A thousand... LOL!
Thanks, Elmo.
Thanks for your reply.
I well understand what you're saying, but first, there are no original wheels with heavy duty spokes. What I make I hope will be comparable to say a Husky wheel, not as good as a Worksman, because probably nothing is, but a good wheel for motorbicycling. As soon as you upgrade to drum brake hubs or disc you're talking money. For my wheels my cost will be determined in part by what I can find in a donor moped. If I can find a fairly complete one I'll have a suspension front fork, possibly headlight, tail light, drum hubs, throttle, speedometer, brake levers, handlebars and incidentals as parts scavenged. That's all that I might be interested in and the rest I can peddle on ebay where there is a brisk market for used parts, especially for ones like Honda and Puch. I think by advertising locally and watching Craigslist I should be able to find a donor in non running condition for a hundred bucks or thereabouts depending on how complete it is and in what condition. My ambition is to have what I sell from the bike pay for all or most of what I got in parts. For old cruisers the choices are limited in suspension front forks to either old and expensive Monark or Schwinn Springers. The new reproductions are not the greatest reportedly with the exception of Monarks which have been gone over with beefing up the welds and making sure all is right... and on my budget I just can't do it. The old cruisers had one inch headsets, threaded, so lots of things available for newer bikes won't work on an old one. The escape hatch for me is old mopeds which had nice suspension forks, threaded and will fit in an old cruiser head tube. So, we're not talking about shipping of anything except the spokes and nipples for lacing the wheels. Yes, a good bit of time will be involved, but that is something an old guy on social security has more of than money. If I were working long hours at good pay this venture might not make sense, but it works for me. And yes, there is also the satisfaction of adapting, fabricating, reusing what someone else thinks is junk, like an old dead moped.I'm looking forward to seeing these old 1952 Schwinn wheels which came of a ladies bike, nicely painted and with thick spokes reaching down to a hefty drum brake with good stopping power. How cool is that? Now all I have to do is learn how to do it.Thanks for your reply.
You make mention of saving money... I have to believe that cost of parts, ship, and time (if you place a value on that), will be more than that of cost to buy what is already available.
Buut, the experience of building your own wheelset gotta be priceless!
I look forward to your updates later on.
Thank you, Norm. I will definitely be asking for advice and will try to do a good thread with pictures so that somebody else can see that they could could do this, too. I've said before that you can teach an old dog new tricks so long as there's a treat involved. Riding along on wheels you've made yourself sounds a treat to me. It will be a month probably before I'm ready to proceed as I have to get from Minnesota to my winter situation in Maryland, get settled in, get the spokes and whatever else I need together. I also want to do some reading on the internet beforehand so that I'm at least a little familiar with things and can ask the right questions.
Actually, I'm looking forward to this all the while having no illusions that it is easy as pie. If I can do the first one in a day, that's fine. I'm not necessarily quick at picking something up anymore, especially since being hit by lightning fifteen years ago which resulted in a traumatic brain injury. Things take me longer now, but once I have it I'm like a bulldog and won't let go. This will be a real good thing to know. Thank you, my friend.
Barely see it from another angle. Custom wheels are like running and regular wheels are like walking. You had to learn to walk before you could learn to run. Custom wheels take the same skills as regular wheels. On this site the guy has a spoke calculator and there are others on the web as well. Wheel building : Hope Hoops, Notubes ZTR, books, guide, courses By the way this book is the best wheel building book that I have seen. He does it in a way that is easy to understand. Also he has plans in the book to build your own truing stand. I know that you can true a wheel on the bike but it is so much better on a stand.
