When reviewing messages dating back to 2003, about how some riders spoked their wheels, I noticed that a few messages talked about having dual spoke-cross patterns on their back wheel. In other words, if they had 2X lacing on the left side of the rear wheel ... then a few riders would have 3X lacing on the right (drive) side of the rear wheel. Or is it 3X on left ... and 2X on right?

Anyway, although those messages from 2003 talked about dual lacing, it was not made clear on why they had dual lacing on the rear wheel. It was not made clear if this is only done if you are racing your bike at speeds above 20 MPH ... or whether dual lacing is done regardless of your riding style.

For simplicity, let's assume that there is a 10-speed cassette on the rear wheel. Can anyone shed light on dual lacing of rear spokes, and is this commonly done when having your wheels built for you?

Differential crossing/lacing between the drive and non-drive side, is that what you are asking about?

Doesn't matter in the front because there is symmetry with no cassette. Lace both sides the same.

On the rear, room taken up by the cassette causes the drive side (cassette side) spokes to be much more vertical and at a much higher tension. Off-center rear rims and differential lacing patterns are meant to even out this major weak link. I'm not a wheelbuilder...so I'll stop there. But you'll see a variety of approaches to the rear wheel.

I rarely see a 3x/2x pattern (and when I did, it looked fugly) but many people radial lace their non-drive (left) side for lighter weight, some radial lace the drive (right) side for a more even tension, and I've seen a few wheels with less spokes on the non-drive side. I always wanted to play around with that idea, say 16 spokes 3x on the drive side with only 8 spokes radial on the non-drive side, which would give you an interesting pattern with groups of 3 spokes at the rim.

Anyway, depending on the pattern the reasons for it could be to even out spoke tension, to increase strength, or to reduce weight.

I love the look of radial lacing, but the rear wheel needs some rotational stiffness between the hub and rim, which radial lacing does not provide, so you need a cross pattern (or something) on one side or the other, most often the drive side.

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I don't know if you "roll your own" or have your manservant do such things for you, but either way, take a look at Robert Torre's fine site for some explanations and some very interesting ideas on Strong Rear-Wheel Lacing. I've built some of his Crow's Foot ideas and they've worked out very well; I'll dig out some pics if you're interested.

- Wil

Yeah, half as many spokes on non-drive side, radial is a great piece of engineering to even out the tension.

The only other pattern that makes any sense from a durability issue is radial drive-side, elbows out. This will make the left-right tension a little closer to even. You need a decent hub body diameter (modern hubs 2cm or more) to make sure the torque is applied efficiently to the non-drive side without fatigue on the drive side's radial spokes.

Other than these two patterns, there's no value in mixing lacing, IMO. If you go radial non-drive, you really screw up how even your tension is.

Those sites are definately worth reading. It's just too easy to "get it wrong" otherwise. Half truths and only partial imformation can confuse more than enlighten, good suggestion, Thanks !

Great links, Wil. That half crow's foot design sounds really interesting. I've got a few hubs and rims waiting around to get built up. I've purchased 36-hole rears because I'm well over two bills, but hadn't researched it much more than that. I'd be curious to see a picture.

…take care what you wish for

Here are some pics:

(1) front 32h laced Half Crow's Foot (with 2x length spokes)
(2) front 36h laced Half Crow's Foot (with 3x length spokes)
(3) rear 32h laced Half Crow's Foot (with 2x length spokes on the Drive-Side, and 2x on the Non-Drive side
(4) different view of (3)
(5) & (6) (for urbanknight) a couple of pics of a 32h rear laced 2x on the ND and 3x on the D side

The neat thing about Robert Torre's method is that he's describes a way of using Crow's Foot lacing on 32 hole hubs/rims, whereas normally it can only be done on hubs where the hole numbers are divisible by 6. I've lots of 32 hole rear hubs, but the 36 hole versions are getting to be like hens-teeth.

I hope this helps; perhaps it will inspire you to "roll your own"

- Wil

I laced a 28h rim 3x drive, 2x non-drive. The tension did even up more than just doing equal crosses on both sides. And the wheel was stiff.

I've built many wheels in the past 40+ years, but only recently got into experimenting with Crow's Foot and Half Crow's Foot lacing, and all of them (so far) have been about the easiest wheels I've ever built. They were easy to lace, and the truing was a cinch. The rear 32 hole Half Crow's Foot (pics 3 & 4 above) didn't need adjusting for dish, it just came up spot on; it took less than an hour to build from scratch (including the truing).

FWIW -

- Wil

Sheldon's recommendation is to go radial NDS. This shortens the spoke length and increases effective tension. If you lace it spokes in you effectively shorten the spoke just a little more.

That's pretty much what I was thinking, except I'd obviously be using a standard rim with 1/4 of the holes skipped, so the spokes wouldn't be as close to each other as that one. Either way, the idea is obviously not mine alone.

Yep, still looks fugly to me. The first time I saw a wheel like that I thought it had been in a wreck, but then realized the rim was still straight. But if it works, it works.

I always thought it was better to do radial non-drive to increase the spoke tension and balance out the rim. The link posted above just says "radial is much stronger laterally" but doesn't give any logic or reason to that claim, so I'm a little wary.

Wheels I'll be building soon will be thicker spokes on the drive side (2.0/1.8) with thinner non drive and front wheel (1.8/1.6) but 32 hole 3x all around. Also a off-center rear aerohead, I think this will make a very strong light wheelset. DT swiss calculates it around 1640 grams with brass nipples for what I feel will be a much stronger wheelset than any factory set for the same price range.

Yeah, I guess I remember reading that. I wonder if Sheldon might chime in here.

As I see it, radial NDS will give the spokes a steeper approach angle, so they will be lower tension for the same reason that radial DS is lower tension. Spokes-in will help give them a shallower angle again, but depending on flange size, 3x would still usually yield a shallower approach angle. Maybe I need to play with more to-scale sketches.

Of course, I've never taken a tensiometer to a wheel laced either way to see what the actual results are -- but I'm sure Sheldon has.