Originally Posted by
FBinNY
It's always nice to have people who can't do something well and efficiently tell those who can that's impossible.
Good wheels have been built reliably for a century without the "precision" measurements some here insist are necessary. Even tension is achieved through good practice and methodology rather than the "measure and correct" method some advocate.
In any case, there's the question of cost. Measure and correct might be OK for a home mechanic, but isn't practical or cost effective for a commercial operation. In order to keep hand built wheel labor reasonable, wheel has to be built, start to finish in under half an hour. Otherwise (do the math) it would be unaffordable. So skilled builders rely on methods that don't require the type of work and rework that the measure and correct folks need.
Measuring for quality control is good practice, but the goal is that the vast bulk of the output passes. That requires a method that consistently produces work that's right well before it gets to the inspection station.
I am caught here. I have built quite a few wheels over the past decade-plus, and trued quite a few. I have a wishlist at the moment that includes a Park centring tool and a tension gauge.
The centring tool is a given, but the tension gauge? I am now not so sure.
I have got by all this time by tensioning the spokes by feel and then by plucking them to determine that pitch is fairly close right around one side of the wheel (or both on the front). I started out building just on the bikes, then went to a cheap wheelstand, and now have one that includes dials.
My wheels have done extremely well -- I have had to adjust only two, one on a MTB, in that period when the distances they have covered number in the tens of thousands of miles.
I am thinking I will go ahead and get the tension gauge anyway, because I like the geek and validation factor as much as anything.