I've been spending my evenings building a new wheel set. Ambitious, but I had nothing to lose. The rims on the old wheels both had nasty dinks on them, not my doing, but the spokes and hubs were of a good enough quality, that I wouldn't want them to go to waste. So after a good few hours surfing the net looking at wheel sets, and realising that I couldn't afford anything of equal quality, I started looking at rims. I found a pair of Exal LX17 rims, which seemed to have reasonable write ups, and also described as 'forgiving' for the novice, for a little over £20. So I dismantled the old wheels over last weekend and have spent the last couple of evenings re building onto the new rims. After a few false starts, trying to get the lacing and spacing right, I fitted the new builds last night and took them for a ride today. First impressions.....NICE !. Well worth the effort. The most difficult part of the process was getting the wheel round. I've got it to within a couple of mm on both of them. Getting them straight was easier, as well the dishing. I used my rim brake settings to adjust them to run straight and central, but keeping them round meant a little more ingenuity. I ended up stretching a loop of fishing line across the stays/forks, and moving it back and forth as required. If todays outing is anything to judge by, then I have a lightish, strongish, quality set of wheels that will do me for many miles. Plus I got a bit of an ego boost knowing that I had managed to complete a task that I had never tried before. Chuffed
Spending the afternoon fitting and tuning to my liking, Hopefully get out on them tomorrow before the rain sets in. And in reply to Arch, not straight away, but its certainly a job I would try again.
) and checking over properly. That'll be next week.
