Wheel Building
07-15-23 | 08:23 PM
#51
Klaatu..Verata..Necktie?
Joined: May 2007
Posts: 23,678
Likes: 17,149
From: SF Bay Area
Bikes: Litespeed Ultimate, Ultegra; Canyon Endurace, 105; Battaglin MAX, Chorus; Bianchi 928 Veloce; Ritchey Road Logic, Dura Ace; Cannondale R500 RX100; Schwinn Circuit, Sante; Lotus Supreme, Dura Ace
No. The proper tools aren't "essential." Like I said, it's possible to true wheels using the bike frame. Just like it's possible to remove a Phillips screw with a flathead. The proper tools aren't "essential." But they do make life easier. Isn't that why one would use the correct tool for a job, when another might suffice?
OTOH, I suppose that if you cobble your tools together rather than buying them, you can blame your own shoddy work on lousy tools. It'll still be your own fault, though.
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"Don't take life so serious-it ain't nohow permanent."
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"Everybody's gotta be somewhere." - Eccles
07-15-23 | 10:01 PM
#52
Senior Member
Joined: Oct 2020
Posts: 1,507
Likes: 1,176
From: Phoenix, AZ
Bikes: 1964(?) Frejus Tour de France, 1967(?) Dawes Double Blue, 1979 Trek 710, 1982 Claud Butler Dalesman, 1983 Schwinn Paramount Elite, 1984 Miyata 1000, 2014 Brompton, maybe a couple more
On whether truing stands are necessary:
I built my first two wheels last year because I had a 1983 Paramount that the original owner had rebuilt with crappy blade spokes that kept breaking. I wanted to keep the nice Campy hubs and Mavic rims, but the local bike shops did not want to deal with rebuilding two forty year old wheels.
The rebuild was theoretically easy because I had the spoke length and lacing pattern already established. I did the front wheel first. I built it at home without even spinning it in the fork, and it came out straight and round on the first try.
I figured, wow, this is easy. Then I did the back wheel. As I tried to get it dished properly it was looking more and more like a 7th grade science experiment with a gyroscope that is slowing down. I took it into the co-op and got it straightened out pretty quickly with a tension gauge and a truing stand that had calipers. I probably could have got it straightened out by spinning it on the bike and plucking the spokes, but it might have taken a very long while.
I'm very happy with the wheels, and I never miss chance to say "yeah, I rebuilt those wheels myself."
The moral of the story is to go to your local co-op. Buying tools you might only use once is sort of fun, and I do it fairly often, but it is not necessarily good advice or economically rational (unless maybe you are living out in the sticks and you are the local equivalent of the co-op).
I built my first two wheels last year because I had a 1983 Paramount that the original owner had rebuilt with crappy blade spokes that kept breaking. I wanted to keep the nice Campy hubs and Mavic rims, but the local bike shops did not want to deal with rebuilding two forty year old wheels.
The rebuild was theoretically easy because I had the spoke length and lacing pattern already established. I did the front wheel first. I built it at home without even spinning it in the fork, and it came out straight and round on the first try.
I figured, wow, this is easy. Then I did the back wheel. As I tried to get it dished properly it was looking more and more like a 7th grade science experiment with a gyroscope that is slowing down. I took it into the co-op and got it straightened out pretty quickly with a tension gauge and a truing stand that had calipers. I probably could have got it straightened out by spinning it on the bike and plucking the spokes, but it might have taken a very long while.
I'm very happy with the wheels, and I never miss chance to say "yeah, I rebuilt those wheels myself."
The moral of the story is to go to your local co-op. Buying tools you might only use once is sort of fun, and I do it fairly often, but it is not necessarily good advice or economically rational (unless maybe you are living out in the sticks and you are the local equivalent of the co-op).
