Originally Posted by
LarDasse74
I primarily use my front brake and my rear rim still wears out faster and I could never figure out why. Maybe because the rear brake is so much less effective you actually have to use it more? Maye rear brake pads get filled with grit faster?
I also use my front brake as the primary one and my rear rims (and brake pads) still wear out much faster. I'm fairly sure it's because the rear wheel lives in much dirtier conditions particularly if you ride in the rain or other bad weather. The rear gets all the spray and grit thrown up by the front wheel so it lives is an abrasive bath and wears accordingly. Fenders help but don't completely even out the wear. If you want to reduce wear on the rear rim a REAR disc brake would be the way to go.
Originally Posted by
LarDasse74
Also, if you paid $200 for just a rim and spokes to be built onto your old hub then you paid too much. Subsequent replacements should be done on the same hub and should cost you just a little over $100, IMHO
Agree. I recently had a rear wheel rebuilt with a Velocity Aerohead rim and DT straight 14 ga spokes using an old but excellent Dura Ace 7700-series hub that was too good to discard. The cost of parts and labor from my LBS was $115 including sales tax.
I also recently purchased a complete "Dimension" rear wheel from Jenson USA with a Tiagra hub, an Alex R390 rim and 32 DT spokes for less than $100 complete. It came properly tensioned and true and only needed a small amount of dish adjustment to make it nearly perfect. So far it's worked extemely well.