Wheelworks.co.nz, Handbuilt wheels by Tristan Thomas

The 2011 Tour of Wellington is all finished.  Check out these amazing photos from Joe Kelly of the boys at work and jump over to the team’s Facebook page for more great photos, updates, and insight.

Many thanks to all of the people who gave up their time to help the boys in this years tour.  Joe Kelly the photographer, Gary the chauffeur, James, Janine and Ross for handing out bottles, Nathan for his physio expertise, Mr and Mrs Hagan for their picnic making abilities, and for all the people who came out and cheered the boys from the side of the road.

With the Tour behind us we’ll be looking ahead to the upcoming races.

I’ll be out of the workshop for the rest of the week doing my job as driver / mechanic / coffee brewer / director sportif for the Wheelworks Racing Team as they compete in this year’s Tour of Wellington.

You can read about the members of the team or  follow the Team’s updates and photos at www.facebook.com/WheelworksRacing

I’ll have limited phone and email access over the week and weekend but leave a message and I’ll get back to you as quickly as possible.  Have a great week and make sure to stop by and say ‘hello’ if you’re lucky enough to watch the race :-)

Derek sent his Reynolds carbon clincher rear wheel down from Auckland to have it rebuilt with a PowerTap SL+ rear hub.

First things first – measure the wheel’s spoke tension, then remove tension from the spokes and cut-out the old spokes.  This is to get a benchmark for the tension which the wheel has been under and is especially important with carbon rims.

Then measure the ERD and hub dimensions and calculate spoke length. Spokes get cut and rolled to the precise length on my Morizumi. Now lace and tension the wheel!  It sounds easy but it takes a couple of hours to do correctly.

The wheel is then boxed up in my custom wheel boxes and returned to Derek.  There might even be a Wheelworks waterbottle or two in there….

Some other misc photos I take when I do rebulids

I’ve just replaced a broken Sapim CX-Ray spoke on a wheel I built in September 2009.  I don’t have an explanation for why the spoke broke: it failed at the j-bend for seemingly no reason.

It’s extremely rare that I see spoke or nipple failures on the wheels I’ve built but 100% of them have been with Sapim spokes or nipples:  this is the second broken spoke and I’ve replaced 4 broken nipples.  It’s important to note these account for a very small percentage of the past 5 years business and hundreds of wheels.

I stand 100% behind my work and the wheels I sell. I’m confident in my work and I offer a 5 year grantee against broken spokes.  Should there be a problem, as in this case, I’ll organize for the wheel to be couriered back to me, repaired, and returned – all at my expense.

I’ve used Sapim spokes in about 2% of the wheels I’ve built, and spoke nipples in approx 5%.  The rest have been with DT Swiss spokes and a combination of DT Swiss and Wheelsmith spoke nipples and I have not had a reported failure with either brand’s products.

If you have a wheel built by me with Sapim spokes or nipples there is no need to panic…the likelihood of a failure is remote.  If you have any questions about your wheels please don’t hesitate to get in touch.

These failures cost me a lot of time, a lot of money, and a lot of frustration.  Unless it’s a special case I won’t be using Sapim spokes or spoke nipples from now on.

Thanks for reading.

Tristan

Maz brought his Ulmo into the workshop for me to tidy up the cables and housing.

Before: The plastic Campag downtube cable stops were missing their barrel adjusters and the housing was a poor fit, way too long, and routed outside of the front brake.

At the rear derailleur the endcap from a cheap front brake was used for the shift housings ferrule.

After: I fitted some aluminium Campagnolo downtube cable stops with the correct barrel adjusters in them, shortened the housing, and fitted rubber o-rings to protect the paintwork.

At the rear derailleur I fitted the correct Campagnolo ferrule which has a small shoulder and sits inside the frame’s cablestop.

Frames of this era were never designed with modern indexed shifting in mind and often the cables would be routed over the steel bottom bracket shell….with non-indexed downtube shifters a little extra friction didn’t matter! To ensure great shifting with the reasonably-modern 9 speed drivetrain I fitted small section of teflon tubing. These also have the side benefit of saving the paint. I fitted new DuraAce cables into Maz’s Jagwire outer. The DuraAce cables come at a more expensive price but they’re tightly wound to reduce friction and made from stainless steel so they won’t rust – these are the only cables I use.

The paint on this bike was done by the late (and great) Ross Bee. The threadless fork isn’t the original but it seems to handle well on my short test-ride down to the end of Lyall Bay and back.

Mike Naylors race report from the Hub Tour in Hastings

Hub Tour 2011.

The Hub Tour in the Hawkes Bay is a well-run event which given its proximity to the other major races of the summer season, elites and Tour of Wellington tends to attract a formidable cast of riders all in fighting fit form. When Tristan and I watched Tim Gudsell of PBR disappear rapidly into the distance in-front of us during the Friday evening time trial all illusions that this would be an ‘easy weekend of sun, nice roads, vineyards and ice cream quickly dissipated.

The 6km prologue through up some pretty large time gaps, with Jeremy Vennell decked out in full TT kit putting an impressive 28sec into Andy who rode strongly for 7^th and over a minute into my-self and Tristan who occupied the lower part of the results. Never the less the ride back to the motel with the sun setting over the surrounding hills and the roads devoid of traffic put me in good spirits “I’ll make it back tomorrow”…

A scorcher of a day was building as we got ready the next morning for stage one of the tour, 3 laps of a 33km circuit which offered plenty of climbing. The bunch set off at a fairly sedate tempo and it stayed together over the first 10km which was effectively a series of short climbs strung together by false flat sections. After the K.O.M I felt confident enough to try my hand in a few moves none of which were of any real success. A strong group of 8 slipped away just before the second lap and looked certain to ride away with the race as their lead stretched to over a minute. But once we started climbing, the tempo rose and we pulled them back by the top of the K.O.M, shelling a dozen riders in the process.

All three of us Wheelworks riders were still accounted for in the group and things were looking good as we entered the last lap. I was feeling strong and was readying myself for fireworks on the K.O.M climb but they never eventuated soon after though every man and his dog was trying their hand and Andy and I were getting amongst it with vigour.

While I was on the front of the bunch Gudsell stormed by on my left shortly followed by Vennell on my right. Foolishly I burnt my matches trying to grab Vennell’s wheel and when failed got sent straight to the back of the bunch which was strung out in chase mode. The wheels in front of my lost contact with the bunch on the next climb and I gave it everything to bridge back up to them just in time for the next climb, which proved to be a bridge to far and I the gap opened again.

I looked behind me to see if help was on its way but given my state of extreme exhaustion couldn’t actually manage to co-ordinate this small task with that of steering. When I looked forwards again I was staring at a barbed wire fence and was soon crashing into the gravel verge in a cloud of dust and humiliation.

Thankfully Tristan stopped to pick me up, dust me off and provide company for the final 10kms to the finish. The scratches and bruises weren’t severe my front wheel and jersey were the real victims, both now retired from service. Up front Andy scored a solid 9^th place on the stage which was taken out by Bissell’s Patrick Bevan.

A few hours rest and we were back at it again with the afternoon criterium. The course looked easy enough with just four well-rounded corners. It started pretty easy to but after 10 minutes the pace started ramping up and never stopped. I was lazily sitting at the back and lacked both the power and will to move up and thus it was just a matter of time before a gap opened which I couldn’t close. I gave up the fight after the 20 min mark and joined the growing number of riders sheltering in the shade. Tristan followed soon after. Our melancholy was broken by the sight of Andy storming away from the bunch with one other inside five laps to go. Incredibly the two of them held off the bunch and Andy took a well fought 2^nd to Ben Olsen.

Stu did an outstanding job cooking us risotto and steak for tea and we all spent the evening enjoying the cooler temperatures outside.

Another morning another can of creamed rice and another stage, this time the last one of the tour. At 77km it wasn’t the longest but the two laps of the circuit provided a steep 2km climb each time followed by a rolling section exposed to the side wind which was just tailor made for attacking before turning off on the final lap for a short 1.5 km climb up the very steep Burma rd to the finish line.

The first lap provided almost no action and it was gruppo campacto at the bottom of the climb the second time around and just 20km to the finish. The pace was hard but not terrible as a headwind on the ascent hampered Andy’s efforts to blow things apart. I crested just metres off the back over the top and was back with what was left of the group by the next climb. Unfortunately I was maxed out and when the pace rose again and I went to get out of the saddle there was nothing left and my legs came to an almost complete stall. By the start of the Burma Rd climb those of us who’d dropped had formed into a small group, which included Tristan and the two of us engaged in a full on battle for line honours which involved head butts, elbows, swinging arms and more than one soiree into the gutter. I was proud to claim victory in the battle with a sprint in the last 150m.

Andy had been unlucky to make the front group when they split along the rolling section and finished 6^th on the stage for a final GC spot of 7^th which was highly commendable given the quality of the field. Thanks to his better criterium finish Tristan did one better than me to finish in 19^th. Jeremy Vennell won the stage but didn’t do enough to dislodge the yellow jersey from Shem Rodger’s shoulders as he took the overall win.

All that was left was to pack up the car buy an ice cream and head on home. A good weekend all round with great company, great weather and great racing. See you again next year Hawkes Bay!

Mike.

Mark is an ex-pat living in Melbourne and enjoying working on the other side of the ditch. He was returning to NZ for some Christmas riding and ordered a new pair of wheels for his Trek Remedy to collect while here.

He chose Hope Pro2 hubs for their front axle options, excellent seals, and great durability. Oh, and their bright red colour.

Rims are Stan’s Arch – the Arch is neglected with most people choosing the Crest because of it’s lighter weight but the reality is that with clever spoke options the Arch can often be built up nearly as light as the Crest but with better stiffness, tracking and durability. Win-win.

Alternating red and black spoke nipples finish off the build.

These hubs arrived late on Christmas eve and I came into the workshop on Christmas day to build the wheels – the last pair I built in 2010.

Mark supplied the 29er Flow rims and Hadley hubs and needed them built into a top quality pair of wheels for wet rides in the Akatarawas.

Hadley hubs are made in the USA and are top quality. The company doesn’t have a website but they’ve developed a cult following due to their high quality.

I used silver DT Swiss Competition spokes and brass nipples as Mark’s priorities were durability and stiffness rather than light weight.

As with all the wheels I build my initials and the invoice number are engraved at the valve hole – this shows the wheels are built to the highest possible standards and are guaranteed not to break a spoke for at least 5 years.

Andrew approached me after having these two wheels built for a recumbent trike. Unfortunately the wheels had been built twice and neither was up to Andrew’s standards (bent spokes aren’t a good look!)

I rebuilt the wheels with Sapim CX-Ray spokes…there weren’t many options for a light spoke in the very short lengths required.

The wheels came out really well and look great.

I love doing left-of-field jobs like this – it’s very interesting and quite often I either learn a lot or apply knowledge learned elsewhere to the job.