What Are The Most Important Parts Of A Wheel?

by John Neugent

Tech articles | Commentary articles

John Neugent probably knows more about bicycle wheels than anyone else alive. Maybe more about bikes as well. He's spent his life in the bike business, at every level. He now owns Neugent Cycling, a firm devoted to delivering world-class equipment at the lowest possible price. If you are in the market for a set of wheels, please, check out John's site. He really knows his stuff. —Chairman Bill

John Neugent

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John Neugent writes:

We all know that weight, durability and aerodynamics are important but what are the most important parts? Most people will say hubs because they believe those are the most expensive parts of a wheel. While that may be true 10 or more years ago, I would argue that it’s not the case today.

Hub quality has completely changed over the last 20 years. That is to say that 20 years ago the best hubs were much better than the entry level hubs. The quality of Asian production—both Taiwan and China—has dramatically increased over the last 10 and even 5 years. Look at the electric car market as an example. Five years ago Elon Musk said electric Chinese cars were a joke. Now he says they are the best in the world and it’s not even close.

Hubs have come a long way since these Campagnolo Record hubs of the 1970s.

The same has happened with bike parts. “XXX240” hubs are considered a very top tier set of hubs. They are called 240 because the rear hub weights 240 grams. Now my standard rear road hub weighs 217 grams and the whole set retails for as little as $499—a little over the cost of a rear XXX hub only. Hubs are a shell and bearings and an engagement system for the cassette body. That engagement system (whether it be pawls or some other method) has been around a long time and works well.

So if it’s not the hub is the spokes or the rim? With spokes it’s simple, there are a number of premium brands like Sapim, DT, and Pillar who all make good quality spokes. With rims there are a number of good rim makers. On both spokes and rims the technology has come a long way.

Spokes as well have been improved.

The final piece is build quality. This is an important part of the quality of the wheels. On low spoke count wheels the first place they wear out is with rear rim cracks—almost always on the drive side on the rear wheel. With quality hand building it’s possible to mitigate that problem as much as possible. I do it with two important things. First I used dual internal washers on the drive side rear. This not only moves the nipple pressure over a larger area, it adds thickness. The second and maybe more important part is my wheel building method.

Build quality is the most important ingredient.

With machine building, the machine tensions all spokes quickly without regard to the method. Then most high end wheel companies do final truing while the wheel is at full tension. When a spoke is at full tension, every time you turn the nipple you degrade the spoke hole in the rim. My method is simple but it’s important. I completely true the wheel at the lowest possible tension. Only then do I tighten the drive side spokes to the spec—using the smallest number of nipple turns and therefore keeping the integrity of the rim intact as much as possible. Finally I tighten the non-drive spokes to center the rim and do all final adjustment with the non drive side spokes. This simple method insures the highest possibility durability.

John Neugent was was one of the first to establish quality hand building in Taiwan around the turn of the century. He now owns Neugent Cycling, a firm devoted to delivering world-class equipment at the lowest possible price.