Exploding Myths!

There are lots of myths surrounding wheels and their building. I’ll try to explode as many as I can here!

MYTH: Black spokes are more prone to breaking.
TRUTH: Cheap black spokes are prone to breaking, but no more so than cheap silver spokes. Limited budgets get spent on presentation (i.e. the black coating) first, substance last. Quality spokes last for ages, irrespective of hue.

MYTH: Building wheels is some kind of black art.
TRUTH: Painting with oils is an art. Carpentry is an art. Building wheels is a technical discipline involving a relatively straight-forward mechanical process, whereby a collection of ready-made components are assembled according to a set of instructions, the results of which are measurable. Building flat pack furniture is not an art, and neither therefore is building wheels.

MYTH: Competition between the mail order wheel builders has driven prices down to a point where it’s not worth building your own wheels.
TRUTH: This is not so clear-cut, because it depends upon precisely what you are after. My pair of wheel builds can certainly be achieved far cheaper by sourcing the components and putting them together yourself, as I have shown. Something more akin to my DMR Revolver/DT EX 5.1d wheels is a different matter, because some of the components are not widely available or are new to market, so there are little or no discounts to be had.

MYTH: Reviews in the cycling press give a good indication as to who the best wheel building shops are.
TRUTH: Think of magazine reviews more as an extension of the retailers’ (read “advertisers’”) marketing strategy than an objective evaluation of the product. Quite often the wheels will have been ridden for no more than a day at most before scoring 9 out of 10 and are rarely tested against their direct competitors.

MYTH: The mail order wheel builders are all pretty similar, just go with the cheapest.
TRUTH: To some extent it’s a lottery whomever you use, but Merlin Cycles are probably the most consistent.

MYTH: The quality of the hubs/rims/spokes/nipples (delete as applicable, depending upon to whom you listen!) is of the utmost importance.
TRUTH: My opinion only, but the quality of all the components is equally important.

MYTH: Spokes get broken through hard riding.
TRUTH: The spokes are the strongest, most fatigue resistant part of a wheel. Spokes break because the wheel was either poorly made, poorly maintained or has been damaged in some way. Sometimes all three!

MYTH: Plain gauge spokes build a stronger wheel.
TRUTH: This perpetuates because some people can’t get their thick heads around the fact that a thicker spoke doesn’t necessarily make a stronger wheel. Firstly, the spokes aren’t the weak point in a correctly built wheel, the rim eyelets and hub flanges are. Secondly, spokes don’t break due to weakness; they usually break due to fatigue. Only if the spoke is thicker in the right area (usually the elbow) does this improve its fatigue life and plain gauge spokes are no thicker in this area than butted spokes. Plain gauge and double butted spokes build equally strong wheels, but those using the former will be heavier and cheaper. So the next time you see wheels advertised as “built with plain gauge spokes for strength”, tell the seller that they’re a berk!

MYTH: Double butted spokes build a stronger wheel.
TRUTH: This one always makes me laugh, as though removing material from a component can make it stronger! The explanation behind it is that when under load butted spokes will stretch a tiny bit more than plain gauge spokes and therefore some people claim, not without some justification, that this tiny bit of extra flex is enough to dissipate shocks more evenly across the whole structure thus improving fatigue life but NOT ultimate strength.

MYTH: You can’t re-use old spokes on a new wheel.
TRUTH: You can re-use spokes over and over again, providing that the wheels that they have previously been a part of have been properly built & stressed and that the spokes are the correct length and not damaged in any way. You should use new nipples each time though.

MYTH: You can re-use an old rim on a new wheel
TRUTH: Sometimes you can, but I wouldn’t. Rims are disposable items, especially if they’ve been used with rim brakes. Rims with dings or other damage should be discarded.

MYTH: You can get good advice on web forums.
TRUTH: You can certainly get a lot of advice, but not much of it is of any use except for passing the time of day. However, sometimes you get pointed towards a resource from which you might actually learn something worthwhile.

MYTH: A wheel can collapse if you don’t build/true it properly, so it’s best to take it to a pro.
OR: If you go out for a walk this lunchtime you might get hit by a car while crossing the road, so it’s best stay at your desk and post nonsense on internet forums.
TRUTH: If a wheel is in danger of collapsing during normal use then it will be so obviously out of shape that only a fool would even consider riding it. So no, it won’t collapse. Truing a wheel, especially, is very simple and a good guide can be found on Park Tool’s website.

MYTH: Wheel builders are beardy-wierdy train-spotterish loners.
TRUTH: I don’t have a beard!

If you can think of any other myths (lets try to keep it wheel-relevant), feel free to explode them hereunder!