Yes, regarding the steel version 1.27mm works out to 18 gauge which is much smaller than most anything you're going to find these days. 16 gauge is I think the smallest butted dia available at this point.

And it looks like mine is also the alu version. I might throw a tire on and ride it once on a track just to see what it feels like 😬

I have to imagine that if Dyneema and advanced adhesives had been more available in his day, Harlan would have gotten around to making a wheel with those.

Aluminum spokes never seemed like a great idea, but at least the "siamese spoke" avoids the issue of having to form a head at the end. OTOH, the threads at the end seem like they would be stress risers and prone to failure.

I suppose the biggest question is whether there is enough redundancy in that wheel to reliably survive a broken spoke pair.

In retrospect, I'm amazed that Harlan didn't require his customers to sign waivers in order to buy some of his products! I heard Larry Black tell a few stories about Harlan at one of the CR events, and Larry was clearly not impressed by how Harlan pushed the limits.

Steve in Peoria

I may have already mentioned that one guy I knew who rode Hi-E wheels was pretty heavy. He never had problems with them until he t-boned a car. Maybe they would have cracked later in life, I wonder if anyone has seen that with those rims

I think it makes sense to market questionably lightweight products as special racing equipment, rather than as regular consumer goods. It's all fun stuff from an engineering standpoint, but God, the liability...

I read somewhere that Charlie Cunningham, of early mtb fame, liked hi-e components because he preferred parts to break rather than be "too heavy," which is an interesting philosophy at least!

Kind of surprising. Charlie made machines to put the WTB components through thousands of stress cycles to test their durability.
Brent

I love it! Very nice! What serial #? I am restoring #11.

I think he had a good sense for the difference between tinkery one-off items for friends on the one hand, and production bikes on the other. His personal preferences can be seen on his meticulously whittled weight weenie builds.

Vintage mtb Workshop did a cool series of instructional posts on how to modify hi-e hubs like WTB did so that you can remove the bearings without disassembling the hub body:

https://www.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=2292959090790929&id=100069150756252

Example of Charlie being careful about products for consumers:
His own bike and Jacquie's had a toggle brake of his design, that he knew was unsafe for Joe Sixpack because if not adjusted almost constantly, after a little pad wear they could go "over-center", after which you had no brake at all. Thus the birth of the roller-cam, which got most of the advantage of his toggle brakes but without the danger.

Another maker of crazy-expensive aftermarket MTB parts (OK it was McMahon) actually sold toggle brakes to consumers. I was in the shop the day the McMahon rep came by with his own personal MTB that was so equipped. I asked him how do you prevent the brake from going over-center and he asked me what I meant, this was a new concept for him. I gave his brake lever one strong squeeze and POP! — over it went, zero front brake. I think his face went white. McMahon stopped selling those brakes shortly thereafter, hopefully before anyone was injured. I'd like to think I had some small part in averting someone else's dental reconstruction.

It was wavering between 418 and 419g for the aluminum Siamese spoke model

Saw and marveled at those wheels at the New York Bike Show when I visited Harlan Meyer's booth.

In case anyone missed what makes these wheels unusual, other than the high spoke count: there are actually half as many spokes in the wheel as you'd think from a cursory glance. The (very long) spokes, which were threaded at both ends, were inserted into the hub to the spoke's midway point and then bent to reach two spoke holes on opposite sides of the rim.

I'm not an engineer, so the reasoning behind the design is not obvious to me. Any guesses? Vague memory of being told at the Hi-E booth that the point was to enable the use of aluminum spokes for reducing wheel weight, but that might be a false memory. An easy test would be to check whether or not those spokes are magnetic, of course.

I picked up this wheel thinking the concave rim might be salvaged. However it looks like it might be just more scrap aluminum. The wheel has a date with the spoke wrench and will soon be four components, rim, spokes, freewheel, and hub. If it becomes parts the hub and FW will be in the pay it forward thread. Smiles, MH

The wheel and it looks like it took a pretty good ding about the 2 O'clock position

The hub looks to be what is being discussed here.

The bad section of the rim, note the chatter marks.

Remember to remove the freewheel before unlacing the wheel or cutting the spokes!
I know you (@Mad Honk) know that already, but it can't be repeated too often!

Off we go to the pay it forward thread! The rim had a hop from a dent and so the rim and spokes are on the way to the scrapyard. Hub and free wheel pics:

Hub and FW seems to have cleaned up nicely.

Freewheel looks like Suntour five speed.

Non drive side.
Smiles, MH

Thanks for the reminder! I have destroyed probably ten Campy record hubshells to remove FW's that had the spokes cut to get the hub. The good part is the axles, cones and races were saved. But too many mechanics take the quick but bad method of just cutting the hub out with the FW still on. BTW; the FW was pretty tight, I had to use a cheater bar to break it free. Smiles, MH

Impressively light! Though also was over compensated in the excess build time, fussy lacing and bending yada comparative to the conventional race wheels of the times. Still got to give credit for what he accomplished.

For grins the other day weighed a. 700c tubular Nisi Sludi 290 Moncalier laced 32 spoke 3 cross using 'non butted GALVANIZED' spokes, brass nips, Galli competition hub (not the Maillard produced), 652 gram total (but less skewer). Could go lighter with other spokes but its a routine quick and easy build. Reliable too.

I’m restoring a hi-e Cosmopolitan bike and it would properly be equipped with hi-e pedals. Let me know if you still have and might be willing to part with them.

While I am a real sucker for HiE + tubulars, I already have a pair, have more tubular wheel sets then I can currently use, and need to downsize myself, I will recommend that another member take advantage of your kind and generous offer.

Mad Honk you are the best!

Restoring a Cosmopolitan, have the main stuff covered, but if any current users of this forum want to part with a pair of Hi-E pedals, water bottle, or possibly a The Seat (though this would not be period correct), ping me back. Thanks!

3xLittle500 For a saddle, believe Hi-e offered a replacement rail frame in aluminum for the Cool Gear / The Seat. Near impossible to find but if one scored a Cool Gear, the rails (1 piece) are easy to remove and reinstall. Perhaps one could pattern the original but in aluminum tubing.

There were 2 versions of the Cool Gear/ Hi-E seat, one complete plastic, and one with some localized padding. Guessing they are rare because the plastic on every one has shattered over time.

Still have the pedals? I’d like to get a pair if you’d like to part with them.

I have this vague memory that they were called something like Road and Track. anyone remember?

This one, that was on my Graftek (that I sold), might have started out as a Road but had the padding and top pulled off? No memory of that. Maybe it started as a Track. Anyway here are some pics:




BTW that Graftek had Hi-E wheels including Siamese spokes and the crazy-light Hi-E hubs + rims, plus Hi-E pedals and a Hi-E water bottle cage.

I sold it to a framebuilder in Nederland who apparently was very interested in '70s Americana.

The Graftek was another super innovative bike from the 70s, Raced by Howard, Stetinas, Doughty, Kingsbury, and many others at the top level in the US. I don’t know of any earlier graphite/ carbon fiber bike that predates it. There were problems with the steel lugs that were glued to the graphite tubes if memory serves. I had thought they were all collected back by Exxon and destroyed for liability reasons, but I must be confusing that with other experimental products of the day. Hope the new owner treasures it.

Perhaps the author of the article that you remember reading was being sarcastic. I worked for Charlie as an apprentice in 83/84 and this statement is not true. His philosophy was more to make parts as light as possible until they broke, then make improvements so that they would not break while still trying to keep them as light as possible without breaking.

Happy to have the record set straight! I run a website on the history of titanium bicycle development but I would be interested in doing a section on aluminum if you'd be open to an interview!