Originally Posted by
FBinNY
As I and others have said, tension can be used to match the spoke tensions within a wheel, and can be a useful and fast method for doing do.
But pitch cannot reliably be used for absolute tension. Not only are there too many combinations of free span and gauges to make a meaningful chart, but there is also a decently wide spectrum of desired tensions for various wheels. That means that there are 2 sliding variables; free length and target pitch; so establishing the database would be one hell of a chore.
Then when you were finished, it would be totally useless since only a small percentage of people have perfect pitch and can identify or reproduce a pitch without a pitch pipe or piano.
Yes, I envision the use of either a musical instrument for pitch reference, or something like an electronic guitar tuner. But yes, I see now it would be a pointless task trying to create an absolute reference or formula for any given wheel, probably the best would be anecdotal lists, like "I built a wheel out of these rims, nipples, spokes, and hubs, with this lacing pattern, and achieved drive side tension of such and such numbers, which resulted in a drive side range of A440-C, and NDS range of D-flat to E-flat. Then if somebody wanted to build the same wheel, they could maybe do it all by pitch, with no tensiometer