Lacing your own wheels

[trailsnail]

Ideally, for a disc wheel you want the outside spokes to pull tight when you apply the brakes. This arose from an initial concern amongst wheel builders that if the spokes went slack under braking they could bow outwards and get hooked up on the calliper. Having said that, many disc wheels are built the other way without problem.

I agree with SummitFever here, also the same theory can be used on the drive side for a rear wheel to prevent spokes shifting towards the derailleur.

If you are building your own wheels then chances are you will be sold DT Swiss spokes.
If you are going to buy these I would reccomend that you buy a set of spoke washers to go inbetween your spoke head and hub flange.

A few years back DT changed their spokes to a larger elbow length to allow easier builds for machine built wheels, they did shorten this distance since then, but not all the way back to what a hand build wheel should have.

Using spoke washers will stop the bend on the elbow from straightening out and the short straight section of the elbow from bending.
Overall this will create a longer lasting wheel build with alot less retensioning required over the wheels life.

Also I would suggest just using the brass nipples, alot of aluminum nipples struggle to get proper tension.
I feel a properly tensioned wheel will be faster than one with not enough tension but slightly less rotating mass.

Always bed in your spokes, you can do the crank arm thing like on sheldon browns web page or you can walk on the spokes with the wheel on it's side.
I think a combo of the two works well.

bed in your spokes before you add your higher tension to your spokes and your nipples will stay looking fresh.

Lube the threads and where the nipple meets your rim, some people say this can loosen, I think this is not a problem unless you have skipped the bedding in process and not used spoke washers. a correctly built wheel needs little maintence.
I was 4 years in on a set of street wheels, I had retensioned them once and always abused these wheels.
they were still as strong as the day they were built.
I have since changed them as I now run 20mm front and 14mm rear axels.

 

[trailsnail]

I also forgot to mention, use a high quality spoke key.
Don't go for the cheap ones, especialy not one of those round steel ones with a million sizes squeezed into them.

Here is a spoke calculator that I made myself, I have never had a bad length and have made many wheels using it.
It is just an excel spread sheet using a standard spoke formula.

Just fill in the green squares and you will have your spoke lengths, lengths are assuming you will be using a standard 12mm nipple.
and always round down if your answer is not a whole number.

 

[harro the old]

G'day

Well here is a question for you.
My original question was because I was wanting to lace a coaster brake (back pedal brake ) hub into a 700 rim.Before you all start having sleepless nights, and bad dreams about this idea ,I want to say I have put the idea on hold until I find out more about the hubs avaliable.I bought a cheap wheel of ebay just for the hub , but to be honest I'm not happy with the quality of the hub.Is there such a thing as a good quality coaster brake hub ??? or are they all cheap rubbish???
The bike I'm assembling is a Cannondale R800 framed single speed.It is just for around town and fun.I have come back to bikes after many years and my wants and desires , it seems quite different from what seems to be in fashion at the moment.My desire for a coaster brake single speed comes from sitting on my mates latest mountain bike and being overwhelmed by all the levers and cables hanging off his handle bars.I sat there and said to him, remember when we were kids and all we had was a pedal brake , single speed and the only thing on the handle bars was the grips.So that is what I'm trying to build , but on a grown up frame.
Let the laughter begin
I really would like to know the source of a quality hub though if anyone has an idea.

Thankyou for your time

Harro the old

 

[SummitFever]

Do some searching for "klunker", "coaster brake" and "repack" and you should come across some stuff about which ones (from the MTB dawn of time) work better than others. Some of these may still be made or you may be able to get a good condition second hand one.

 

[trailsnail]

I love the idea of a simple bike,

I am currently riding single speed but with discs on both ends.
I made the change to single speed years ago and find myself loving the decision every time I go for a ride.
One thing to consider with a coaster hub is back pedaling will result in your rear wheel braking so it will probably lead to more thinking about pedal positioning while riding.

Not an issue around town, but if you decide to use it out on the trails you might want to consider keeping the brakes on your bars.
Either way Im a big fan of keeping it simple, Great work!

Alot of coaster hubs will be suited to bmx spacing 110mm, make sure you buy the correct width. mtb spacing 135mm. and road 130mm spacing.

just measure the distance between the nut faces on your hub. The ones that meet the inside faces of your frame, if that makes sense?

I have never looked into a quality coaster hub sorry, post it up if you find one, I am very interested in this project.

Also do those frames have horizontal dropouts? back pedaling will result in the lower section of chain becoming tensioned.

 

[scblack]

Lube the threads and where the nipple meets your rim, some people say this can loosen, I think this is not a problem unless you have skipped the bedding in process and not used spoke washers. a correctly built wheel needs little maintence.

This is correct, I lightly dabbed the spoke thread with engine oil for lubricant. Six months down the track of DH, no slippage whatsoever.

 

[harlequinn]

The Bicycle Wheel by Jobst Brandt is considered by many to be the wheel building bible - others disagree. I've got a copy and it has very relevant information but the latest edition is 1981 - before common use of carbon wheels and disc brakes.

http://www.amazon.com/Bicycle-Wheel-3rd-Jobst-Brandt/dp/0960723668

Another good read on bicycle mechanics (as in the engineering and physics principals behind bicycles) is Bicycling Science by David Wilson. For the bicycle geek anyway.

http://www.amazon.com/Bicycling-Science-David-Gordon-Wilson/dp/0262731541/ref=ntt_at_ep_dpt_1