Originally Posted by
Kontact
Which is a very mild, barely magnetic steel. You can do the same job with piano wire half the gauge.
Ahh, but wouldn't the thinner wire be much more elastic, requiring higher spoke count to achieve same wheel stiffness and side-loading limits?
They can get some stiffnes back by doing away with the J-bend, and I wonder if today's 1.5mm spokes are processed/worked to much higher tensile load capacity than the thicker ones? I recall that HED instructed me to use 150kg with the 1.5mm spokes (I encountered nipple-seating issues a bit short of that level of tension iir).