Hi! ----- JoelMatthews <joelmatth...@mac.com> wrote: > > I still do not understand the desire to buy a new 135 freewheel hub. > PW along with many other companies make perfectly fine casette hubs in > that size.
Wheel strength. Generally, the 3-people-who-actually-know-these-things that I contacted all implied or stated outright that a wheel built around a Phil Wood IRD-style FW hub would be stronger than one built with a cassette hub, all else equal. They didn't say "you need this wheel"... they didn't say "only it will work"... they basically said it would be non-trivially stronger. I even now have zero reason to doubt those folks or that assertion in particular. My own history of consistently ruining wheels led me to think I wanted all the non-trivial strength enhancement I could tolerate (didn't want a 48-spoke wheel, didn't want a black rim). In the face of that history, those opinions, *and* the fact that choosing a cassette wheel that would be comparably strong meant an extra $200 right from the start... why *wouldn't* I desire a new 135 freewheel hub? The money itself wasn't a problem. But compromising the wheel's strength *and* paying real money to do it still seems silly. In hindsight, my desire (no matter how I came to have it) may have led me to a poor choice. Freewheel issues certainly threaten my use of my current wheel as anything other than a backup. It won't take too many more instances of a surprise failure-to-catch as I enter traffic to make me *not* use that wheel regularly. That'd be a shame... I've grown enamored of the elegance of a low-dish wheel, of the isolation of the most important bearings on the bike from the least important bearings on the bike, and of the notional simplicity of servicing of a Phil Wood freewheel hub (haven't actually had to service it yet). As well as the proven strength of the wheel, be it needed or not. In spite of that appeal, I remain open to the idea that all of my old wheel problems would have been basically solved with a 36-hole Phil Wood/Synergy O/C cassette wheel (I have and sometimes use two XT/Synergy O/C wheels, having had only minor and probably-solved issues) or a 40-hole Phil Wood/Dyad cassette wheel. In use I prefer the Dyad rim; it's easier to mount the tires I use. And one person-who-knows said the 40-spoke wheel would be stronger, despite the additional dish (there's no O/C Dyad and there's no 40-hole O/C Synergy). In any case, I haven't given up on using the freewheel-based wheel yet. But I'll decide over the next few months, since I would like to pick a sustainable system and have it in place before I seriously pursue my next Rivendell, which will probably be next year. At this point, a second 60cm double-top-tube Hillborne is the front-runner. That bike just plain fits. 62cm Hunqapillar and 60cm Bombadil are still in the running, though. Yours, Thomas Lynn Skean -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. To post to this group, send email to rbw-owners-bunch@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to rbw-owners-bunch+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/rbw-owners-bunch?hl=en.
