Re: [CR]Re: Wheel Building

(Example: Bike Shops:R.E.W. Reynolds)

Date: Thu, 17 Feb 2005 08:48:53 -0600
From: "John Thompson" <JohnThompson@new.rr.com>
Organization: The Crimson Permanent Assurance
To: classicrendezvous@bikelist.org
Subject: Re: [CR]Re: Wheel Building
References: <20050217123024.787.qmail@web81009.mail.yahoo.com>
In-Reply-To: <20050217123024.787.qmail@web81009.mail.yahoo.com>


Jerome & Elizabeth Moos wrote:
> The debates about how to lace a wheel, remind me of the "Big Endian"
> and "Little Endian" schism in Guliver's Travels, wherein simple
> personal preference is raised to the level of theology. I built my
> first wheels following the procedures set out in Jobst Brandt's The
> Bicycle Wheel, and have continued to do so because it works just
> fine. But Bob Lickton, who scoffs at Brandt, built me a very fine
> set on wheels with the rear wheel spoke heads on the "wrong" side of
> the flange according to Brandt. Lots of variations work fine as long
> as the spokes are correctly tensioned. Different strokes for
> different folks.

There's a lot of religion in wheel building, and I agree that there are many ways to build perfectly serviceable wheels.

I actually still have the very first set of wheels I built, way back in 1978 -- Campy Tipo SF hubs with Weinmann "concave" rims. They've needed nothing more than a little tweak every now and then; never broken a spoke or anything... but I did "goof" and cross the spokes over the valve stem on the front wheel. Never felt compelled to fix it, though.

--

-John Thompson (john@os2.dhs.org)
Appleton WI USA