Wheelworks.co.nz, Handbuilt wheels by Tristan Thomas

With the Tour of the Vineyards starting next week Wheelworks Racing is rife with inter-team rivalry.  Kicking off with a timetrial for the first time has caused all sorts of inter-team smacktalk (yes, more than usual) especially as WWR is the Euskaltel of New Zealand road racing with none* of us known for their prowess against the clock.

The winner of this sweepstakes will receive a Wheelworks bottle which may- or may-not be filled with jetplanes.  Pick the fastest Wheelworks Racing rider (and get closest to his time) to win – place your comments at facebook.com/WheelworksRacing

*Andy Hagan

Due to being the only WWR member who owns a TT bike, skin suit and funny looking helmet, Andy is exempt from this competition.  If he doesn’t post the fastest time he’ll be forced, like a Ninja, to commit ritual suicide with an aerobar.

Greg Taylor

My personal pick – Greg is more rouleur than grimpeur and can pack a mean 10km lead-out

Pros:

Rode Southland

Has the tallest socks in WWR

Cons:

Due to getting old it takes Greg a long time to warm up and 9.4km might not be enough to get the diesel sparking.

Chris Kendall

A potential dark horse of the timetrail.

Pros:

Probably the most TT experience on the team.

Smooth style on the bike

Uses aerobars

Cons:

Kendall’s beard puts him at an aerodynamic disadvantage

Stu Houltham

If Stu can translate smack-talk to performance he’s a shoe-in, however so far this year he’s yet to do so.

Pros:

7 National mountain bike championships under his lycra

With 5 corners the technical (for a TT) course is suited to Stu’s bike handling skills.

Uses aerobars

Cons:

The safety pins Stu needs to keep his armwarmers in place will flap causing excess drag.

Tristan Thomas

Riding well at the moment but racing poorly if Tristan can make the stars align he will be in for a good ride.

Pros:

Uses aerobars

Like Kate Moss in Family Guy when he turns sideways he’s skinny enough to disappear.  This could be advantageous in crosswinds.

Cons:

Towering at 6’4″ Tristan’s height presents a significant aero barrier.

With the attention span of a 3 year old it’s highly likely Tristan will get bored, start dreaming about building wheels, and back off.

Michael Naylor

Racing on home soil infront of Mum and Dad is sure to boost Mike’s performance.

Pros:

Don’t let Mike’s boyish good looks and blond hair fool you: he’s tough on the inside.

His new Bont shoes look PRO.

Mike has cut back on the hokey-pokey icecream this year.

Cons:

Aerobars and cycle computers are considered frivolous items.  In a sport where the more money you spend the faster you go this might be Mike’s downfall.

In the womans event it’s Kirsten vs Janine.  Using her SlamMySeatpost timetrail bike this is an unfair fight and thus wagers will not be taken.

680 grams is pretty light for a front wheel, however for an aluminium clincher rear wheel this is pretty much unheard of.

Start with a 136 gram hub then use only 20 light weight Sapim CX-Ray, matched with aluminium nipples, and an American Classic CR420 rim. I’m generally not a fan of rebuilding onto a used rim (more often than not “no” will be the answer) this rim appeared to be in good shape, and given the intended purpose and combination of light weight and reasonable 30mm depth the rim fit the bill.

Months ago the idea of a black jersey was mentioned at a team meeting and the gears started turning.  We were very conscious of not having a jersey which looked like the awesome PureBlack kit.

All of the Wheelworks Racing guys and gals are huge PureBlack fans.  To hear the news that they weren’t able to secure funding for next year’s European campaign is extremely sad. Hopefully this is just a temporary stumbling block for them.

It sucks for everyone:  For the riders, especially guys like the uber talented young fellas James Oram and Michael Torckler, it’s too late for them to find another international team for 2012.  For Avanti who need to prove they have a top-tier bike as they enter foreign markets.  For New Zealand cycling which looses an inspirational, groundbreaking, iconic team.  For NZ corporates who missed the opportunity to showcase their brands to the world on the jersey of a bunch of top kiwi blokes.

These black Wheelworks jerseys are our tongue-in-cheek way of showing our respect for the PureBlack boys.

David in Auckland wanted a stiff, durable pair of wheels to replace his Askiums. David is a big, tall rider so I suggested the excellent White Ind H3 hubset – with it’s steel axle, titanium freehub body and 5 bearing design the rear hub works really well for bigger riders.

Hed C2 rims will allow lower tyre pressures for a more comfortable ride with more traction in the corners. DT Swiss Competition spokes and a combination of brass and aluminium nipples will keep this wheelset rotating for many kms to come.

We settled on yellow decals to match his Scott CR.

Cameron had a pretty clear idea of what he wanted when he approached me, right down to the style of decals he wanted.

A 24 hole Alchmey ELF front hub and 32h ORC rear hub are laced with DT Swiss Aerolite bladed spokes to a pair of Hed C2 rims.

The decals are fully custom – I took the original Hed decal and scanned the logo, changed the colours around, and matched them up to some custom red and white spokes. I don’t normally do this style of decal but I really like the way it turned out.

A wheelset weight of 1483 is incredibly light for such a stiff, durable wheelset.

Enve’s awesome new 6.7 rims are starting to ship. This pair is laced to an Alchemy ELF front hub and a DT Swiss 240s rear hub with DT Swiss bladed Aerolite spokes.

Decals are custom bogan-black to match the stealth look of the rims.

If you haven’t read about Enve’s 6.7 rims then check out this Velonews and this BikeRadar article. Rims are in stock and I can build them to whatever hubs are going to be the best match for your weight and riding style.

Craig selected Crest rims and an Alfine 11 speed rear hub to make an ultimate do-all mountain bike / commuter wheelset for him and his wife to use in Mt Manganui.

I laced these wheels up with DT Swiss Competition spokes and brass nipples on all four corners.

As with all Wheelworks wheels they’re true to less than a tenth of a millimeter (that’s about the width of a strand of hair) and should stay that way for a long time to come.

Right from the get-go this was a cool project: take a pair of old Campag Record hubs with Colnago patographing, convert them to fit a 126mm-spaced Colnago Master, and build some wheels around them.

In the box: two hubs, an axle, a bunch of bearings, a 7 speed freewheel, and an 8 speed freewheel. Yep – freewheel. Pre-cassette.

First I fitted the new, longer axle, and mocked-up the spacing. I left a 1.5mm overhang on the driveside.

Then the fun starts. After a few notes, a couple of measurements, and bit of math it’s time to make chips.

With the new spacer made I can adjust the hub bearings. When correctly adjust an open-bearing hub will have a slight amount of play before the quick release is clamped – the force of the QR actually compresses the axle and removes this play. Wheelbuilding with a loose hub is a pain and makes it very hard to hit the tenth of a millimter targets I build to so at this point the hub is adjusted to be too tight.

With the hub in one piece I can measure the flange offsets and calculate the spoke lengths are per normal.

Peter wanted a pair of smooth-riding wheels for his DI2 Storck. The 23mm wide Hed C2 rim fit the bill perfectly and laced to a pair of DT Swiss 240s hub will match Peters weight and riding.

For the front wheel I used 24 Aerolite bladed spokes and aluminium nipples.

The rear wheel uses 28 of the same Aerolite spokes. The non-driveside nipples are aluminium to save weight, and the driveside ones are brass to handle the higher tension of this side of the wheel.

I fitted the rims with Stan’s yellow tubeless tape so that Peter will be able to fit RoadTubeless tyres in the future.

These Pro2 hubs and Crest rims are destined for the new Niner of Bushloves’ Tony teh Tiger.

Based on Tony’s weight and his gram-counting nature I use DT Swiss Revolution spokes for the front and rear non-driveside, and stiffer Competition spokes for the driveside. It doesn’t matter how light the wheel is if it doesn’t go where you point it, and these stiffer spokes really help.

Red aluminium nipples match the hubs perfectly and look great.