So Robert, what is a shop willing to pay for a hand-built wheel with basic components? Spending an hour to an hour and a half on these, I can't imagine you are getting rich at it. I've been building all my own wheels for over 10 years - I think the last wheelset I had built by someone else was a set Bob Lickton built for me in 1998. I've never seriously considerd do this for a living, as I figured there really wasn't much money in it. Plus I figure that building for myself, if a wheel has a problem, I just redo it and don't have to deal with an unhappy customer. Truth is, I find wheelbuilding to be kind of therapeutic, almost like a ritual.
Like so many things connected with cycling, I admire those who actually have the will to build wheels for a living, as I have learned enough about bicycles to know that there are many, many easier ways to make a living.
Regards,
Jerry Moos
Big Spring, Texas, USA
> From: mrrabbit@mrrabbit.net <mrrabbit@mrrabbit.net>
> Subject: Re: [CR] wheel-building machinery
> To: hsachs@alumni.rice.edu, "Harvey Sachs" <hmsachs@verizon.net>
> Cc: jerrymoos@sbcglobal.net, "Classic Rendezvous" <classicrendezvous@bikelist.org>
> Date: Friday, April 10, 2009, 8:40 PM
> Dirty little secret of the wholesale distribution basic and
> replacement wheel
> business...many distributors for the various regions of the
> US including my own
>
> do this...
>
> Lots of distributors will call a 20 minute wheel built by
> an employee at home
> a "hand-built" wheel.
>
> Typically the employee does 'em on spare time for
> roughly 8 bucks apiece - so
> they are encouraged to do at least 3 an hour. Some can do
> 4.
>
> And of course they are passed off as a "better"
> substitute for the same
> machine-
> built wheel that was done in 10 minutes - 5 by hand and 5
> by machine.
>
> They'll often use two spoke wrenches at once - no lube
> on the seats - and
> literally start off with 2-3 complete turns right off the
> back before spending
> the final 5-10 minutes fine truing - and rarely get
> anywhere near +/- .002
> inches or decent tension.
>
> ...slick advertising really...
>
> I.e., like the machine-built wheels - they still need some
> finishing work.
>
>
> My wheel business is basically:
>
> The same machine built basic and replacement wheel but hand
> assembled, lubed,
> trued and tensioned, stress relieved, adjusted and spun,
> for a total build time
>
> of at least an hour - often 1.5 hours for rear wheels.
>
> Some shops and customers do want to know that the wheel
> coming off the shop
> hook is "truly" a "hand-built" wheel
> "quality"-wise even though it may be a
> cheap basic and replacement wheel.
>
> For a shop that is really busy during the Summer - my
> wheels help 'em get low-
> end work out fast but right - so the higher-end and
> higher-revenue generating
> stuff such as overhauls and custom bikes don't get held
> up. I don't sell much
> during the winter - nor do I expect to.
>
> Of course like most builders, I do high end wheels as well.
>
> http://www.mrrabbit.net/
>
> =8-)
>
> Robert Shackelford
> San Jose, CA USA
>
> p.s., If the link above is not appropriate Dale, let me
> know.
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> Quoting Harvey Sachs <hmsachs@verizon.net>:
>
> > Jim Papadopoulos, my wife, and I visited the Schwinn
> works in Chicago in
> > the Fall of 1974. At that time, assembly of
> run-of-the-mill steel-rim
> > wheels was a two part process. Humans spoked the
> wheels. They were then
> > put on a machine that mechanically tensioned the
> spokes. It was
> > certainly "good enough". This had been
> going on for a long time, so I'm
> > pretty sure it was not even computer-controlled.
> >
> > I believe that Jim eventually patented a concept that
> would do the final
> > tensioning in a single pass around the wheel.
> >
> > Harvey Sachs
> > mcLean va usa
> > +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
> > Jerry Moos wrote:
> > Kind of amazing that someone could build 6 wheels an
> hour. I guess one
> > could get pretty fast at spoking them, but the
> tensioning is what takes
> > time. I've read a few places that In The Day
> inexpensive wheels were
> > tensioned "by machine", but I've never
> seen a description or photos of
> > the machines used. Is JB using some sort of
> tensioning machine? If
> > these guys are spoking and tensioning 6 wheels an hour
> by hand and
> > sustaining that all day, its amazing they can even get
> them true enough
> > to not drag on the brake pads. I'll bet some of
> these guys get good
> > enough that they could probably build some really
> excellent wheels if
> > they were ever given the time and decent pay for doing
> so.
> >
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> >
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