Ron Ruff provided me with an excellent set of photos detailing the build of the rear wheel. I’ll be putting together a description of each photo as I understand them, but here are the photos. As with all other pages, click on the photo for a full sized version. My color commentary as usual, but Ron’s explanations are in script.

The first picture is of all components assembled for build. It is also interesting in that it is proof that Ron is in New Mexico. Not that you can’t look back at the last page, but the components are:

• White Industries H2 front hub (silver)
• White Industries H1 rear hub (silver)
• Sapim C-Xray spokes (black)
• Niobium 30 Rims (black)

We ended up with the WI H1 rear hub since that’s what WI sent Ron. The H2 is also 25-ish grams heavier, so I decided not to wait.

A spherical burr is used to lightly chamfer the inside edge of the nipple seats.

Ohh – Alloy spoke nipples (“tangerine” color) that should match the color of the King headset and the highlight colors of the frame. Sure, this might be dorky and match too much, but I think it’s a nice touch. This was something Ron noticed about the coloring of the bike and asked me if I wanted. To me, it will just say in a subtle way (not like getting Mango colored Chris King hubs which would have been overkill) – again, a subtle way that these wheels belong to this bike.

And of course the Sapim CX-ray spokes. You can see that they are bladed, but minimally so. Not a wide blade like other aero spokes, but this is why they are still light.

Nipples and threads are coated with a marine anti-seize compound. I also apply this to the nipple seat in the rim using a little brush.

A bent spoke with a nipple turned backward and forced past the threads, is used as the nipple insertion tool. Jeremy Parfitt of Alchemy Cycle Works turned me on to this. Also note the anti-seize on the nipple threads.

Here is a photo of the non-drive side of the rear hub with the spokes in.

Parts of the hub are covered with electrical tape to prevent scratches when the spokes are inserted. On this hub it is best to do the NDS first because the spokes on that side are more difficult to insert due to the smaller flange.

This is either really out of true, or not tensioned. Here, Ron has finished lacing the wheel and it’s ready for tensioning and then truing.

When the wheel is partially tensioned, then the spokes are formed at the hub, the cross, and the rim, and a punch is used to ensure that the spoke heads are firmly seated in the hub. All of this is done to minimize residual bending loads that could cause the spokes to fatigue. When a little higher tension is achieved I use a rubber mallet to align the outside spokes at the hub.

(A punch is used to ensure that the spoke heads are firmly seated in the hub.)

(When a little higher tension is achieved I use a rubber mallet to align the outside spokes at the hub.)

Once the spokes are up to final tension and reasonably true, the wheel is stress relieved using two different methods. Both involve increasing the tension in the spokes substantially so that they achieve their final form. At first the spokes will lose a lot of tension when I do this, but by the end of the build it will have no effect. This is how I know that stress relief has been achieved.

Tension is measured and balanced all around the wheel. From the beginning I worry mostly about keeping the rim radially true. All rims are out of round to some degree and it is important to not compound this issue. On a deep rim like this one it is especially important since it takes a large tension change to effect the radial true. Ideally, you want the tension about as high as the rim can bear, but more importantly you want the tension to be as even as possible. It takes many rounds of tensioning, measuring, and stress relieving to achieve this. Final tension on this wheel was DS: 115kg +-6kg, and NDS: 50kg +-2kg. The radial variation was ~.012in (.30mm) and the lateral <.005in (.12mm). All of these are good, but the radial was close to the acceptable range (.015in). Improving that would have required too large of a DS tension variation.

When it’s finished I check the weight. This was a little lower than expected based on the first estimate (826g vs 829g), which is good. The rims in particular vary quite a bit, so it is hard to tell what they will weigh until I receive them.

There is also a cleaning step (not shown). The anti-seize is quite sticky and tends to get all over, so I need to use mineral spirits to clean it off. The rim bed is cleaned additionally with acetone if tape will be installed.

The entire process takes at least 3 hrs. I know a lot of builders say they spend less than one hour per wheel, but either they are much faster than me or they do it differently.

I was impressed with Carl Strong’s packaging of the bike frame, but am equally impressed with Ron’s packaging of the wheels.  He boxed each one individually and taped the boxes together into a single package.

More impressively, each wheel was then completely sheltered with holders, and foam on each of four corners. This is the front wheel, but the packaging for the rear wheel looks exactly the same.  Taped to the top flap of the box is the instruction set for the White Industries hubs.  Taped to the beoom flap are the spare spokes, with spoke nipples and spoke prep already in there.

And here are the photos of the finished product:

I’m not sure what it is about black hubs that are all over the place these days. I just don’t like them. These silver hubs have a great shape and I think are very classy. The front is the H2 while the rear is the H1. They seem to be slightly different, but the design didn’t change so much that it will bother me.

Here are the wheels complete. I think they look great. You can’t really tell how deep the rims are from this angle, but shiny new wheels are always nice. The contrast that comes out of the black spokes is also nice. I also love the look of low spoke count wheels. You can see the spoke holes in the rim in these shots that Ron too, but I asked him to put in the VeloPlugs in for me.

As seen in both the previous and following pictures, the “tangerine” colored nipples add a subtle, but nice highlight to the wheels. These should match pretty much perfectly with the headset and the paint highlights on the frame.

This entry was posted on April 4, 2007 at 5:21 am and is filed under Bicycle, Bicycling, Bike, Cycling. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.