Originally Posted by bobbotron
My girlfriend is shopping for a touring bike. She's looking at getting a 42 cm surley with 26" wheels. We were talking about rims, and we realized that neither of us know much about 26" rims. I've found a list of ATB touring rims on
Peter White's site, I thought I'd ask here for input. She's planning on doing loaded touring, weighs around 120 lbs and will generally be riding them on the road. We're thinking of getting a set built up with double butted spokes and XT hubs. Not sure about whether to go with 32 or 36 spokes.
For someone small, even with a load, the demands on a wheel are much less than for, say, a 200 lb man. 26" wheels are also inherently stronger than 700C wheels because of their decreased diameter. For touring, you could probably use a 32 spoke 26" wheel without issues for that 200lb man. However, 4 spokes don't weigh that much so if you can do them in 36, you'd have a little cushion of safety.
I'd probably go with an XT hub and an X517 rim and never worry about my wheels again. The wheels will probably outlast the bike
