4: Expect to spend a lot more time than you think putting the wheel together, and roughly forever getting it round, trued, and tensioned. Go slowly, get used to turning each nipple 1/4 turn at a time, and you'll be OK. Patience, and enjoy the process.

I spent two afternoons building and truing my first wheel. That was with experience truing wheels and under the tutelage of a master mechanic. That was also 35 years ago... wheel building is addictive: once you build a good one, you want to build another one, and another, and another... eventually you'll mortgage your house and your cat to buy more spokes and hubs and and and

Sorry, I haven't built a wheel in a while. I'm getting twitchy.