OT: Question on spoke count and lacing

[Chris Pomeroy]

I want to get into wheel building and set up a set of road wheels.  These will primarily be used for "SF2G-ing".  

-I weigh 180-185.

-Favoring the H+ Archetype and the simplicity of cartridge bearing hubs.

If I go 24/28 the hub option I'm favoring is DT 350 F&R (however 24h DT 350 front hubs only come in radial / straight-pull)

If you guys want to talk me out of radial front, I can do 28/28 instead and use either DT 350, or Miche hubs.

In either case, what lacing pattern would you recommend based on my usage and weight?

24 radial front, 28 2x rear?

or 

28 2x front & rear

or something else?

[Chris Pomeroy]

Forgot to mention I use rim brakes, no discs.  Cantis for what its worth.

[Brooks Sizemore]

On Sun, Oct 4, 2015 at 2:36 PM, Chris Pomeroy <christoph...@gmail.com> wrote:

-Favoring the H+ Archetype and the simplicity of cartridge bearing hubs.

Cartridge bearings will be much more costly to replace, and you'll need a tool to press the bearings into the hub shell, but you'll not need worry about getting the perfect cone adjustment.

 

If I go 24/28 the hub option I'm favoring is DT 350 F&R (however 24h DT 350 front hubs only come in radial / straight-pull)

With regard to cross vs radial, it's mostly just a question of aesthetics. Radial isn't as strong, but it will be ever-so-slightly lighter since your spokes are shorter.

Never worked with straight pull spokes personally, but I've heard it's difficult to tension them since you don't have an easy way of holding the spoke in place when turning the spoke nipple. Not an issue with j-bend.

 

If you guys want to talk me out of radial front, I can do 28/28 instead and use either DT 350, or Miche hubs.

In either case, what lacing pattern would you recommend based on my usage and weight?

24 radial front, 28 2x rear?

or 

28 2x front & rear

or something else?

For pure SF2G riding, I'd opt for the strength and do 28h 2x front and rear with the 350 hubs.

--

Brooks Sizemore
bro...@darg.net

[Nathan Davis]

If you're building your own wheels you really should consider Chris King hubs because bikes like to look pretty too. Personally I opt for standard 2 or 3 cross patterns (I also go for 32 hole) because I value strong and stiff wheels over weight savings. I'm closer to 230 though so I'm a bit more prone to punishing wheels.

-- Nathan

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[Peter Colijn]

fwiw I'm building a 24/28 set 2x on both because I prefer stronger vs. the ever so slight weight savings of radial. Though I've heard that cross patterns aren't really much stronger than radial, and radial is a bit easier to lace/etc, so ymmv.

I weigh 140ish +/- a few lbs. I don't think there's a blanket rule of thumb you can use to determine appropriate spoke counts, because the type of spokes you're using will matter a lot. But most of the literature I found suggested that < 24/28 is probably not a good idea for my weight.

Then again I've seen sf2g riders who can't weigh _that_ much less than me riding wheels with like 8 spokes, so what do I know.

[Jason Thorpe]

> On Oct 5, 2015, at 2:16 PM, 'Nathan Davis' via SF2G <sf...@googlegroups.com> wrote:
>
> If you're building your own wheels you really should consider Chris King hubs because bikes like to look pretty too. Personally I opt for standard 2 or 3 cross patterns (I also go for 32 hole) because I value strong and stiff wheels over weight savings. I'm closer to 230 though so I'm a bit more prone to punishing wheels.

Indeed. I’m all about 32h 3x front and rear. I personally mostly-use Shimano Dura Ace 7700 hubs because they will survive the zombie apocalypse and are fully serviceable (including the FH body if you have the appropriate forged-from-unobtanium tool, which I happen to have :-). I have 10,000 miles on one set of those hubs that are still going strong, and they were already 15 years old and previously used when I got them. I guess if you really must use cartridge bearings, get White Ind hubs instead (although I can’t argue with the price of the DT 350s).

Radial lacing? Don’t bother. Doesn’t save enough weight to justify it, and your wheel won’t be as strong. The only place radial lacing makes any sense, IMO, is when used on the non-drive-side of a rear wheel if you’re using a hub whose geometry is particularly bad with regard to non-drive-side spoke tension; in that case. radial lacing of that side only can help because there won’t be “leading” vs “trailing” spokes on that side (“leading” spokes on the non-drive-side are more likely to go slack when it’s their turn in the load cycle).

I have a set of H+Son Archetypes laced 32h 3x to Campagnolo Record hubs with Sapim CX-Ray spokes on my steel Lemond. Super nice rims. I really like ‘em.

-- thorpej

[Jason Thorpe]

On Oct 5, 2015, at 2:35 PM, Peter Colijn <caff...@colijn.ca> wrote:

Though I've heard that cross patterns aren't really much stronger than radial, and radial is a bit easier to lace/etc, so ymmv.

The main source of extra strength in a cross-spoked wheel is the lateral load sharing that takes place where the spokes cross.

-- thorpej

[Peter Chang]

On Monday, October 5, 2015 at 2:07:51 PM UTC-7, Brooks Sizemore wrote:

Never worked with straight pull spokes personally, but I've heard it's difficult to tension them since you don't have an easy way of holding the spoke in place when turning the spoke nipple. Not an issue with j-bend.

https://www.google.com/search?q=bladed+spoke+holder&espv=2&biw=1273&bih=1140&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ved=0CFUQsARqFQoTCOasprTArMgCFYEyiAodRJsCkQ

i guess it was a smaller pain when i was rebuilding w/ a non-bladed spoke, but it wasn't really that bad.

otoh, rims where the nipple is 'hidden' are a pain in the ass. i didn't realize how much my first setup was based on seeing a couple threads beneath the nipple before starting into tensioning.

\p

[Patrick Kitto]

Plus everything to all of the below. Except that dura ace shit.

32h 3x. Everything else is a gimmick. Having spoke redundancy is a really good thing if you like riding long distances into remote(ish) areas.

Less than 32 is fine for most of the time. But if you loose a spoke on a 24 spoke wheel you better limp home real, real gently.

[Patrick Kitto]

As evidence by the Bomb-proof was of tied and soldered wheels. 

Once tied and soldered, the effective /theoretical hub diameter is the tie points. 

[Jason Thorpe]

On Oct 5, 2015, at 4:44 PM, Peter Chang <d...@google.com> wrote:

On Monday, October 5, 2015 at 2:07:51 PM UTC-7, Brooks Sizemore wrote:

Never worked with straight pull spokes personally, but I've heard it's difficult to tension them since you don't have an easy way of holding the spoke in place when turning the spoke nipple. Not an issue with j-bend.

My biggest issue with straight-pull spokes is that the anchor mechanism in the hub (the spoke head) is actually weaker than J-bend

-- thorpej

[Jason Thorpe]

> On Oct 5, 2015, at 7:19 PM, Patrick Kitto <patric...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Plus everything to all of the below. Except that dura ace shit.

Hey, cut me some slack, bro… I threw you a bone with my example H+Son build that has Record hubs :-)

(No shit — I actually did think to myself when writing that sentence “This should make Kitto feel better…” :-)

-- thorpej

[Peter Chang]

hmmm... i guess the stresses are different w/ the bend than w/o, but
wouldn't that mean that there'd be more head fails than we have today
(or at least than the none that i've ever seen).

\p

[djconnel]

Cross-spoking is slightly more comfortable than radial, but the difference is very small: https://reynoldscycling.com/reynolds/news/Understanding-Wheel-Dynamics-Spoke-Crossing-&-Rider-Comfort

J-bend will pivot in the hub when deflected bit double-threaded spokes will shear and that in my experience leads to more broken spokes.

You need cross on at least one side in the rear to transmit torque.  Traditionally people pick drive-side but it can also be non-drive side if the hub is stiff.  Non-drive-side offers the advantage that those spokes are lower tension and can better handle the tension variation that comes with torque transmission.  With disc brakes the front also needs to transmit torque so you need cross-spoking there also.

[djconnel]

Jason: I just saw your argument on drive vs non drive radial. The drive side are more likely to hit a maximum tension limit during propulsion and the non drive side more likely to hit zero so I guess it depends. You could always do what Sheldon Brown recommended one April and cross the forward tensioned spokes and radial what would be backward tensioned spokes to get perpetual forward propulsive torque...

In any case drive side cross has tradionally been more popular since people assume flexy hubs.

[Jason Thorpe]

On Oct 6, 2015, at 6:18 AM, djconnel <djco...@gmail.com> wrote:

Non-drive-side offers the advantage that those spokes are lower tension and can better handle the tension variation that comes with torque transmission.

Yes, this is the reason Mavic did this on the Ksyrium.  PowerTap hubs (at least the ones pre-“G3”) also require you to lace the non-drive-side as crossed because of the way the torque is transmitted through the hub’s “torque tube”.

-- thorpej

[Jason Thorpe]

> On Oct 6, 2015, at 6:30 AM, djconnel <djco...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Jason: I just saw your argument on drive vs non drive radial. The drive side are more likely to hit a maximum tension limit during propulsion and the non drive side more likely to hit zero so I guess it depends. You could always do what Sheldon Brown recommended one April and cross the forward tensioned spokes and radial what would be backward tensioned spokes to get perpetual forward propulsive torque…

The issue is that on very imbalanced wheels (due to hub geometry), NDS is going to be much closer to “slack” already… then when the “leading” (or “pushing”) spokes take their turn bearing the load, the compressive load removes whatever tension is left, they go slack, and then start to fatigue. Lacing radially avoids this problem since they aren’t transmitting torque.

-- thorpej