spoke if possible, or 46-spoke if not.
To cut to the chase: all three rear wheels came out as 48-spoke.
Because they're 36-hole. With true tangent lacing on 36-hole, it becomes 40-spoke anyway.
All spokes are DT Competition.
The polished finish is thick and applies well overall,
but when truing closely, the waviness of the plated surface registers as runout.
It's difficult to know how much to call runout.
The Sanshin rear hub and Velo Orange rim are laced.
All Competition, 48-spoke lacing.
With 36-hole, 4-cross gets pretty radial-like. Nice. But the point is it's not radial.
The RM50 hub and Velo Orange rim are laced.
All Competition, 48-spoke lacing.
The 135mm MTB hub is set tight on the non-freewheel side,
so the cone is tight and even with asymmetrical left-right lacing
I couldn't quite eliminate the left-right difference.
I shudder thinking what it would have been with regular 66-spoke lacing.
The Sanshin front hub and Velo Orange rim are laced.
All Competition, 66-spoke lacing.
By the way, beside the point,
the hub nuts were an incredibly rare 16mm.
Glad I had that 16mm hub wrench!
The Velo Orange hub and Open Pro rim are laced.
All Comp (details omitted).
The sticker on the Open Pro opposite the valve (actually hiding the joint)
and the hub's VO sticker are aligned on the same line, which means
if you look through the valve hole, you see the VO sticker dead center.
That's a performance-irrelevant quirk.
The customer's original request was to build them "loose,"
but they changed to "tight," so I'll lace them.
Actually, I hate lacing.
I hate it "as a task."
But after lacing I get more pleased than the customer, so
I do love "the result of having laced."
↑Looks like I need re-education! Come here!
Lacing... I... love it...