^^^ you know too much. Every day I tell myself Im a damn good bike mechanic and then people like you put me back in my place. Anyway, I used 293's as you suggested and the threads seem to overlap well; and at a nice tension the end of the spoke is by the screwdriver flat on the nipple (which i now know is NOT the most accurate way of determining if the spokes are the right length). By the way, which spoke calc did you use? I only got 293 when I added 3mm to the erd as certain sites say about mavic rims, but I called mavic today and the nice man on the dealer hotline said adding 3 mm is bogus (i agree).

Thanks for the suggestion though, I laced the wheel during 1 side of an LP and tensioned it up during the other, and it all came together perfectly as the recorded ended.