Thanks, Jerry, I did indeed mean Nuovo Tipo hubs rather than just an Italian word.
I also was not precise in characterizing the drillings as "unique," haveing been aware of the British use of 32/40 on bikes. However as someone who uses old wheels and is prepared to build replacement old wheels, I haven't seen many wheels at all listed that have this configuration, never seen a 32/40 high-end hubset on Ebay, and the majority of vintage sew-up rim pairs I've seen on offer have been 32/32 or 36/36. Maybe I just play with Italians more than Brits, but that's been my experience.
I do also appreciate the engineering values that would lead one to choose a 32/40 design for one's bike. But that wasn't the basis of my comment.
Mind you all, I'm not stating what is out there or what is better, merely what I am aware of, a subset of what exists.
I should have said their application is unusual, rather than unique. I can get flamed for that, too, I guess.
However, a few people were clearly very interested!
Ken Freeman
Sheldon is, strictly speaking, correct of course, but most bike collectors understand that "Tipo hubs" means Campagnolo Nuovo Tipo, grammatically correct or not. In fact "Tipo" is clearer than "Record", which can be used to mean pre-1967 Record, Nuovo Record, Super Record, C-Record or even the latest carbon fibre stuff.
I agree it was sad the Brits gave up their hub standards, but was equally sad the French gave up their metric thread standards at a time when the world had supposedly been moving toward universal adoption of metric standards for several decades already. It seems marketing trumps technical logic every time.
Regards,
Jerry Moos, Big Spring, TX
Sheldon Brown <CaptBike@sheldonbrown.com> wrote:
Quoth Ken Freeman:
>First, I don't see too many high-flange sets that are not Tipo.
"Tipo" means "type" or "model." It is not a specific model
designation. You're probably referring to "Nuovo Tipo": "new type."
>the drilling combination is unique.
No, it is far from unique.
32/40 was the standard spoking for British bikes for many decades, ending in the late '60s.
It was actually quite a bit superior to the 36/36 setup used by the rest of the world. The only downside was that people had to deal with two rim drillings.
The resulting wheel pairs weighed exactly the same as 36/36, but they were stronger in practice. (Nobody ever has problems with front wheels, and the extra 4 spokes in back make for a noticeably stronger wheel.)
Generally these even used the same spoke lengths front and rear, because they would be laced cross 4 in back, cross 3 in front.
It was a sad day when the British industry gave up on their superior setup.
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