Wheelworks.co.nz, Handbuilt wheels by Tristan Thomas

Calum had a bit of a crash and destroyed his front Arch rim. I re-laced the Pro2 hub with new DT Swiss Competition spokes and black brass nipples to an Arch rim.

I also serviced the rear hub with a new set of 5 bearings and a good clean of the freehub body.

The XR-270 rims are now available in colours and I’m stocking red and silver.

This pair of wheels uses a custom blue pair of DT Swiss 240s hubs with two blue spokes at each valve. The wheels will be used for general training and a bit of club racing, but Ian has a similar pair with lighter hubs and fewer spokes which I built a few years ago for racing.

Front and rear non-driveside spokes are DT Swiss Revolutions, and stiffer Competitions are used on the rear driveside.  The driveside spoke nipples are brass, and I used aluminium for the non-drive and front.

At 1485 grams these wheels are still lighter than most out-of-the-box race wheels.

Spring seems to be a popular time of year to buy a Rohloff – a winter’s worth of drivetrain maintenance catches up and the simplicity of the gearbox suddenly makes sense. I’ve had four of these hubs to build in the last two weeks!

The Salsa rims work really well with the large flanges of the Rohloff hub. Some rims, like DT Swiss, don’t let the nipple exit at the right angle, and some spoke nipples, like Sapim, have a similar problem. I’ve got a lot of experience with these hubs so I know what combinations work well.

This wheel is being fitted to a Salsa La Cruz cyclocross / commuter / touring bike.

I had these hubs custom-coloured to match the silver stripes and logos on Paul’s BMC PRo Machine. The front hub is an Alchemy ELF, the rear a DT Swiss 240s. Spokes are DT Swiss Aerolites with the two spokes next to each valve coloured the same as the hubs. Rims are Kinlin XR-270 with custom silver decals to match the hubs and spokes.

I’ve been experimenting a lot with custom coloured hubs and spokes and I’ll be offering this as an option on more wheelsets in the future.

The wheelset weight is 1399 grams – super light for such a stiff and durable wheelset.

Some new silver bar tape and custom-painted stem top cap and preload cap finish it off.

This front wheel is for Paula Tesoriero’s new custom-made Cyfac timetrail bike with a front disc brake.

The Zipp 404 tubular rim doesn’t need much introduction: it’s the benchmark for mid-depth carbon rims and it’s aerodynamics make it perfect for this task.

24 hole disc hubs are hard to find but we tracked down a couple of XTR 965 hubs. This is a great hub for a timetrail bike as it’s light and has adjustable cup-and-cone bearings. To add every possible advantage I replaced the steel bearings with ceramic balls. The Center Lock splined rotor interface, when combined with the DT Swiss 6-bolt adapters, provides a light and aerodynamic way of mounting the brake rotor, and I’ve got some light weight KCNC rotors on order to save a few grams.

Spokes are Sapim CX-Ray which are aerodynamic and will match the 808 rear wheel Paula will use.

I love all-silver builds…modern high-performance components produce great performing wheels yet they have a classic appearance suitable for modern or classic bikes. We topped them off with white decals.

Wes wanted a pair of daily-use wheels which are fast enough for Sunday group rides and durable enough for mid-week riding and commuting.

This pair uses the White Industries H2 front hub and H3 rear hub. The front wheel is laced with 24 DT Swiss Revolution spokes and the rear with 28 spokes – DT Swiss Competition on the driveside and the lighter Revolution on the non-driveside.

1511 grams is lighter than a pair of Ksyrium SL’s (or similar) yet these wheels will have excellent durability and ride quality.

I’ve been a fan of mountain bike tubeless systems since day 1 and I’ve run tubeless on every bike I could including my 20″ bmx. This rim is Stan’s first road-specific rim, the Alpha340, which I wrote about last month.

I laced these super light rims up to a pair of DT Swiss 240s hubs in custom white using DT Swiss Aerolite and Competition spokes. I used the bladed Aerolite spokes on the front wheel and non-driveside of the rear wheel for light weight and good aerodynamics. On the driveside of the rear wheel I used the heavier Competition spokes to add some lateral stiffness to the rear wheel.

Even with a sensible 24h front / 28h rear and using brass nipples on the rear driveside this wheelset tipped the scales at only 1347 grams.

I’ve been riding these wheels for the past few weeks with a pair of normal (non-tubeless) GP4000s’ and inner tubes to see what they ride like, now that I’m used to them I’ll mount the 25c Hutchinson Intensive RoadTubeless tyres and see what the tubeless combo is like.

These are demo wheels so if you’re interested in trying road tubeless for yourself drop me a line.

These wheels will undergo a lot of kms as Darren prepares for IronMan.

The front hub is a Novatec 20 hole and the rear the excellent DT Swiss 240s.  Spokes are DT Swiss Competition.  The Competition is a double-butted round-section spoke with a great balance of weight and stiffness.  It make and makes a great spoke for the very stiff Kinlin XR-270 rim.

Total wheelset weight is 1552 grams – very light for such a durable wheelset.

Andrew has two Thorn touring bikes with Rohloff hubs…the old rims were getting a bit thin at the brake track so it was time for a replacement.

The amazing thing about the Rohloff hub is how well they last.  These two look like they’ve done a lot of miles yet the axles spin freely and they still change gear well.

I rebuilt the two hubs with Sun Rhyno Lite eyeletted rims and I used DT Swiss Competition spokes and brass nipples.

I laced this pair of DT Swiss 240s hubs to XR-270 rims for a great ‘all-round’ wheelset for Mark.

We used round-section DT Swiss Revolution spokes on the front wheel and Competition spokes on the rear.  The front wheel is laced 24 hole radial, the rear is 28 hole, 2-cross.  Both spokes are 2.0mm at the head and thread but the Revolution spokes are 1.5mm in the center section compared to 1.8mm for the Competition.

Lateral stiffness is less of a concern on the front wheel because of the widely spaced, symetrical flanges so a lighter spoke can be used to reduce weight and improve the ”feel’ of the wheel.  For the rear wheel stiffness is more important because the cassette pushes the driveside flange in towards the centerline.  Competition spokes add stiffness to the rear wheel and I used brass spoke nipples on the driveside to help with long-term durability.

Mark wanted to use red spoke nipples and red decals to match his frame and fork.  Plus red is the fastest colour :-)

This is a great pair of wheels and they represent great value for money.