Two years ago, I built a front wheel for my bike. I got a hub, spokes, nipples, and a rim and put them together into a wheel. It was fun to learn how the spokes, which are in tension, put the rim into compression, which is a structurally more stable configuration. Then the way the spokes from either side of the hub pull the rim in the transverse direction and when tightened from both sides of the hub they can change the radial displacement of the rim.
This past winter (2007) I started to build a rear wheel. It is slightly more complicated, since the cassette - the sprockets on the rear wheel - offset the spokes on that side of the wheel and make them asymmetric compared with the spokes on the other side. I have built the wheels in the basement shop of my friend Robert from work (same Robert as from previous
posts). He was very helpful in guiding me through the process and for giving me access to the shop 24/7.
I laced the spokes in a 3X pattern, which means each spoke crosses over three other spokes as it goes from the hub to the rim. There are also 2X, 1X and radial spoke patterns, but since I am so heavy, I went with the 3X design to optimize strength.
I have 9 sprockets in the cassette, which is referred to as a 9-speed bike, though I have two chain rings in the front, which gives me 18 gear combinations. The largest three sprockets in the cassette are made of titanium, which is why they look a little duller than the others. The six other sprockets are made of steel.
I will break the new wheel in on the roller trainer I picked up from a garage sale recently. It is getting too cold to ride outside lately, though I got in a short ride with Charlene and Robert today.
More about the ordeals with the trainer in a future post.
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By the way... I give you 100% of the credit for helping me to solve my electrical problem today. If you hadn't have suggested connecting the "hot" ground to a ground on another circuit, I would not have set off the smoke detector which, as I have already explained, led me to the smoke detector hidden in the ceiling which was wired incorrectly. !!!
For those of you who don't know what Bill is talking about: He and I were chatting via IM Sunday morning. He set up his laptop webcam in the basement as he tried to debug his electrical problems down there. I encouraged him to get a voltmeter and try and track down the problem that way. I ended up abandoning him to go on a bike ride and finish my rear wheel construction. He ended up discovering a smoke detector that had been drywalled over up in the ceiling! Perhaps he will write a blog entry about it.
A couple of years ago my son in Houston Jeff had a short in his garage. Couldn't figure it out for several days until he remembered putting up some new brackets to hold tools! Oops, be careful when nailing into the wall.
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