fooferdoggie 

I weight 200 or so pounds my bike is a mid drive e bike its a bosch motor so not a motorcycle.the bike is 70 pounds with all my gear and I can carry upto 30 pounds of stuff. it is my commuter and i put 6000 miles a year on it. the stock wheel is having issues and my local high end bike shop trued it up and thinks it will always have issues. I want them to build it but it may be 3 weeks and they are out of the rims. not sure what parts they are using though they had a dt swiss rim and spokes then a dt swiss hub so I can change the end caps to a through axle when I get a new bike. the bike is 700 with a 135 spacing and a qr right now. 10 speed shimano. what I dont know is what rim width I need I run 300x38 tire. a different place to go would not be a problem.
https://www.prowheelbuilder.com/

• Drillings

  32 Rim - Recommended | Hub - Recommended

• Rim

  DT SWISS EX 471 29IN BLACK DISC BRAKE RIM $114.00
  700c / 29er
  Tubeless Tape for 1 wheel Installed NO Valve (works with tubes as well) (Not available as Rim Only) + $6.00

• Hub

  DT SWISS 350 REAR BLACK CENTERLOCK DISC HUB $221.00
  Spoke Type: J Bend
  QR Rear 10x135mm (Does Not Include Lockring)
  *Shimano HG/SRAM 8,9 or 10spd (Dyna-sys Mountain Bike 11 spd compatible)
  *No Bearing Upgrade
  Shimano Centerlock Lockring (works with all axle types) + $13.00
  *Stock 18 Point Engagment 20 Degrees

• Spokes

  DT SWISS COMPETITION 14|15|14 GAUGE BLACK SPOKES $1.58 Recommended

• Lacing Pattern

  Three Cross Recommended

• Nipples

  DT SWISS BLACK 14G 12MM BRASS NIPPLE $0.20 Recommended

• Weight

  1016.16 grams

• Price

  $410.96

tallbikeman

My wife recently bought a RAD e bike and I noticed that it has 36 12 guage SS spokes and a heavier than usual rim. Basically a Clyde is above 200lbs, then you add a fairly robust electric helper motor driving the rear wheel. I would say that wear and tear on your drivetrain and rear wheel will be greater. If you are breaking spokes or rims or both then something more robust may be called for. All you can do with your wheel "recipe" is try it and see if it holds up. It looks fine for a human powered machine but meager for an e bike. Her RAD City step thru has been an awesome bike so far. Really a game changer compared to her human powered bike.

fooferdoggie 

heavy spokes make the wheel heater as they cant be tensioned properly. Rad is known for failed rear wheels.

Grudey1

That's a good one. I purchased a very similar set from them a year ago. Still strong, tight and true after 1,200 miles of riding. I highly recommend.

cyccommute 

I’m not entirely sure what you are trying to say here. I think you were trying to say that heavier spokes make the wheel heavier. While that is true, the weight increase is small and not terribly important. As to tension, the gauge of the spoke has some impact on tension but it is in the opposite direction. A thicker spoke can take more tension before breaking than a thinner gauge spoke. They are also harder on the rims because of the lack of elasticity.

The best spokes have elasticity in the middle and a stronger head. Double butted spokes have the elasticity but they have weak heads. A triple butted spoke like the DT Alpine III has the same elasticity but with a head that is 50% stronger. This article from Wheel Fanatyk explains why triple butted spokes are the way to go.

fooferdoggie 

12 to 13 gauge spokes make a weaker wheel because they cant be tensioned properly. they would pull out f the rim if they were. my wheels have triple butted sapim spokes. first pic is one of thew wheels for the my commuter bike. the second are the ones we had built for our tandem. they have Sapim heady duty spokes made for tandems and such and a e bike heavy duty hub.

cyccommute 

You have said that before. It is not correct. Spokes don’t need to be as tight as physically possible…i.e. up to the breaking point of the spoke…to be effective. They need to be tight but not so tight that they start to break the rim. In fact, single butted spokes are weaker than double butted and double butted are weaker than triple butted. Pillar spokes has some charts that show the breaking strength of the various spokes. They are the only place where I’ve actually seen actual data.

I’m aware of Sapim’s spokes but haven’t built any wheels with them. I’ve built with DT Alpine and Pillar since the late 90s. I’ve used Pillar because I couldn’t find silver Alpines. That problem has been solved, however, as Rose Bikes sells DT Alpine III in silver.

fooferdoggie 

thats not what I am saying what I am saying is they cant be tensioned poorly or they will damage the rim. I have talked to several wheel smiths about this. thats why none f them recommend thicker spokes.

cyccommute 

You are incorrect in your understanding of the tension needed. There should be no need for higher tension when using larger diameter spokes. If you look at the Park TM-1 conversion chart, you can see that while the readings on the gauge are different, the actual value of the tension in kilogram force (a truly dumb unit of force) is in the same range for each different diameter of spoke. In other words, a 2.3mm spoke (13 gauge) has a reading of 27 but a force measurement of 92 kgf. A 2.0mm spoke has a reading of 23 but the same force measurement.

Many wheelbuilders don’t like building with heavier gauge spokes because it’s not what they have learned to build with. The article I linked to talks about this. There may be slight problems with using a 2.3mm spoke (butted or not) fitting into the hub but, in my experience, it’s not a common problem. I’ve built several dozen wheels over the past 20 years using 2.3mm spokes (butted) using many different hubs and I’ve only had one hub set that didn’t fit and it was easy to drill out.

To be clear, I wouldn’t use a 2.3mm straight gauge spoke but that is due to the butted spokes being stronger due to their elasticity.

fooferdoggie 

My info came from a master wheel builder who's whole business is building wheels and he was doing a large job building wheels using heavy spokes because he could not talk the customer into better 14 g spokes a e bike shop that specializes in regulating and building ebike wheels.They see so many thick spoke wheel failures. A couple of other high end wheel builders have given me the same opinion. Unless you need a super heavy duty wheel 14 gauge spokes make the strongest wheels.

tallbikeman

I have used 12 guage spokes in wheel builds but not too often. Generally the rim should to be stout and the wheel is being build for ultimate durability for heavier/stronger riders. I have had very good reliability with this type of wheel build. I've never broken a 12 guage spoke in service nor have I broken any heavier duty rim. E-bikes can have up to 750 watts of power or more. 746 watts = 1 horsepower. Humans have much less horsepower than that on a regular basis. The combination of human and motor will be wearing out or breaking rear wheels that were meant for less than 1 horsepower. This extra horsepower is the reason e bikes use much heavier duty wheels. I notice a lot of e-bikes that have a motor driving the entire drive chain along with the human using the same drive chain system. I can think of no faster way to wear out your sprockets, chains and rear freewheels/cassettes more quickly. Very shrewd marketing. I try to build wheels with the lightest spokes and least spoke counts I can get away with and still have good durability. I haven't broken a spoke in several years mainly due to regular maintenance on my spokes and durable enough builds. At 265lbs I regularly ride a wheel set that has 16 bladed 2mm spokes in back and 12 of the same in front. The aero rim is heavily built of aluminum and the spokes are carbon steel. No broken spokes, no stress cracking of the rim and the fastest wheels by quite a bit that I own.

cyccommute 

The problem is that either you or the wheel builder is interpreting the problem wrong. Straight gauge spokes are weaker than butted spokes. But thicker straight gauge spokes are stronger than thinner straight gauge spokes. Perhaps the wheel builder doesn’t want to run the spokes up to the tension that a gauge says they should be so they end up being under lower tension and would likely break. But just using 14 gauge spokes doesn’t make for “the strongest wheels” possible. Triple butted spokes make for “the strongest wheels”. Using a double butted spoke would be the next best thing and using a 2.3mm spoke would be a good third place. Using a 2.0mm straight spoke would break its leg in th gate and is on the way to the glue factory. In other words, not the best choice.

Go read that article I linked to. Ric Hjertberg is a master wheel builder and founder of Wheelsmith.

fooferdoggie 

I am terrible explaining what I mean. Heavier gage spokes can be stronger yes but they are hard to tension properly hard on the rims. So using 14 gauge spokes will make a stronger wheel because they can be tensioned right. Of course double butted or triple butted spokes are the strongest thats what I have on my wheels. But what all the wheels smiths I have talked to have said is heavier gauge spokes aren to needed for a strong wheel.

cyccommute 

And, yet again, no, thicker gauge spokes aren’t any more difficult to tension than thinner spokes. If you need to increase the strength of the wheel and don’t use butted spokes, heavier duty spokes will last longer for much of the same reason that triple butted spokes with thicker heads are stronger than double butted. Anyone who says that a spoke can’t be tensioned properly, no matter what the gauge, doesn’t know how to build wheels.