Wheel building at Birmingham Bike Foundry

petemarshall · Post by **petemarshall** » 27 Jan 2015 22:01

A long time since I built my own wheel and to be perfectly honest it took ages and a lot of messing about!
I think it's about time I actually did a proper course.
The Birmingham Bike foundry seems both a very worthy cause and runs day long courses at £60.
http://www.birminghambikefoundry.org/tr ... 20Building

I am assuming some of you on here have experience of the place. Is it any good? Is the course decent?

My touring bike rims are starting to get pretty near to the end of their days (beautifully built by Red Kite quite a while ago), using it for shopping and commuting this winter is going to finish them off so I want to rebuild them to the original (very high, never had to retune them over 1,000 of km's fully laden and on some very dodgy surfaces). I would like to do it myself, but don't want to spend loads on expensive DT swiss rims only to make rubbish wheels which spend more time being re tensioned than they do being ridden.

Post by **CakeStop** » 27 Jan 2015 22:27

Are you just doing a like-for like rim replacement or building completely new wheels from scratch?

If the former, with a methodical approach and patience, it's not at all difficult to get good results. Having said that £60 for what should be an interesting day which will also equip you to do the latter sounds like a good investment.

petemarshall · Post by **petemarshall** » 27 Jan 2015 22:54

I will be using new spokes and I think the present rear rim has been "upgraded" by DT swiss so it may be different.
I have rebuilt front wheels with the old spokes in the past, they worked very well except I did have a spoke break (although I was using a 32 spoked front wheel with front panniers which may have contributed).

I also built a complete wheel from scratch (not so good but it worked).

I would rather replace spokes when re building a wheel. Decent hubs will outlive a couple of sets of rims, but I am not sure spokes do.

And I would rather do things myself when I have the time.

Si_Walker · Post by **Si_Walker** » 28 Jan 2015 07:15

Pete,
I went the course about a year ago and found it really interesting. I had 'one to one' tuition (just me on the course) and it lasted the best part of a day. I've not built a wheel since, it was something I fancied doing just for the 'hell of it'. In doing the course it did teach me quite a bit about how to straighten a wheel if it goes out of true which i have had cause to do a couple of times. The foundry will probably built one for you if you supply them with the materials and they can offer advice (which you probably don't need) on spoke lengths etc.

Andy Terry · Post by **Andy Terry** » 28 Jan 2015 09:36

I did the course at the Bike Foundry last year - just something I've always wanted to do. Like Si, I haven't built another wheel since. but I feel confident I could true one up. I built a 26" rear wheel using my own rim and hub. Very satisfying.

Clive · Post by **Clive** » 28 Jan 2015 12:28

I did this course Autumn 2013, and I also had one to one tuition for most of the day. I took in all the components and built a pair of good solid wheels for my old hybrid; Tiagra hubs, Rigida Sputnik rims and sapim spokes. They are as true now as the day I built them. it was well worth the money and I have built and refurbished wheels since with good success. It is somewhat satisfying cycling on your own built wheels.

A good additional/alternative reference source is The Professional Guide to
Wheel Building By Roger Musson. he has an online spoke calculator and a downloadable book which I have found helpful for £9.

http://www.wheelpro.co.uk/spokecalc

I found Spa cycles in Harrogate very helpful too. They gave good advice regarding spoke choice, will do all spoke calculations if you buy from them and will price match too.

I see rims as consumables really certainly with rim brakes and potholes, and think good hubs and spokes will pair with many subsequent rims.

There seems many a good deal out there at the moment. I've just ordered Mavic open pro rims (£34 at all terrain cycles) and a pair of Shimano 105 hubs for £52 (Wiggle). Just ordered an Ultegra cassette for £28.50 too (Wiggle).

I noticed during my search for parts a pair of Shimano Tiagra hubs for £33 and a Sora front hub for around a fiver. (Ribble I think).

Philip Whiteman · Post by **Philip Whiteman** » 28 Jan 2015 13:14

OFF TOPIC - nice to see again, Clive. I was only thinking yesterday that we have not heard /seen you much recently.

BACK ON TOPIC - I had considered undertaking this course but then ruled it out following a discussion with Alan:

1. You need to regularly practice wheel building, which is fine if you like that type of thing and have the time;

2. In order to maintain your own wheels, in addition to the necessary truing stand, you also need a good stock of nipples, appropriate spokes, etc.

So, given the cost benefit analysis, I thought it better to contract out wheel building and repairs.

petemarshall · Post by **petemarshall** » 28 Jan 2015 14:19

I was happy once to contract out wheel building but not so much these days.
It's fine if you are having a fully built wheel the St John's Street cycles and a couple of other shops offer an excellent service. The problem comes when rebuilding with an old hub. Then you need the LBS. In the past every shop built so many wheels that there was always a skilled builder. Now most shops sell ready made wheels and employ staff on minimum wage who may build very few wheels. So I would rather do it myself.
I have a truing stand and the tools I require for any rim, spoke, hub combination I am ever likely to use so I think I will give it a go.

AlanW · Post by **AlanW** » 28 Jan 2015 17:59

petemarshall wrote: Now most shops sell ready made wheels and employ staff on minimum wage who may build very few wheels. So I would rather do it myself.

To be fair, it all depends on what shops you go to. I can think of a number of local cycle shops that are more than capable of building a quality wheel?

As I explained to Phil when we were talking about it the other weekend, its the tooling up costs that killed the exercise for me. So if you want to do a proper job, the truing stand, dishing stick and most certainly a spoke tension gauge.

I got as far as getting the truing stand, and very good it was to, made the job so much easier. But again, and as I also said to Phil, unless your doing it all the time, then you do loose that certain knack of perfection

listensqueak · Post by **listensqueak** » 28 Jan 2015 19:28

Hi Pete. The only time I have ever broken spokes is on a relatively new wheel, probably due to them being over tensioned. I have replaced rims on the mtb a few times using the old spokes and never had a failure. Having no jig I true them up on the bike, using the brake blocks to sight the tolerances. It seems a simple process and pretty foolproof If I got away with it.

Post by **CakeStop** » 28 Jan 2015 19:45

listensqueak wrote:Having no jig I true them up on the bike, using the brake blocks to sight the tolerances. It seems a simple process and pretty foolproof If I got away with it.

Me to although I out a cable tie around a fork leg and cut it so that rotating it on the fork put's the end a whisker away from the rim. I've replaced rims on existing hubs & spokes using this method (I reckon 2 rims per set of spokes) but I can appreciate that for more regular wheel building and building new wheels from scratch a jig would be most desirable.

petemarshall · Post by **petemarshall** » 28 Jan 2015 20:22

I have a truing stand. You can build wheels using it, but it's not as good as the sort you would get in a proper workshop.
The course includes membership of their Tool club, which gives you regular access to their fully equipped workshop with all the tools you would need.
A tension meter makes wheel building a whole lot easier.

I have trued wheels on the go using the brakes (don't think cable ties were as easy to get in those days, but obviously better than using the brakes as Steve says), but usually for other people whose wheels were so out of true it was madness. These days, most people have machine built wheels and I leave them well alone. Weird spoke keys required and such high tensions and so few spokes I don't dare go near them. Shouldn't really go out of true anyway given how much they cost!

Also had to do it in the bad old days on touring bikes when even with 36 spoked wheels they regularly went out of true carrying large loads. Trying to true a wheel to old fashioned canti's (which themselves were never true) was a big pain, along with regular **flat**s

. Advances in technology have improved rims no end, allowing stiffer wheels less likely to go out of trim if well built to start with and of course modern tyres are just the business.

**flat**s are things of days gone by (famous last words as the hedge cutting gets started round by us)

A truing stand makes that job a lot easier. Tensioning without a meter is a bit of guess work and a decent ear to try and get all the spokes sounding the same. The recent rebuilt wheels I had were not tensioned enough and I had to go round every spoke adding a quarter to half a turn. These built by a shop with, I assume, a meter.

Clive · Post by **Clive** » 28 Jan 2015 21:50

Philip Whiteman wrote:OFF TOPIC - nice to see again, Clive. I was only thinking yesterday that we have not heard /seen you much recently.

Thank you. I've been out of the saddle for a while for numerous reasons, but getting back into it now and getting fitness back I hope. Last 200km audax was the Cheltenham flyer last March, may do it this year as a comeback ride - but it probably isn't the easiest to start with again.

Back on thread; I think the things most needed for wheel building are time, patience and the will to do it - it can't be rushed. A lot can be done with little or no expensive tools, Roger Musson in his book describes how to make your own nipple driver and wooden truing stand which would be perfectly adequate.

I bought a cheap £40 or so truing stand, but it is a tad flimsy and a better one would be nice. I have a tensionometer, but 4 wheels I built from scratch before I bought it were all within 10% of the given tension ranges - I think there is a tendency to over tighten. I have in the past used highlighter pens strapped to the frame with an elastic bank for truing.

Last time I had a pair of wheels trued in a cycle shop, they came out worse than when they went in. That was when my bike was new, straight out of the box from Spa cycles/SE Asia with untrued factory built wheels - dreadful when one spends around £900 really.

Patch · Post by **Patch** » 03 Feb 2015 11:42

New bikes often have untrue wheels. They sit in a container for several weeks in docks, on boats etc and have to endure huge temperature changes during their journey here. First pair of wheels I ever built were a forced rush job for a customer. I used a book for instruction as nobody else in the company could build wheels. Wheel builder was outsourced and not available. The wheels were dispatched and customer called to say how they were the best pair he had ever had. He also went on to become a regular the wheels were fine. So I would say learn how to do it a nice skill to have under your belt.

Andy Terry · Post by **Andy Terry** » 03 Feb 2015 15:23

Clive wrote:Roger Musson in his book describes how to make your own nipple driver

... out of an old screwdriver ... and very useful it was too.

You never know when it might come in handy.

Carl_Williams · Post by **Carl_Williams** » 03 Feb 2015 18:49

Fin at Bike Foundry taught me back in 2011. The course was over two evenings. I supplied my own components so I kept the wheels at the end. They survived a few years of commuting over Birmingham's finest pavé but now the rims are shot. I'm just waiting for some new rims to replace them.

I've paid my £10/year(?) for Tool Club since they've been in Stirchley and have been back to use the truing stands a couple of times. My wheels survived the Tour of the Black Country unscathed.

I'd thoroughly recommend them and the joy of riding on your own handbuilt wheels. You'll easily re-coup the cost of the course over the life of the wheels and the experience.