Wheels and breaker bars

I finally got around to building up a new rear wheel to match the front wheel which will be used on the nzumbi. After reanimating the road rat (which got unceremoniously stripped in building up the voodoo) i have given myself the ability to have 2 built up road going bicycles. The road rat, which will be used for errands, going to work and such, has cheap/used/old stuff and is much less of a target for thieves (spit!).

The nzumbi will be built using newer, posher stuff and will act as a miler muncher for when the trails are too maukit for off road riding, or i just fancy a loooooooooooooooooong ride.

I like wheel building. I now dont ride on any wheels i have not built myself. I have built with 3 different manufacturers rims (mavic primarily, DT and Salsa) i use DT spokes exclusively, comps and brass nips for the most part. I use phil, shimano, DT and paul hubs.

The rear wheel pictured i really enjoyed building. I have had the parts for ages: they were purchased so the front wheel (DT RR 1.1 to DT comps to 340 hub) would have a similar looking but singlespeed rear. The 340 hubs differ from the 240 i use as a singlespeed cassette rear in that they have steel axles and are not available singlespeed. This is a shame, as the 240 is really quite expensive...£220 at last count. So i decided to utilise my old favourite phil wood rear hub. Although coming in at nearly twice the weight of the DT, it is big, burly, beautifully smooth and a dream to build with on account of its huge flanges and super wide spacing.


















































Within the hour i had my new rear wheel on the bike.

The rim was considerably easier to build with than my previous DT RR - it seemed far more true initially and far less likely to pop out of true once tensioned correctly. My tensiometer tells me i have a good tension all around so it is either luck, skill (doubtful) or a result of a different rim alloy (possible, i did hear a rumour this has been changed) or the use of the hub. Or a mix...

Anyways, should serve me well..

I also slotted the Hunter forks on trina's bike. Her voodoo was designed around a longer fork than the 420mm P2s that were on it and the geometry should be more relaxed and easier to ride trickier stuff now the 440mm rick hunter 5 piece brazed beauty is in place. With that went an upgrade to a king headset....well, it deserves the best.

So - all we need now is some sunshine!

As an aside, ever wonder just how long a breaker bar you need to remove a bmx freewheel from a well used hub? see the
aluminium scaffold pole in the back ground....?