DPDISXR4Ti

I'm building my first wheel - a rear 700mm 32-spoke road wheel. I did the drive side first, and all seemed to go okay there using 292mm spokes. For the non-drive side I've got 294mm spokes, and half the spokes just barely reached (the in-ies) and the other 8 are too long (the out-ies).

I was baffled at first, but then I realized that I must not have the hub rotated enough. Can I force the rotation by loosening the 16 spokes that pull in the "wrong" direction and gradually tighten the other 16? Looking now, I can see that although I didn't struggle with the 8 spokes on the drive side, there's a consistent mis-match there as well with how far the nipples are screwed in.

sweeks

I would start by loosening all the nipples until the first thread is just visible on each nipple. Then tighten each nipple one turn; go around the wheel a couple times and see if things look right. I'm assuming you calculated the spoke lengths correctly.
Others with more experience than I have may offer better advice!
Steve

Andrew R Stewart 

Sounds like one flange's spoke are off by one spoke hole. I have had to unlace one side of a wheel more then a few times. Andy

Jeff Wills

Unlace one side, move each spoke towards the "short" direction by one spoke hole, then relace. Make sure the valve hole is between parallel spokes.

There are other solutions, but this is what's worked for me when I've gotten distracted while lacing. It's happened 5 or 10 times in my 35 year wheel-building career and I bang my head on the bench when I do this to myself.

(Darn. Andy beat me to it.)

davidad

Oops. WE do it all the time. The spokes are in the wrong holes.

79pmooney

My first thought too. I find the most critical and easiest screwup I can make is locating that first spoke of the second flange. I put that spoke in, start the nipple, then carefully sight down parallel to the axle until I am convinced I got it's hub location right. Usually I'll do one side's inside spokes, lace on outside spoke on that flange to give the wheel it's "shape", then start the first spoke on the other side where I can see that it is properly behind or in front of its opposite at both the hub and rim.

Ben

Andrew R Stewart 

I learned to lace one flange's one side at a time. For a 36* wheel that's 4 sets of 9 spokes. I always have maintained that there are only two spokes that are critical for a wheel (with crossed spokes). The very first one and the first on the second flange. All the others fall into the pattern these two spoke set up.


I've watch a few coworkers do wheel builds with half or even all the spokes in the hub before starting the lace up, I'm too stupid to figure it out that way. Andy

DiabloScott

I've had to unlace a few wheels myself, and start over.

My next build though has rims with all spoke holes on centerline... Never even seen that before... Planning to be extra attentive.

https://www.hedcycling.com/belgium-rim-brake-tubular/

Kontact 

Most wheelbuilders, myself included, lace heads out on both sides, rotate the hub, then lace heads in on both sides - spokes barely started in the nipples. When that is done it is all loose, but it clearly looks right and all the spokes are the same floppiness. Then you can start snugging them down to set landmarks, like to one thread showing, etc.

There are all different ways of lacing a wheel, but sticking to a very procedural inner, inner, outer, outer steps using strict counts and starting point rules keeps you out of trouble compared to trying to visualize the build logically.

Remember to pre-bend your heads in spokes as you lace them - it is considerably more effective than trying to bend them when they are connected at both ends.

cny-bikeman

It is more awkward to lace all of one side and then the other primarily because one has to navigate the 2nd set of head out spokes around the spokes that have already been laced on the other side. I have a less common routine than most. As I was the primary wheelbuilder in our co-op I learned to be very fast at lacing. I filled the entire hub with spokes, holding 4 or more spokes fanned out to insert, then mounted to the rim in sets of four, starting with the first set to one side of the valve hole, and turning down two nipples at a time. I don't necessarily recommend it, as it can be awkward at first, but it was fast. I tried one once purely for speed (I "cheated" by using a small flange hub with large spoke holes) and my record was 19 minutes to lace, tension and true a 36 spoke wheel.

Dan Burkhart 

They say, first you get good, then you get fast. I build over 300 wheels a year, but every time I try to speed up the process, I find less enjoyment in it. I really don't need to be fast, as I work on my own schedule, and I find enjoyment in filling my time with such activity, so I just concentrate on turning out a quality product, and don't have to worry about anybody cracking the whip.

dabac

My method is to start with the two ”parallel” spokes straddling the valve hole.
From both sides.
If they line up, then the rest of the spokes will too.
Then I do all the heads-out, then the heads-in.
Haven’t gotten it wrong since I started doing it like that.

DPDISXR4Ti

Thanks for all the input! FWIW, this is the video I used as a guide. He suggests doing all 16 on the drive-side and then moving over to the other.
Off by one spoke makes sense. I'll take a look at this later today and report back.

FWIW, the wheel is a Alexrims R390 which indeed has centerline spoke holes. I guess that made it much easier to make this sort of mistake.

cny-bikeman

I'm glad that works for you. I certainly enjoyed wheel building as well, very seldom was going as fast as possible, and I decided when a build would be ready. Back in the 70's there was relatively more need for builds, as the availability of pre-built quality wheels was nil, especially for touring rather than racing. I certainly never compromised on quality.

Andrew R Stewart 

These days a pro shop mechanic might not build 300 wheels across his career, wow. I thought my couple of years of doing, maybe, 75-100 wheels over the winters was a lot.


There's a lot of good advice here. Some is only preference, but that's how many of us were taught. The teacher's preference. Andy

Dean51 

I'm with Andy Stewart on this topic, "There is a lot of good advice here". My input to the OP is to find a lacing procedure that works for you and do it the same way each and every time. To this end, you may find it helpful to lace (but not tension) a wheel with your chosen procedure, then take it apart and do it all over again....and again....to drive it home.

I'm one of those who lace the trailing spokes of one side, flip the rim over, then lace the trailing spokes of the other side. The first trailing spoke of the second side is critical. The school of hard knocks has taught me to slow down at this point to make certain I have it right. The rest is downhill.

Dean

sweeks

I appreciate all the comments from more experienced wheel builders ^^. I've built my few (5 or 6) wheels with Roger Musson's book nearby. I've had to un-do some of them and start over. It's a bit harder only building a wheel when you need one... by the time the next need occurs, it's back to square one (maybe square 1.5 ).
Steve

rccardr 

I've also found it worthwhile to mark the starter holes for each flange side before starting to lace. Putting a spoke through both sides of the flange and viewing it from the side ensures that I'm not starting the lacing out of phase. Began doing this after taking more than a few rims apart that had the half tight/half loose syndrome.

Kontact 

Ultimately, this is the harder way to do it. Though it is not a bad idea to tension the drive side first, but only after the wheel is completely laced.

Gresp15C

I feel that I haven't really built a wheel unless I had to un-lace it and start over at least once.

Dan Burkhart 

Well, left to my own resources, I would never find a market for nearly as many wheels as I build, but fortunately, my biggest customer sells a branded line and also sells them as new equipment already installed on new bikes.

speedevil 

Wow. That's fast. When I built my last wheelset (36h, small flange) it took me at least an hour to get it into decent shape and I tweaked it a bit after that to even out the spoke tension. Of course, this is my time, not someone else's time so there wasn't any penalty for being slow.

And those wheels are still true a couple of years and a couple of thousand miles later, so slow and deliberate worked for me. I'm definitely not making a living building wheels, but it was great to ride on them the first time, knowing I built them. That's a skill not a lot of people have. Learning stuff is fun all by itself.

DannoXYZ 

It's not the rim, but the hub holes you have to worry about. Take a bare hub and push a spoke through flange from outside straight across hub and touch opposite flange. Note that the spoke doesn't touch a hole? But hits a spot directly in between two holes? Whether you use a hole to the left or to the right for next spoke makes a different and that's where you got mixed up.

DPDISXR4Ti

I guess I'm on well on my way then to over-building a wheel . I've tried partially disassembling my work a couple times now. I guess that was a bad idea. I got the drive-side re-done, and now it has alternating long and short spokes.

For the non-drive side I think my spokes are too short overall. I could only just barely get half of the nipples screwed in a little. They are just 2mm longer than the drive-side. It seems 3 or 4mm is more typical. This is a center-drilled wheel, if that matters at all. Any thoughts there?

Just confirming overall that I've likely built this wheel wrong, the outer-most cross-over point for the spokes (the ones that touch) is about 6.5" from center. The built wheel I'm looking at for reference, the spokes cross over about 3.5" from hub center. I'm assuming that's more in the range of being correct, yes?

Good thing I didn't quit my day job to become a wheel builder. I'd be living in a refrigerator box at this point.

Anyone have any different videos than the one I referenced above to use as a guide for a 32-spoke wheel build? I think I need a full, clean start.

DPDISXR4Ti

Thanks for confirming what I thought was the case. I think that makes it easier to screw up than I thought was the case. Tearing everything down now and starting over. There will perhaps be a pause for a few days if I decide I need longer spokes for the non-drive side (see my previous comment above). The ones I got had alloy nipples any way, which is probably a bad idea for an amateur like me.