Originally Posted by tomn
Buy the way, I bought it because I got such a deal that I couldn't pass it up. I thought that it wouldn't be such a trick to spread each dropout 5mm. It's only 5mm after all. Boy was I wrong!
Yeh, I'd never drop 5 bills on a hub either. Or even a hubset.
Maybe you should try cold-setting that frame with some 2x4s so you don't blow a hernia or lose a finger the next time you pull the wheel out.
Size always matters.
Originally Posted by Peterpan1
Ok so having hashed out the non-question stuff, is there anyone out there who can answer the question?
You have not stated your question clearly, thus the answers you receive are unsatisfactory.
If you ask a wheelbuilding question (in the touring forum, instead of more appropriate and effective mechanics forum), and state you have a dishless wheel, then naturally anyone who's built a few rear wheels is going to be curious how you accomplished this somewhat incredible feat - since this is the most elusive goal of every rear wheelbuilding effort.
At least you now understand dish as applied to building wheels - my ms paint skills were not wasted!
The only builder I know of who uses different spoke gauges is dave at speeddream. I don't really buy his theory supporting this practice. I think its mostly a line he uses to get people to buy $$$ wheelsets. Everybody needs a gimmick is business, that seems to be his.
Why don't you post your question in the bike mechanics forum with Sheldon in the title. He is a regular contributor to that forum and has experience with unusual bike topics. A large section of his website is devoted to wheelbuilding. Calvin at Park is also extremely helpful and knowledgeable and also offers sound advice.
Or, you could save some time and frustration and just get some wheelsmith db spokes and build the wheel. I think i could have built one in the time its taken me to answer your posts. Maybe not, i'm slow and particular.
Millions of front disc wheels have been successfully built and run without imploying some obscure mixed gauge spoke strategy. Yours most likely will too provided you get the spoke tension somewhere between 70 and 130 kgf. In other words, make em kinda tight. If you start rounding off nips they're too tight.
If you want to do this right and have a high tolerance for mind-numbing arduous tasks, get a park tensiometer and you can achieve uniform spoke tensions to a target +/- 5%.
Bottom line - a front disc wheel builds nearly the same as a front non disc wheel, and these are not hard to build up well using inexpensive standard parts.