Originally Posted by
Tanstaafl
Thanks for the replies! It sounds like proper wheel building is not a task for the novice,
It's fine. Jobst Brandt tested the wheel building instructions in his book _The Bicycle Wheel_ by having each of his grade school sons assemble a pair with no other help.
With contemporary deeper rims you'll need to measure tension instead of determining the rim's elastic limit than backing off which worked well for the shallow box section rims that were popular when Jobst wrote his book.
Like most professional bicycle mechanics, you won't be fast enough to do a job which is both good and profitable.
That's not an issue with well built wheels lasting until crashed or the sidewalls wear out from rim brakes.
though it sounds like I should invest in a spoke tension meter.
Kids these days have a $5 cellular app for that.
Seriously - you can calculate tension from spoke diameter and unsupported length. A computer like your smart phone can apply a Fast Fourier Transform to convert samples from time to frequency domain, pick the loudest frequency, and report tension.
Just replacing spokes you don't need to do that. Assuming the wheel has adequate tension, just make the tone match within a wheel half.