AsanaCycles

I'd pick a pair of MAVIC's, use the MP3 program, and forget the rest.
most bike shops here US are MAVIC dealers

Camel

For my year tour France-Vietnam I called Peter White and talked with him. He built me up some crazy strong wheels-suitable for tandem riding. Phil wood hubs etc. They never needed any re-truing/maintenance. I even brought along spare bearings/spokes just in case, but luckily didn't need them. These were 700c.

If I were to do a similar tour again, I would use 26".

For 2 month long tours I took what I had, 2nd hand wheels which I used commuting as well. The shorter tours I was loaded less, and riding MUCH nicer roads/paths.

Doug64

Universal Cycles, Portland, Oregon

Excellent craftsmenship, great customer service, very good prices. We have 2 set of touring wheel built by them and are really happy with them. I get a lot of my parts from them and could fill up another paragraph with examples of their excellent customer service.

Try their custom wheel build appliction to get an idea of prices. https://www.universalcycles.com/wheelkit.php

cyccommute 

It's a Soma Fabrication Deco rack. When I saw it, it just clicked

safariofthemind

Hey thanks for the tip on the Soma. May just have to go on my Christmas list

LeeG

You'll save a few lbs of money, not a ton, building your own if you get all the parts DIRT cheap. Otherwise the most important thing you'll get is the knowledge for wheelbuilding and repair which is worth a ton. When I weighed as much as you 25yrs ago I built my own, I haven't ridden much in the last 15yrs but have been riding more again in the last three years. The wheels I built 15-20yrs ago still held up and the recent wheels I got came with a stock LHT and I purchased some from PeterWhite.

If money is a concern buy one production front wheel like a QBP Handspun front wheel and build your own rear wheel. Don't bother with expensive hubs, Basic Shimano are fine, pack some extra grease in them and adjust them right. Don't bother trying to build superlight wheels, just pick the rim width that fits the tires you expect to use. I'm not a fan of unmachined rims on the front, the grabbiness is bothersome. If these are for touring you don't need light, you can get light tires when you want a light ride on an unloaded bike.

Like another poster mentioned these threads bring out the wheelbuilders but that doesn't mean it's the most economical route. It is if you can get the parts at OEM cost.

rothenfield1

Having picked up the hobby of rebuilding vintage lugged-steel bikes a few years ago, and progressively learning how to rebuild a bike from the frame up, other than welding my own frame, I figured I'd have to hand-build a wheel set sooner or later. So, I just went for it building my first set with 36H Mavic OP/DT Swiss Champion/Ultegra. I had access to bike shop tools, but not much experienced advice other than a mechanic shoving a copy of "The Bicycle Wheel" by Jobst Brandt in my hand. Between the chapter on wheel building and reading Sheldon Brown site on the subject was really my blueprint. I'm happy with the result, although I haven't put any loaded miles on them yet; and I'm proud that I finally did it. But, quit honestly, I don't think I will do it regularly enough to justify the expense. If you build wheels a lot, you can stock up on spokes and nipples. I agree that you want the best spoke you can afford, but spokes are sold in large quantities if you want a good price and you may end up needing 3 different lengths so you'll end up with several spokes you don't need.

Learning how to true a wheel is an important and easy skill for any cyclist to know. But I find wheel building more of an art than a science. That is why hand-built wheels are preferred over machine-built ones. I may build another wheel set sometime in the future, but my current opinion is that the next time I need wheels, I'll look for a good used set and hand true them.

sstorkel

I wouldn't buy a used (touring) wheel unless I was sure that it had been properly tensioned throughout its life. Improperly tensioned spokes have a significantly shorter lifespan than properly tensioned spokes, if my experience is anything to go by...

AsanaCycles

buying used bicycle wheels is a process that is a whole lot simpler than buying a used car or house.

there is no problem in buying used wheels. the main issue is being able to look at a wheel and know what it is. Being able to measure a wheel is yet another layer of skill/knowledge... really its just knowledge.

rothenfield1

I agree with you; but coming from my very limited experience, I think that stress relieving the spokes is as important if not more so in determining how long a wheel will stay in true. Building a wheel capable of staying true for loaded touring must be the most demanding wheel building there is. Most of the responders to this post are obviously very competent and experienced wheel builders. However, I'm assuming from the OP's post that they are not as experienced and IMO a good wheel builder has probably taken years to master their craft. So I was just trying to counter the impression I got from the posts that the OP should build his own wheel set and expect it be better and cheaper than a pre-built set. It's just my opinion, maybe I'm making it more complicated than it should be.

AsanaCycles

dude, you so know that the most demand of a wheel is going to be a crazy mtb downhill wheelset.

but...

demanding wheel building

I'd concur that a wheel built for someone that is apt to go out on bicycle tour, to god only knows where... that build, is going to require the strongest foundation in the practice of building a wheel.
from choice of components, the sales pitch, right down to the minute details.

a MTB DH wheelset, while its apt to incur the hardest/most traumatic abuse a bicycle wheel would be expected to sustain
and while the failure is sure to be catastrophic by nature of the sport

at least as a wrench, you have that to dig into.... "who is crazy enough to huck their bike off of THAT?" (more than likely the activity is already illegal on an illegal trail somewhere)

as compared to a loaded tourer descending HWY 1 at 40mph.
for sure a wheel failure at that point is bound to also be catastrophic

I don't know what the legal terms would be
while one is engaged in an Extreme Sports type of bicycling (downhill, hucking off of ledges, etc)
vs
the other on a bicycle tour, which is quite often sanctioned by bike lanes, etc...

and to top it off... so many touring wheelsets are founded on road wheels with rim brakes.

rothenfield1

I hadn't thought about DH wheels Asana. Obviously, a catastrophic wheel failure on a touring bike could be dangerous, but a wheel failure after you've just hurdled off a cliff could be catastrophic to the rider.

sstorkel

Trueness is over-rated in my opinion. If your wheel is slightly out of true, that's a minor problem that can easily be fixed in a couple of minutes on the side of the road. If your spokes aren't tensioned properly and you start breaking them as soon as you hit your first pothole, that's a much bigger problem... With a used wheel, you really have no idea how the spokes were treated by the previous owner, so it's difficult to estimate the amount of life remaining in them.

AsanaCycles

ideally rims come from the factory as "true" that is they should be flat
building up the wheel, hopefully it can be built up so that the hub is centered
and the wheel is true with uniform tension.

if the rim ever gets bent, in order to straighten the rim by "truing the wheel", what occurs is that the rim is pulled back into "true" by using the spokes to pull it into position at that spot.
whereby, now spoke tension is not uniform.

one may look at the situation as if and out of true wheel is a side effect from not having uniform tension. (upon initial build)

once the rim becomes bent (out of true), by "truing" the wheel, by using spoke tension to pull the rim into position, the spoke tension is now, not uniform.

spokes are amazingly strong. They can withstand something like 125,000 psi before they break. when they pull apart they break in a pulling fashion akin to pulling taffy.

spokes are so crazy strong that they will easily collapse a rim or pull out an eyelet.
the spoke wrench will round the nipple before you can put that kind of stress on a spoke.

so why do spokes break?
bad spokes, low quality, quality control, etc...

most likely, the deal is that the spoke tension is too low.

i.e. a spoke is easy to push and it bends. a spoke is very strong while pulling on it. like a piece of string. (think Tioga Tension Disc)

when the tension is low, the spokes flex. Flex is bad. when the spoke cycles thru this flex cycle enough times, its going to break.

if you find a used wheel that is true, and the spoke tension is even, its probably going to last awhile.
while there are plenty of other points of inspection, like hubs, sidewall wear, rim condition, etc...

uniform spoke tension and a true wheel, is a really good sign that a used wheel will be dependable.

AsanaCycles

the other hard reality for bicycle wheels are on Cargo Bikes
i.e. Surly Big Dummy

another are tandems

rothenfield1

This will probably be my last post on the subject because, as I stated, I have little experience other than the ‘one’ wheelset build. Which, is exactly why I felt compelled to respond; the OP seemed closer to my experience than those of the many obviously experienced wheel builders here.

My impression from reading the above cited references and others was that making sure the spokes were basically not twisted and had been prepared to accept the load of tension they were about to receive by bending them into shape before tensioning was as important, if not more so, than the actual tension itself. This makes sense to my simplistic mind, seeing that the rod (spoke) will want to twist as the nipple is tensioned. Some people will drop some lube on the nipple and eyelet thinking that it will allow the nipple to spin as the tension is brought up thereby allowing the spoke to remain straight. But at the higher tensions of the final truing, a little lubricant doesn’t do that much good IMHO. That’s why some tress relieving measures have to be used as you bring the tension up. And, you can take your choice of what those measures are as it seems that there are many. It seems to be the ‘secret sauce’ of a quality wheel build. Not to mention making sure the spokes are bent to accept the high tension as they overlap the other spokes.

This level of wheel building discussion is fascinating to someone like myself, but sometimes I get the impression from these threads that if the newbie can just get the hub laced to the rims, the battle is won; when in fact, the battle has just begun.

The wheelset; the most underappreciated part of any bike, and the people that can build them to handle the incredible loads they do and still remain true year after year are artists in this backyard mechanic hack's opinion.

EKW in DC

FWIW, I got my rear wheel from aebike.com... a Handspun wheel made with Velocity Dyad rim and Shimano Deore LX hub. I haven't been touring on it yet (a tour WAS in the cards until a death in the family this summer sidetracked those plans), but it's taken well over 3,000 miles of commuting and general purpose riding so far w/o any broken spokes. I trued it up once at the co-op on my own and another time had it trued and retensioned at the LBS (coop didn't have a tensiometer at the time). I weigh in at 290 or so - add my bike and all my commuting gear (change of clothes, lunch, etc.), and you can see the wheel can hold up to quite a bit. I paid $125 for it, I think. Shipping was included.

The Dyad is a good touring rim, and I bought it on recommendation from several experienced Clydes, so you know it's built to hold up to the weight. Handspun wheels are hand made, just at a centralized facility. I've been reallyou happy with it after a year of constantly breaking spokes when I first started cycling. If you're on a budget, that may be a good way to go. Just a thought...

The Smokester

Just want to put in a word in favor of high-quality rims. I think that a good wheel build must have even tension (+/- 5%) to spec on all the spokes. This cannot be attained unless the rim has a smooth join where the two ends of the rim channel are butted together during manufacture.

Philly Tandem

I've seen some good deals on wheels on Ebay from Rocky Mountain Cyclery. They seem to always be having sales. I've been eyeing up a set of Mavic Open Sport rims, 36 spokes, Ultegra hubs for in the low $200s. Seems like a decent deal. Not a touring wheelset exactly, but with 36 spokes they should be plenty strong, and the Open Sport rims are heavier-duty than the Open Pros.

If you are using the wheels on your current bike you'll need 130mm spaced hubs, unless you want to coldset or manually spread your rear triangle to fit MTB-spec hubs like XT, LX, etc.

Philly Tandem

Also, I think used wheels can be a great value, as long as you know what you are getting. I bought most of my wheelsets used, and with few exceptions, have had no problems. IMO, a wheelset built from good source parts most likely has been built by somebody who has a clue what they are doing. You're unlikely to get a wheelset with White Industries hubs that has been built by a hack.

fietsbob

My 700c loaded tour bike's wheels have featured tandem spoke counts. for me,
they have been pretty reliable.
OP was speaking of their low spoke wheels .
I call mine 'Piano wheels', because pianos have 88 notes,
the wheels are built with 40 spokes in the front, 48 in the rear.

Tires used tend to be 38 - 40 mm wide .

more recent bike: 26'' wheels Mavic EX 721 rims ,
Schmidt Dyno Hub in the front 32 spoke,
and , Rohloff Internal Gear hub, only made in 32 spoke ,
but unlike derailleur bikes the wheel is evenly tension balanced side to side
as the one cog doesn't need the space of 9.

LeeG

I recently ordered a custom rear wheel from a mailorder retailer who I like and have had good experiences with. The person who built the wheel with good parts did not have a clue. It was built with DT spokes, Rhynolite rim and XT hub. At first it looked nice and true then I started plucking the spokes and discovered a non-drive spoke that was higher pitch/tighter than the drive side, it was obviously wrong. One of the spoke nipples was twisted/rounded over and another partially twisted so they couldn't be turned without further stripping. I loosened all the spokes and replaced the twisted nipples then retrued it properly. It trued up fine so the builder really wasn't checking spoke tension at all let alone letting a new build go out with two ruined nipples. With 36 spokes and a stiff rim this screw up was hidden.

I'll still buy stuff from them but won't get a wheel built from them. The whole idea of 36 spokes and a beefy rim was to have a strong wheel, not one that a lazy wheelbuilder could whip out.

PeterWhites builds are worth it.

NoReg

There is a lot of incorrect information about wheel building in this thread. Why spokes fail in particular. If you want to know more just google spoke failure brandt. As far as making wheels is concerned, just do it, if you are so inclined. If you lace them correctly (good diagrams on sheldon's site), follow brandt's pairs of spokes stress relieving advice (in this case avoid sheldon), you will get good wheels. Buy name brand components since the fit will likely be compatible for the parts. I made my first wheels without a truing stand, I still don't have a proper one, and I only recently got a spoke guage. Never had problems with my builds. So I think in order to get good result you don't have to build a perfect wheel, you don't even need to build a wheel perfectly, you need to use decent stuff and avoid the main pitfalls.

The main pitfalls are: Too light or missmatched components; wheels with low tension; wheels without stress relieved spokes; undersized spokes at the head or anywhere else for that mater; alloy nipples; inadequate rims (lots of threads here). Ueven spoke tension doesn't appear to be fatal since many good wheel builders have been building wheels unevenly for ever. But since we can now cheaply measure spoke tension and since proper tension is one of the few skills involved in wheels building...

I'm not an LBS guy really because they don't carry the stuff I want. But my LBS does build good wheels. If you go to an LBS often the mechanics are kids. When the adults are away, the work may suffer, or sometimes you get a kid who is uber careful. My favorite LBS is all pretty serious older dudes (over 25). Their main serious clients are couriers, they do the work well. You don't need to go to Peter White. Wheelbuilding is easy. But your wheels have to be properly built, so if you have any doubts and no options, then Peter White would make a lot of sense.

One thing that will happen if you go to Peter White is that he is going to de-BS you. Unless you lie to him tell him you weight 50% of your weight or something, he is going to build you a tank of a wheel. Most people don't need to pay a premium for that advice, except to the degree that half of what experts do whether in the stock market, or wheel building, is just get you off some crazy thing you read on the internet. If you want to tour on a 16 spoke wheel with bladed spokes, he isn't going to build it for your. But he tells you that on his site, an he tells you what components he is going to use, so if you want to DIY, he has all the relevant info on his site. remember that if you want lights, or someting.

If you want to avoid torsional loads in you spokes, or at least the bad results of them, use straight gauge. If you want to relieve the loads, start with some grease on the threads and on the nipples or bearing points in the rims. Then you can place the wheels on the floor like a steering wheel and press down on opposite sides of the rim you will hear the spokes ping into place. This is one way to stress relieve wheels, but totally inadequate for that purpose according to Brandt. So I do it to hear the pings, but not for stress relieving.

When spokes fail, they normally break at the bend if they are failing from fatigue. The outside bend is under greater stress, if you do the matched pairs thing it takes the bend to 11 and then when it is released the outside bend is no longer the hot point. If you crash and a spoke breaks it tends to be away from the ends. Properly built spokes can last a lifetime, and will outlast many rims.

xizangstan

I've been watching this thread with interest. I may be like a couple of you here: I've ridden mountain bikes for lots of years. But now that I'm older (63) and a bit more mature, I am looking to slow down and maybe do some short touring. I get bored easily, and can't stand riding the same route over and over. And my funds are very limited. (I can't afford to pay for repairs or replacements every other day) So, I'm looking to put a top-quality, extremely-reliable and very durable pair of wheels under my vintage GT Xizang mountain bike.

I've always used Shimano XTR components. In wheels, it's been XTR in Mavic rims. I'm running XTR hubs in Mavic 717 32-spoke rims right now. But if there's something out there that's better and more reliable, I'll go for it.

Okay - I weigh 244 lbs. (down from 268 last winter) and want extremely durable touring wheels. Maybe 36-spoke sets?

What's the consensus here? What would you guys suggest I buy? I'll spend the money, if I only have to spend it once. I don't want to be replacing broken crap.

LeeG

Sounds like you have a good set of wheels, why not wait until it's broken?