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Join Date: Feb 2012
Location: Rochester, NY
Posts: 18,092
Bikes: Stewart S&S coupled sport tourer, Stewart Sunday light, Stewart Commuting, Stewart Touring, Co Motion Tandem, Stewart 3-Spd, Stewart Track, Fuji Finest, Mongoose Tomac ATB, GT Bravado ATB, JCP Folder, Stewart 650B ATB
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Another aspect that's needed in a spoke is the ability to replace them and service the results in places other then first world big cities. Any spoke material can and will fail for some reason or another, fatigue/impact/exposure/vandalism/corrosion the list is long out in the real world. So a wheel using spokes that are rare or unique will be worthless in time in many locals around the rest of the world. The ability to take a steel spoke and cut and thread it to fit in less then 1 minute does wonders for a shop's inventory management. The ability to take a spoke out of one wheel and install in another wheel (given suitable lengths) is what many third world "service departments" rely on.
To discuss spoke materials without the rest of the real world and business issues is academic at best.
There's a reason that the common mouse trap is still what it is. Andy.