Can I re-use hubs and rims from an old wheel?

robbarker

I'm keen to learn how to build my own wheels and have an old pair of unused training wheels here, doing nothing in particular. They are made from Ultegra 9 speed hubs and Open Pro rims, laced radially on the front and radial/x2 at the rear.

I am thinking of dismantling them and rebuilding them x3, more for practice than anything else. Is this a viable plan or will the rims be twisted and so out of true to be unuseable, once dismantled?

Also, can anyone point me to an online spoke length calculator that has Ultegra 9 speed hubs as a parameter?

Smokin Joe

There is nothing wrong with re-using servicable hubs and rims, but it is not a good idea to use a different lacing pattern as the holes in the hubs will have elongated and altering the angle of the spoke will further open the hole's out.

Monty Dog

Only relace a used hub or rim with the same spoke patterns - changes can cause problems with stresses and lead to premature failure. A good online spoke caluculator is on the DT Swiss website - has most of the popular hubs on there.

John Stevenson

The specific problem here is that your old hubs will have become grooved where the old spokes were fitted.

If you change the lacing pattern your new spokes won't fit in those grooves, and may well cross the raised edges of the grooves.

That's a bad thing, the kind of stress raiser that's liable to assist a spoke to an early demise from fatigue.

bryanm

But if all he's doing is learning to build wheels, rather than building wheels to use then there's no issue with stress, fatigue etc.. ?

John Stevenson

bryanm

That's a fairly decent set of hubs and rims. It would seem a shame to build them into wheels that one can't then rely on.

aracer

John Stevenson wrote:

The specific problem here is that your old hubs will have become grooved where the old spokes were fitted.

If you change the lacing pattern your new spokes won't fit in those grooves, and may well cross the raised edges of the grooves.

That's a bad thing, the kind of stress raiser that's liable to assist a spoke to an early demise from fatigue.

Almost. I'd suggest it's actually the hub flange which is in danger of failure due to the stress riser (since that's what the stress riser is in).

robbarker

Thanks all - I hadn't realised that lacing to a different pattern would be an issue, so i've decided to leave these wheels alone and order some rims. hubs and spokes and give it a go. I have Roger Musson's excellent e-book (www.wheelpro.co.uk) which makes it all sound very simple, and I have Jobst on order.

How hard can it be?

I'll keep you posted..

Thanks also for the pointer to the excellent DT spoke length calculator - a very useful bookmark!

bikepacker

Wheel building is fairly straight forward and fullfilling. It's a nice feeling riding on your own well built wheels. I found Roger's book is easier to follow than Jobst Brandt. Also I spent a day with Roger Musson and learnt the proper way from a master.