After trueing, skimming, straightening and polishing the hubs I attacked the rims. These were in terrible condition, looked like the PO had used screwdrivers, claw hammers and pry bars to remove and replace the tyres and they were badly oxidised and pitted.
After grinding the gouges out of the rims using a nylon fibre wheel, I ground down the edges of the rims then polished the rims. They came up pretty good, there are still some marks visible, but too deep to remove altogether.
Next I ordered some stainless spokes. The supllier only had front spokes, so when they came I spoked the front wheel, trued and centred the rim and torqued the nipples. Unfortunately, there was thread showing before the nipple, about 3mm worth. I compared the stainless spokes with stock spokes and found the spokes were the same length, they just had an extra 3mm of thread. Spokes are normally ordered either for a particicular bike, as was the case with these spokes, or the size worked out via a mathmatical equation, thus if done properly the excess thread is covered by the blank, threadless area at the begining of the nipple. I've been spoking bicycle and motor bike wheels since 1968, never have I seen this problem before, and I've spoked dozen and dozens of wheels.
I contacted the seller expressing my concern, but all I got in response was a series of abusive emails and texts. He actually sent me a picture of a wheel his 'profesional' wheel lacer did for him showing exposed thread, saying both he and his 'profeional' lacer considered them ok.
I ordered spokes for the rear wheel 'from a different supplier and when they arrived laced, trued, centred and torqued the wheel - no exposed thread, perfect. I emailed a picture of the wheel to the supplier of the front wheel spokes, saying this is how a wheel is supposed to look. Not surprisingly I received no reply.
After both wheels were laced, I cut and polished a blanking plate for the disk mounting hole on the left side of the hub and turned up some wheel spacers from stainless, then turned up some aluminium dust covers and pressed them over the spacers.
Both wheels look nice polished up and laced with stainless spokes, but I do cringe when I look at the exposed thread on the front wheels.
After grinding the gouges out of the rims using a nylon fibre wheel, I ground down the edges of the rims then polished the rims. They came up pretty good, there are still some marks visible, but too deep to remove altogether.
Next I ordered some stainless spokes. The supllier only had front spokes, so when they came I spoked the front wheel, trued and centred the rim and torqued the nipples. Unfortunately, there was thread showing before the nipple, about 3mm worth. I compared the stainless spokes with stock spokes and found the spokes were the same length, they just had an extra 3mm of thread. Spokes are normally ordered either for a particicular bike, as was the case with these spokes, or the size worked out via a mathmatical equation, thus if done properly the excess thread is covered by the blank, threadless area at the begining of the nipple. I've been spoking bicycle and motor bike wheels since 1968, never have I seen this problem before, and I've spoked dozen and dozens of wheels.
I contacted the seller expressing my concern, but all I got in response was a series of abusive emails and texts. He actually sent me a picture of a wheel his 'profesional' wheel lacer did for him showing exposed thread, saying both he and his 'profeional' lacer considered them ok.
I ordered spokes for the rear wheel 'from a different supplier and when they arrived laced, trued, centred and torqued the wheel - no exposed thread, perfect. I emailed a picture of the wheel to the supplier of the front wheel spokes, saying this is how a wheel is supposed to look. Not surprisingly I received no reply.
After both wheels were laced, I cut and polished a blanking plate for the disk mounting hole on the left side of the hub and turned up some wheel spacers from stainless, then turned up some aluminium dust covers and pressed them over the spacers.
Both wheels look nice polished up and laced with stainless spokes, but I do cringe when I look at the exposed thread on the front wheels.