lostarchitect 

Hi All,

I have a set of wheels with old 36 hole Campagnolo wide flange hubs and Fiamme alloy clincher rims. I'd like to replace the old, corroding, crummy looking spokes with new stainless steel ones. It's 3 cross laced.

My first question is this: Is it an acceptable method to replace the spokes one by one? I've never built a wheel and this seems like the easier method to me. If there's a reason not to do this, please let me know.

The second question is about spokes themselves. I've seen spokes advertised as double butted, triple butted, or, say, 14g silver... What's it all mean? Ideally, what kind of spokes do I want here?

A not-so great cell phone pic of the hub is below. Thanks for your advice!

Mark Kelly 

Can't say I've tried your method but it seems unnecessarily difficult to me - you would still need to retension the wheel as a whole. Put another way, lacing is the easy part of wheel building, it can be done by rote where tensioning requires a bit of understanding.

For a wheel like that just use 2.0 / 1.8 butted spokes like DT Competition. The two dimensions refer to the thicker (each end) and thinner (middle) parts of the spoke. Gauge is an old method only used in backwards countries that don't have the metric system.

Rabid Koala

If you stripped it down to the hub, just think of the beautiful shine you could put on those Tipo hubs.

Read Sheldon Brown's instructions for lacing, they have guided me several times with great success.

clasher

It'd be easier to dissemble the wheel first and rebuild it with the new spokes. If the original spokes aren't sticking up through the nipples you can use those to measure the replacement spokes. I've found success using Roger Musson's book however I also followed Sheldon Brown's instructions with ease but found the e-book a great value too.

John E

Particularly on the rear hub you should duplicate the original lacing pattern (outside vs. inside of flange, winding vs. unwinding), since the old spokes will have deformed the flange around the holes.

rootboy 

Have you laced a wheel before? Dead easy, as the others have said, and fun. Of course, you need some sort of truing stand, etc. But you could certainly try it spoke by spoke if you feel unsure about wheel building. Take a lot of time however. Only thing I would add, use the same gauge spokes as the ones that came out of there. Those are probably 14 gauge (2.0 mm) straight gauge spokes in there now , but best measure them, and I would want to match the same diameter in the hub flanges so the new ones aren't loose in the flange holes. You can use 14 straight gauge or double butted 2.0-1.8-2.0, as others have mentioned. I recently did an identical set of Tipo hubs with 2.0 SS Dt's. Those are nice hubs. And yes, it sure makes it a LOT easier to polish up the hubs and rims when they have no spokes on them.

lostarchitect 

That's a good point about polishing. They really need a good shine.

Regarding lacing, no, I've never done it before. I guess it seems harder than it is, given what you guys are saying. I was just nervous about it. I want to replicate the existing lacing, so I thought spoke by spoke might be a way to do that and insure that I don't mess up.

I also don't have a truing stand. I usually true wheels in the fork. So you can see why I'm nervous about all this. I've been watching CL for a used stand, but truth is, I've spent a lot of money lately and I don't want to spend too much more.

clasher

The e-book I linked to has plans for a home made stand that seem pretty reasonable. The author builds wheels for his livelihood with it so I guess it's good enough for that... there are some instructables for wheel building stands too, and in my hazy memory I recall a neat thread in the mechanics subforum about home-made stands.

lostarchitect 

I think I'll download that book, Thanks, Clasher. Looks like it will be really helpful in the long and short term.

marley mission

i'm right where you are w all that brotha

rootboy 

You can certainly use a fork to do the truing in a pinch. I was very nervous too, first time, but truly it is much easier than it might seem. Just get the same length spokes as in there now and make sure you follow the rule of thumb listed in many of the wheel building sites regarding turning the spokes all the same number of turns. Bit by bit and resist the urge to hurry. Here's a site I found particularly clear and concise. Good luck.
https://miketechinfo.com/new-tech-wheels-tires.htm

lostarchitect 

Rootboy, that site is awesome! Thanks so much for that link!

WNG

That pattern on your high flange hub makes me suspect you have 4 cross lacing. I may be wrong of course, without a full pic.
I agree with others, it'll be a lot easier to remove all old spokes and start lacing with new ones. The crossing of the spokes makes one at a time a PITA.

lostarchitect 

Hmm.. Here is a picture of the whole wheel. Is this 4 cross or 3 cross? I thought it was 3 but it does appear that the spokes also cross right on the flange, if that makes sense. I didn't think that counted as a cross. I'm a newbie at this so any info is helpful.

lostarchitect 

Bump.

Can anyone tell me if the pic above is 4-cross or 3-cross? Thanks!

Puget Pounder

Looks like a 4 to me.

BTW repeatedly detensioning/replacing 1 spoke at a time like what you proposed in the original post may warp your rim.

Zaphod Beeblebrox 

Yep that counts as a cross. I'm seeing 4 cross as well. Of course if you're rebuilding it you could go with 3 cross...or anything else.

lostarchitect 

Yeah, I've been convinced that method is a bad idea, not gonna do it. Thanks for the info to you and Zaph.

rootboy 

You could go 3 cross but of course you'll have to calculate for shorter spokes. See if you can find your particular Fiamme on this site to help decide.
https://lenni.info/edd/

Amesja

Meh, I think it is a good way to bend the heck out of the new spokes. I dislike the job of replacing a single spoke -especially the inner ones. The thought of doing an entire wheel this way makes my back hairs stand on edge. That's a lot of distorting spokes to get them in.

jimmuller 

What he said. When you consider how the act of loosening one spoke throws all the tensions out of balance thereby threatening the rim, and how you might have an impossible task to re-balance all the spoke tensions to be as good as you could get them on a newly-strung wheel, and how much work it would be just to thread all the spokes through all the others, it would seem a far easier and far safer task just to build the wheel.

norskagent

If I were to do it one spoke at a time, I would loosen all the old spokes a lot first. I did a similar job on my raleigh pro, and elected to start with a fresh hub, it wasn't too hard. Of course, I do have a truing stand in my living room! One thing to note about building up wheels, you don't have to do it all at once! I laced up one wheel, then trued it another time, then tensioned and trued another night, etc. It doesn't change if you walk away...

lostarchitect 

Absolutely, guys. I am just going to build the wheel the normal way.

robatsu

If you want to be extra careful to save the rim, don't cut the spokes when disassembling - go around the wheel loosening each spoke one full turn or so until it is fairly loose. This shouldn't take any more than three times around. This also avoids putting the weird stresses on the rim that can happen from cutting spokes.

lostarchitect 

I already did just that. Glad I did it the right way. The rim seems very straight and I polished up the hub very nicely.

I have to pick up a freewheel remover before I can take the rear wheel apart.