Evening everyone…

I just thought I would share my experience of building my first wheel.

Well, I got started yesterday at 5pm, laying out all the bits and pieces:

– Sapim race spokes
– Brass spoke head washers – for a stronger wheel.
– Mavic XC717 disc rim
– spoke wrench
– minoura cheap wheel jig
– the dish stick
– brass nipples
– a bit of oil and grease
– kitchen roll
– masking tape
– glass of water, haribos, radio on.

Lacing the spokes wasn’t too bad, following the 3 cross pattern from the various websites out there. Mounted the wheel onto the jig and then screwed the nipples on until no thread was showing. A spin of the wheel and sure enough there were a few wobbles.

An hour later after getting ride of the wobbles and checking the dish I discover radial hops!!! Oh man! So I get to work truing those out adding tension, taking some away…taking ages. I have to admit that at one point I started losing concentration and was undoing tension by accident and truing the dish to the wrong side. It is worth noting down on paper which way you want to wheel to go visually.

Bit of food and water…classic fm is on. When I think it is done, I check the tension with my fancy blue Park Tool tension meter (recommended investment). Tensions seem uniform, but I do go around the wheel scientifically trying to get accuracy. A bit of OCD here! Mmmm…all looks ok, so after about 4 hours of strangely therapeutic efforts I have a wheel. It is round and strong! Haha

But then, I decided to convert my tyres to tubeless and something like this happens!

The stans liquid explodes everywhere…like being slimed from Ghostbusters!

So what did I learn. on your first wheel build, do it in stages over a one to three days, possibly a week. Break it up…oh and read Sheldon browns BEFORE you start!

sheldon brown wheel guide

I finished at midnight!

Hope you enjoyed reading…perhaps share your first wheel builds with us?

Thanks,

tBike. (junior wheelbuilder)

Christ! Took me about an hour and a half for my first one, I’m a bit quicker now having done about 10.

Congrats, I fancy building a wheel some day.

Congrats! I completed my first home build this week, really pleased with it.Nice and true and fairly round 🙂

Took a couple of hours spread over a few nights.
I used an old fork with some zip ties as a truing stand, will be trying it on the bike this week…

Currently gathering parts for a rear wheel, which I think may be trickier.

Hi
I have just built my second set of wheels. Thoroughly recommend buying this book. http://www.wheelpro.co.uk/wheelbuilding/book.php
Very practical and also has plans to build your own dishing tool and wheel jig. Works a treat.

A nipple driver will speed you up a bit and give you a more even initial spoke tension

Wheel building is great isn’t it 😉 I put a black mark on one half of spokey on each side so I know if I press that mark it is tightening the spoke that way you can’t forget

+1 for the nipple driver and the wheelpro book…

great job OP! 🙂

Fair play mate, I struggle riding my bike let alone building wheels, so fair play.