Dave Ornee said:Quoted message said:In this case, there's daylight showing through the
seam... I thought that was a little weird, but it wasn't
too bad in the truing stand. I'm assuming this is
something to worry about... BTW, this was a rim hanging
around in the shop I work at. $15.
Quoted message said:Daylight showing through the seam doesn't sound good, but
depending how they secured it, there may be a couple of
gaps that wouldn't be a problem.
The rim joint does not need to be secured but only parallel
so that when the wheel is tensioned there is no
discontinuity in alignment. Spoke tension on a 36-spoke
wheel puts the joint into about 1000lbs compression. The
joint was another piece of lore formerly passed on by
experienced wheel builders. The spokes adjacent to the joint
must cross each other in the spoke pattern or the rim will
separate. No one seemed to notice that radial spokes didn't
cross but maybe they took the convergence angle toward the
hub as sufficient to hold.
Quoted message said:Sometimes the splice doesn't fill all the way around. It
sounds like you are mastering the build issues. It is
better to put the " slop" of rim problems in the radial
direction, as long as they are in the range you are
talking about. I would ride the wheel and see how it goes.
Keep watch over tension and irregularities around the
joint and spoke holes.
If the joint is not a parallel cut it will deform and not be
easily trued, if at all, once spoke tension is up. As I have
mentioned often, a rim could be made of 36 segments with
unsecured joints at the midpoints between spokes, with no
filler piece, and work properly as a wheel. No doubt this
would make assembly difficult but with a line of tape around
both sides of the rim this could also be done. The joint is
a non functional artifact but attracts much attention from
people who don't understand its function in the wheel. Once
built into a wheel it has no effect. The filler piece is
needed for wheel building and the event of losing all spoke
tension, but it has no effect (aka impact) on wheel
performance.
Jobst Brandt [email hidden]