plonz 

Sound advice. I have 3 pairs of Ambrosio Excellence. My measured ERD across the 6 rims ranges from 602 to 605. I always double-check the rim I am building.

cjenrick

a good bike shop will invite you to come on down with you rims and hubs and allow you to lace up the wheels right in the mechanics shop, that way you do not have to go back and forth a million times to exchange spokes in order to find the right length.

mechanics keep a little black book with spoke lengths for different rims and hubs and 3 x and 4 x and you know what? even those numbers can be off from rim to rim.

we use to use non stainless spokes in order to save weight, they would break if you looked at them wrong but would make it through a race or two. there was quite a bit of weight savings there, which translates into less rotational inertia.

oceanhaitang

Good info!

Yeah... I’m not too worried about weight as long as it’s not excessive. I’m not planning to race on this particular bike. Looking more for something strong, durable, and aesthetically pleasing

cyccommute 

Several things here. I’ve been building wheels since 1986 and I’ve never had a shop offer to allow me to lace my wheels up at the shop. No one offered and I never even considered asking. In the early days...before the Intertubz...they would do the calculations for the spokes I would need but that was the extent of their involvement. I really question if any shop would allow a customer in the work area...liability, a litigious society, and all that.

A co-op with a shop where you can work on your own bike might allow you to work on lacing a wheel but it would depend on the shop and the traffic. Don’t show up at my co-op where I’m the shop lead on a spring Saturday and expect to build wheels. I’ve got 6 other stands that I need to help with and can’t babysit a wheel builder. A really crappy (weather wise) Saturday in January would be much better.

Second, I’ve known dozens of bicycle mechanics through my co-op (I’ve been there longer than any of the paid personal) and not one of them has ever had a “little black book” for wheelbuilding. I’ve built about 100 wheels and I don’t keep a “little black book”. It’s just not worth the data collection. Rims from even 10 years ago are probably not still being made. And the “Intertubz” have a lot of that data anyway. Heck, only 3 or 4 of those bicycle mechanics was even a wheel builder themselves.

Finally, nonstainless spokes wouldn’t be any lighter than stainless. Steel is a bit heavier than some types of stainless and a bit lighter than others. The difference, however, is negligible, especially when in the small quantities of a spoke. Nor is stainless stronger than carbon steel. It’s slightly weaker. Neither is particularly delicate. Stainless just doesn’t rust (as much).

cyccommute 

If you want durability and strength, look into triple butted spokes...DT Alpine III, Sapim Force, Pillar PSR 2018 are examples. Strength and durability are increased by about 50% over a straight spoke.

dmarkun

DIY prototype

Mk II

I liked:
"Professional Guide to Wheel Building" 7th Edition
A complete wheelbuilding reference. By Roger Musson
(not free though)

Classtime 

Digging your jig. I'm also a fan of R. Musson. And wrt little black books, my go to expert on all things vintage, modern, bicycle, and Wheelbuilder extraordinaire checks his notes when I go to him for spokes. It might be a black book. It might be little. He kept it in the back room.

Chombi1 

I was never disappointed with DT stainless steel spokes I had on most of my bikes since the 80's.
I had used straight gauge, double butted and aero bladed stainless steel spokes from DT and had never had any of them break on me.

montclairbobbyb 

DT Swiss Competition (butted)👍👍👍

I literally learned to build wheels online from Sheldon Brown (following Jobst Brandt's method), and I have successfully laced at least 50+ wheels with never a complaint nor a failure. Check him out, straightforward method.

buegelfrei

I have always used DT spokes and nipples, but when it came to my most recent set of wheels, built around Onyx hubs, Daniel at Onyx plugged Sapim’s “Polyax” nipples (which come in assorted configurations in both aluminum and brass). He told me:

Given this is a bike you care about, there is no good reason not to use double or triple-butted spokes.

While I have enjoyed lacing 10 or so wheels over the decades, I have to acknowledge that the wheels I have had my guy at my fave LBS do in the past decade have required far less truing. In fact, those wheels with the Onyx hubs haven’t needed any truing in 18 months and circa 1500 miles...of BMX.

The anodized color (blue and lime) on my Sapim nipples seems to be holding up fine against UV, if you were wanting color. I’ve never had colored aluminum nipples from DT, so I can’t comment there. I have seen some anodized parts fade really fast.

bikepilot50

Sheldon Brown is one of the best on wheelbuilding and other vintage bike topics
//sheldonbrown.com/wheelbuild.html