Wobbly
15-01-2005, 11:14 PM
When starting out on your own motard project, the first question that normally comes up is what to do about wheels .... there are several options, but the most common are either to lace up a new set of 17 inch rims to your existing hubs, building some dedicated spoked wheels using additional components or adapting some road bike wheels to suit.
The cheapest and easiest option is the first, which is simply to order some new rims, a couple of matching spoke kits and have your existing rims un-laced and the new ones fitted up. Cost wise you'll probably be looking at around $350 for a front 3.5" rim and $450 for a rear 4.25/4.5" rim from a well known manufacturer (such as Excel, etc), plus spoke kits at around $100 each end. If you're confident enough to lace them up yourself then the rest is free, otherwise you'll need to talk to your local offroad shop to see how much they'll charge you to do it, but it shouldn't be deadly.
If you prefer to keep your original wheels to be able to swap back to the more dirt oriented setup, then you'll need to make up an additional set of wheels. If money is constrained then you can do the first option and then have some spare time to hunt down an original set of hubs and then lace up your old rims and spokes to them again. Otherwise, if you want to avoid excess lacing and re-lacing of wheels, then the best bet is to make up a new set of dedicated 17" wheels right from the start.
When building new wheels you can either order the bits and do them yourself (or have your local shop make them up for you), or buy them pre-built. Pre-built wheels are normally at a price premium, but do have a lower hassle-factor with everything ready just to bolt straight on to your bike. Otherwise you'll need to find yourself some appropraite hubs and buy the rims and spoke kits as described above. As for hubs, you can either go for a set of billet hubs from manufacturers such as Talon, etc or for your bike manufacturer's OEM hubs.
At first the OEM hubs seem a lot cheaper, but by the time you add the necesary bearing and seal kits (which the billet kits normally ship with), the cost different narrows significantly. However, although stronger, the billet hubs are in effect heavier, so the OEM hubs do have some advantage. If you can find some hubs at a wrecker, however, that might provide a well priced way out (especially if the rims are already buckled as you won't be needing these). If you want the ultimate bling factor though, billet is the way to go, as you can get them pre-anodized in a variety of different colours to suit your bike as well as choice of rim colour.
The final option which is preferred by some is to adapt some wheels from a sports bike of similar desired rim width. Common in this are RGV wheels, which are the desired 3.5" and 4.25" front and rear sizes, both in 17" diameter. These can often be had reasonably cheaply at wreckers, meaning that they are often seen as the cheaper alternative to building spoked wheels. However, when doing this a couple of things must be kept in mind - firstly, unless you are a competent machinist you'll need to pay someone to adapter the wheels to fit. The fronts usually just need appropriate spacers made up, but the rears are quite often more problematic, needing the hubs to be machined down and the cush area adapter or a solid cush adapter plate put in place to save room. Another problem is that chain rub may be more of an issue with cast wheels as you cannot offset the rim from the hub like you can with a spoked wheel in order to tailor its 'lie' in between the rear arms.
Once fitted, these cast wheels have the additional drawback of being somewhat more fragile than spoked rims (as the spokes flex and provide a sort of internal 'suspension' to the wheel, as long as all the spokes are in good order and of the appropriate tension!). This isn't a problem for road riding, as its very rare to dent road rims on normal road riding, but if you're considering doing any supermoto racing or taking on any jumps, then you'd better think twice about doing that with your cast wheels on....!
So there you have it, some options, and a variety of prices. Re-lacing your original hubs is the quickest and easiest way to quickly get yourself going, but you do loose the dirt outfit, or will need to re-lace new hubs later on. Build wheels are the most expensive but least hassle, but DIY wheels can still be built at a cheaper cost with the correct bolt-together parts for fairly little hassle. Finally cast wheels are an option if you want to do it as cheap as possible and have some machining skills, or if you come upon a set at a bargain basement price.
The cheapest and easiest option is the first, which is simply to order some new rims, a couple of matching spoke kits and have your existing rims un-laced and the new ones fitted up. Cost wise you'll probably be looking at around $350 for a front 3.5" rim and $450 for a rear 4.25/4.5" rim from a well known manufacturer (such as Excel, etc), plus spoke kits at around $100 each end. If you're confident enough to lace them up yourself then the rest is free, otherwise you'll need to talk to your local offroad shop to see how much they'll charge you to do it, but it shouldn't be deadly.
If you prefer to keep your original wheels to be able to swap back to the more dirt oriented setup, then you'll need to make up an additional set of wheels. If money is constrained then you can do the first option and then have some spare time to hunt down an original set of hubs and then lace up your old rims and spokes to them again. Otherwise, if you want to avoid excess lacing and re-lacing of wheels, then the best bet is to make up a new set of dedicated 17" wheels right from the start.
When building new wheels you can either order the bits and do them yourself (or have your local shop make them up for you), or buy them pre-built. Pre-built wheels are normally at a price premium, but do have a lower hassle-factor with everything ready just to bolt straight on to your bike. Otherwise you'll need to find yourself some appropraite hubs and buy the rims and spoke kits as described above. As for hubs, you can either go for a set of billet hubs from manufacturers such as Talon, etc or for your bike manufacturer's OEM hubs.
At first the OEM hubs seem a lot cheaper, but by the time you add the necesary bearing and seal kits (which the billet kits normally ship with), the cost different narrows significantly. However, although stronger, the billet hubs are in effect heavier, so the OEM hubs do have some advantage. If you can find some hubs at a wrecker, however, that might provide a well priced way out (especially if the rims are already buckled as you won't be needing these). If you want the ultimate bling factor though, billet is the way to go, as you can get them pre-anodized in a variety of different colours to suit your bike as well as choice of rim colour.
The final option which is preferred by some is to adapt some wheels from a sports bike of similar desired rim width. Common in this are RGV wheels, which are the desired 3.5" and 4.25" front and rear sizes, both in 17" diameter. These can often be had reasonably cheaply at wreckers, meaning that they are often seen as the cheaper alternative to building spoked wheels. However, when doing this a couple of things must be kept in mind - firstly, unless you are a competent machinist you'll need to pay someone to adapter the wheels to fit. The fronts usually just need appropriate spacers made up, but the rears are quite often more problematic, needing the hubs to be machined down and the cush area adapter or a solid cush adapter plate put in place to save room. Another problem is that chain rub may be more of an issue with cast wheels as you cannot offset the rim from the hub like you can with a spoked wheel in order to tailor its 'lie' in between the rear arms.
Once fitted, these cast wheels have the additional drawback of being somewhat more fragile than spoked rims (as the spokes flex and provide a sort of internal 'suspension' to the wheel, as long as all the spokes are in good order and of the appropriate tension!). This isn't a problem for road riding, as its very rare to dent road rims on normal road riding, but if you're considering doing any supermoto racing or taking on any jumps, then you'd better think twice about doing that with your cast wheels on....!
So there you have it, some options, and a variety of prices. Re-lacing your original hubs is the quickest and easiest way to quickly get yourself going, but you do loose the dirt outfit, or will need to re-lace new hubs later on. Build wheels are the most expensive but least hassle, but DIY wheels can still be built at a cheaper cost with the correct bolt-together parts for fairly little hassle. Finally cast wheels are an option if you want to do it as cheap as possible and have some machining skills, or if you come upon a set at a bargain basement price.