branko_76 

I need to build a dedicated set of touring wheels and would like some guidance selecting the component types (not brands). These will be used for light touring, i.e. one or two day trips with panniers containing enough food and water, camera, notebook and change of clothes, say around 30 lbs and I'm 170.

The frame is a 1985 ROSS Signature 23" with Ishiwata Triple Butted tubes, the wheels will be 700C x ????

Which of the following would be appropriate?

Hubs.............high or low flange
Hub Type......freewheel or cassette (in terms of durability)
Crossing............3x or 4x
Spokes..........butted or plain, thickness
Rims..................width
Tires..................width

Salamandrine 

Hubs.............high or low flange

Whatever looks cooler to you.

Hub Type......freewheel or cassette (in terms of durability)

I'd lean cassette. Broken axles are no fun. Old freewheel Phil hubs are good too though.

Crossing............3x or 4x

I like 4x in back and 3x in front, but that's just me. More importantly, 36 of them.

Spokes..........butted or plain, thickness

Butted, no question. 14/15/14 is good.

Rims..................width
Tires..................width

Depends on where you're riding. 700x32 is still a good choice for general road use. You can go a bit fatter if you think you might be riding some dirt, or just prefer the ride. If you can be reasonably light on the bike, I've always found that super heavy duty wheels are not required, though I would go for a full retro spoke count for durability. For rims, consider something in the medium range like a TB14 rim.

branko_76 

Thanks. Yes, 36 H each. The TB14's look like some nice rims...

https://www.benscycle.com/h-plus-son...14_724/product

branko_76 

One other option I have available is a set of SUZUE hubs with solid axles, they were probably from a BMX bike. Would they be less likely to break than a hollow axle?

scarlson 

Doesn't matter, although you'll probably have this decision made for you depending on brand of hub you go with.
Cassette 110%. Broken axles are a real concern, even with unloaded bikes. Solid axles can bend (still annoying) if they don't break. Also, if you break any spokes, it's really hard to get a freewheel off on the side of the road. I like Shimano mountain bike hubs. They are reliable and durable, and you can find parts easily. Harder to find these days without disc brake mounts though, but you can always use a disc hub (especially a centerlock one) without any disc. And I'd strongly consider a dynamo hub in front. They are cheap especially on Ebay from Europe, and if you're making a set of wheels, not that much extra money to add in.
I tend to think this doesn't matter. As the spoke count gets higher, you may want to increase the cross, and as the flange gets bigger, you may want to decrease.
I have strong feelings about this. I prefer triple butted, 13-15-14. Like Sapim Force or DT Alpine III. This is because (in the words of Sheldon Brown) since spokes use rolled, not cut threads, the outside diameter of the threads is larger than the base diameter of the spoke wire. Since the holes in the hub flanges must be large enough for the threads to fit through, the holes, in turn, are larger than the wire requires. This is undesirable, because a tight match between the spoke diameter at the elbow and the diameter of the flange hole is crucial to resisting fatigue-related breakage.
It's not much extra cost, in terms of money or weight, but the benefits are real. You can get Sapim Force spokes in any length you want from Yojimbo's Garage in Chicago.
Doesn't matter much, but I'd go with a rim that has double eyelets, like the Mavic A319 or A719, or the Rigida Sputnik, or the H+Son tb14.
The biggest you can fit in the frame, of course! Panaracer Gravelkings or Compass/Herse. You going to use fenders?

branko_76 

Awesome, thank you !

Salamandrine 

The short answer is no. Early MTB's had solid axles in the belief that they were stronger, but this turned out not to be true. At least that was the thinking back then.

Phil Wood FW hubs have big fat axles that simply don't break. Completely different than a traditional threaded axle. That's the only FW hub I'd recommend. Of course BITD people toured on normal hubs all the time, and dealt with it.

The trick for FW hubs was to take a freewheel tool with you. 36 spoke generally allowed you to ride to the next town even with a broken spoke, where you could borrow a wrench from a garage or bike shop etc. If you go cassette you should take a cassette cracker too. Frankly for weekend tours you can pretty much just risk it with no tool. Spokes have gotten more reliable.

branko_76 

Yes, fenders for sure.

scarlson 

Based on the google images, I bet you could fit 35s with fenders, 38s without. Of course you'd need centerpull brakes. This thing doesn't have cantis, if I have the right bike in google images, so you'd need centerpulls or some grotesque giant Tektro dual pivot sidepull to clear fat tires like that and fenders. Biggest you could fit with traditional pretty looking sidepull brakes is probably 32s.

Have you thought about a 650b conversion?

branko_76 

I was wondering about brakes as well, I do have some NOS Dia-Compe center-pull calipers.

650b......I have no idea what that is. When shopping for tires, I see a myriad of sizes that I am unfamiliar with. I have only used 27" and 700c.

Saguaro

+1

Here is a photo of my 2012 Phil Wood Touring Hub with a Suntour 7 speed freewheel loosely threaded on. You can see how substantial the axle is. Probably overkill for the OP’s application, and anything other than heavily loaded touring bikes and tandems but this set up is stout!

The Phil Wood hubs were laced to Velocity Dyad rims. These are great lightweight and robust touring rims.

branko_76 

That Phil hub is pretty awesome. I guess the exposed axle on the non drive side allows spokes on either side of the hub to be of equal length. What's the width of the shell?

Saguaro

Yes, this hub is designed to have minimal dish, producing a stronger wheel, hence the exposed axle on the non-drive side.

The shell width is 52.5 mm. This one is 40 hole. I believe the freewheel versions have been discontinued, cassette only available now.

L134 

For your intended use I think you are over-thinking the whole thing. Probably most anything will be fine. If you like over-thinking bikes (I do), I would agree with most already said except I wouldn’t bother with butted spokes as they are considerably more expensive and straight gauge (I use 14’s) will be perfectly adequate on a reasonably well built wheel regardless of what all the science/math/etc says. In the real world, straight gauge work just fine. I think the last time I broke a spoke was on the very first rear wheel I built over 40 years ago - probably not reasonably well built. I’m your weight and by no means an ultra light packer. I’ve used butted spokes once, maybe twice, and then thought why am I doing this? The bike shop I get my spokes at confirmed my realization that butted spokes are expensive overkill, not that we are talking big $ but I am an accountant.

branko_76 

I agree that I may be overthinking it, but by doing so, I usually learn something new. I appreciate all of the input.

For this build, I will try to use what I have on hand but if I ever decide to build a serious touring bike, the information in this thread will be extremely helpful.

bikemig 

I'd do a 650b conversion on that bike for a touring build. That way you should be able to run a 38c tire. Also I'd spread that rear triangle to 130 (or 128 if you prefer) and run 3 x 8, 9, or 10 (whichever floats your boat). If you run a 46/36/24 up front (steel inner ring is good for the 24 tooth) (this was pretty common on MTBs BITD) and an 11-32 in the rear, you will have a lot of good gears for a touring bike.

This has some good guidelines if thinking about a 650 conversion.

https://www.bikeman.com/bikeman-blog...sion-guidlines

L134 

I understand completely. I hope my comment didn’t come across as being dismissive. It was meant for perspective.

Road Fan

I agree with checking out this stuff, but even more, figure out how you plan to shift and how much you plan to shift. 2x7 can be done with 126 mm freewheel with minimum risk of axle breakage (I honestly never heard of it until getting on-line 20 yrears ago!). 3x5 can be an excellent friction touring system with 120 mm or 126 mm hubs. If you mean for indexing, best to see about 8 through 11 speed cassettes in the rear, which requires 130 mm wide hubs, and a frame cold-set. I have a 2x10 Shimano setup with friction shifting and downtube shifters. After 45 years of friction shifting I can operate it very accurately, but I'm also finally getting tired of it. But it is a strong option for you and can be implemented with relatively cheap used gear. For 10 speed rear indexing I'd go to Campagnolo, which IMO is only $$ if you buy new with your eyes closed.

But these different modes all affect the frame, and hence the wheels.