Originally Posted by
brianinc-ville
You should probably just get the existing wheel re-tensioned by a mechanic who knows something about wheelbuilding (which, by the sound of it, is not a description of your mechanic). They're disappointingly rare, these days, but they're around.
Alternately, why not get the wheels you want built for you, or try your hand at building them yourself? Sun Rims CR-18s are widely available in 559 and bombproof; get the hubs you like, get some good spokes, and let Sheldon Brown be your guide (but then get it tensioned by somebody who knows what they're doing).
The thing I've kind of been avoiding stating explicitly in all of this is that I have almost no knowledge of wheel building or maintenance, which is why I took it in for a spoke fix
I've kind of avoided that whole area of bike maintenance pretty well for more than 30 years now, though now it seems like I might not be able to avoid it so easily any more. And now that I've gotten a few good leads from this thread, now I'm thinking I *still* may need to learn to build a wheel to get exactly what I want. E.g., I found a wheel set that was perfect and priced such that I could just pick it up and not worry about it... except it is set up for schrader valves and not presta. This bike has presta and it's literally the first time I've seen presta on something like a 26" wheel and now I feel like that's super important for some reason.