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Introduction
Welcome to my wheel
building page. First I would like to state that I only build
wheels as a hobby and have not built the a vast number of wheels
expected by a professional.
I have however devoted some time into the theory and have
practiced the building of wheels using irregular patterns. By
irregular I mean patterns other than Radial, 1 Cross, 2 Cross, 3
Cross etc.
I could not find any literature on this subject other than a
small snippet on Crows Foot in Jobst Brandt's book (a recommended
read). However he did state that there was probably no advantage
in building such a pattern, and he may well be correct.
Despite this I decided I wanted to build a 36 spoke Crows Foot
purely from the challenge of building it, And secondly to ride on
a wheel that is reasonably unique. There is a certain amount of
satisfaction in riding on a wheel that is unique. We all like to
personalize our bikes somehow so why not with a unique hand
crafted pair of wheels.
I do assume that you have some wheel building knowledge or have
at least read a book on the subject of wheel building.
There are certain problems you have to consider when embarking on
a new pattern.
These are:
Number of spokes you can use in the pattern. For example a Crows foot has 3 spokes in the pattern and therefore can only be used on wheels that have the total number of spokes on each side divisible by three. Or put another way the total number of spokes in the wheel divisible by twice the spoke in the pattern. This implies that a Crows Foot wheel can only be built on 18,24,36,48 spoke wheels.
How difficult will the wheel be to build and maintain. Complex patterns such as the 40 Spoke Crows Foot Below (5 Spokes per pattern) was very difficult to build, and replacing a spoke could require major surgery. You may wish to consider where the wheel will be used as a wheel like this could result in major surgery while cycling through the most deserted and hostile parts of the world. I only use this wheel for commuting and club runs so I should not be caught out. However so far this wheel has been remarkably reliable.
Where is the best place to put the valve. You must have easy access to the valve. I initially spent hours with pieces of paper drawing the designs, then I spent several hours writing a software package to display them. This package was used to for the illustrations in this site. They are simple but effective.
Please don't pay to much attention to the scale. These are
probably going to be incorrect as it depends on the resolution of
you screen etc.
I'd just like to make one point clear. All these wheels are built
for FUN and not because of some belief that they
are superior in any way. There is no consideration for weight or
aerodynamics. Just aesthetics.
The site has now been updated with photo's on there respected pages. I apologies if they take a long time to load, although I have done what ever is possible to help speed things along. They do illustrate how the spokes are weaved and in some cases this occours close to the hub causing the spokes to leave the hub at acute angles. I was not sure what if I might experience an increase in spoke breakage but so far have had none.
If anyone out there has built any unusual patterns or is about to start doing so, I would be very interested in knowing. So please Email me.
Due to the introduction of photo's I have included some Java gizmo's to help speed up the downloading of the graphics in this site. The Contents Screen (to the left) should contains all the necessary links to navigate around this site. These links have coloured bullets. These mean:
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No graphics for page downloaded yet. Slow to display. |
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Download of graphics for page in progress. Display should be faster but a little waiting for graphics can be expected. |
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Graphics now downloaded. Display of page should be fast. |
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Error occurred in download. You may still view this page but it will be slow to display. Please Email me if this happens. |
You can still go to any page at
any time. It will just be time efficient to enter the pages first. By the
time you have read all the introduction I hope all bullets should
be .
Please send Email to: cookrp@rpcsoftware.co.uk
