Customer Reviews

The Art of Wheelbuilding: A Bench Reference for Neophytes, Pros & Wheelaholics

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

With the most easy to follow directions, this book has helped a total novice become a sought after wheel builder. After building more that 30 sets in the last year, I still open the book and refer to various sections to "tighten" my technique. If you are simply a "bike freak" this makes for great reading. It helps you understand the importance of well built wheels.

There are two well know wheel building books on the market. "The Bicycle Wheel" by Jobst Brandt is one, and the other is this book. While I like the Brandt book, I think this one is my favorite. Brandt's book is full of engineering explanation of how wheels work. I think that is important to know, but I want to know more about wheel building, not just the science behind wheels. Schraner's book concentrates more on actually building wheels and the sport of cycling. Also, the books physical form is easier to lay on a bench and use while actually building a wheel.

I don't understand someone could stand to read more than five pages of this book without feeling the overwhelming disappointment associated with knowing that he has just wasted his money.

First, the book is horribly translated. It's not so bad that the book is incomprehensible, but its bad enough that most people will find the reading extremely awkward.

Secondly, the book is very poorly edited and typeset. It's obvious that this book was very rushed. While I didn't notice spelling errors, there are many minor errors related to spacing and typeface. More importantly, many of the diagrams are unclear, and the pictures, although mostly color, are often blurry or poorly composed.

The book itself is mostly filler and fluff. The author starts out by disclaiming having any actual qualifications, and it goes downhill from there. It's very obvious that the author is stretching just to meet the magical 100 page mark. Some pages are nothing but rambling, somewhat disguised by the horrible translation.

Many parts of this book are completely unclear. For example, there's a section on corked wheels that I've re-read many times, and still don't understand; it doesn't explain what the benefit of corking is, or how one would do this, or even why he's mentioning it. There's an accompanying picture of a corked rim that's so poor I can't see what is intended.

This book lacks most of the specific advice that I suspect people are buying it for. For example, the author refuses to share the ordinary method for lacing wheels, on the grounds that it is "described so often in the bicycle press [that it] does not need to be described in this book too," instead recommending a VHS videotape from DT Swiss for this purpose.

The author's association with DT Swiss, which is not explicitly stated in the text, severely undermines his credibility. Much of the information that is interesting in this text is specific to the DT product line, some apparently directly copied from DT manuals.

In addition, much of the guidance the author offers is obsolete, dubious, or just plain wrong. This author repeats many common bicycle myths that have long been proven to be fallacies. He also recommends various outdated and obsolete practices, such as soldering and tying--which he describes in more detail than is present anywhere else in the book--that have been soundly discredited for use on modern bicycles.

There is very little in this book that is worthwhile reading, and so much misinformation. The fact that much of the book is confusing, incomprehensible, or inane is really just the icing on the cake. Since there is at least one excellent, definitive, and authoritative reference on the bicycle wheel, I can see absolutely no reason anyone would want to buy this book.

This is a great book to read to understand some of the concepts of wheelbuilding. It answers many of the "why" questions. It is not, however, a step-by-step guide on how to build a wheel. For instance, when attempting to build my first wheel, I wanted to know the best specific method for threading the spokes. This book does not include that and you must go elsewhere to get that information. Overall, a good augmentation to your detailed maintenance manuals.

I'm not sure if this book was translated from German (my guess), but the grammar leaves much to be desired. Directions are often confusing due to diagrams and text that don't quite jibe. I would expect more from a truing section than "it is a trial and error process". Mr. Schraner obviously has a lot of knowledge, I just don't feel it comes through clearly in the book.

I recently received "The Art of Wheelbuilding" as a gift to my small collection of 4 wheelbuilding books.
Though at first pleased by the large, easy to read graphs and full color photos; I soon began to notice something was not right--
After struggling with the rough translation, I came to find that much of the technical data was totally wrong!
(e.g.- how a wheel carries a load, soldering and tying)
It is by no fault of the author that it is so incorrect. Merely, that when this book was written there was no way of accurately measuring the way wheels truly behave. In addition, the author clearly has some sort of marketing tie-in with DTSwiss, as he speaks only of their products and their large, copyrighted logo appears in multiple technical diagrams.
That said, this book still lends much to the actual process of constructing a spoked wheel and is kind of fun to read once you get the feel for the verbiage. It comes spiral bound with glossy pages, making it a great bench reference and the diagrams on truing are idiot-proof.
The binding also makes it super easy to remove the incorrect pages, as to not cause any random reader to be mis-informed.
If you are looking to buy your first book on this topic, i would seriously not make it this one.

While this book won't make a true wheelwright out of the reader, it will certainly explain in clear terms how a wire wheel actually works. In doing so it gives the reader the key points nessesary to develop the skills to becoming a wheelwright without miring down in technical minutia. In short, this is the book to start with.

This book is fantastic. There's a simple step by step formula for lacing up a wheel that is better than anything I've ever read. Really.

Building a wheel isn't exactly rocket science, but if you do it wrong, you're going to have a poor quality wheel. Build it right, and your wheel will be better than a factory can turn out.

If you're looking to build a wheelset, or if you may be build 1-2 wheels a year, this is an excellent primer and reference.

This book is clear and illustrates well what it does. It falls short, though, on giving illustrations and instructions on alternatives to the common "3 cross" wheel lacing patterns. It is arguably worth the cost, but if you are going to get into real bicycle wheel building, this book will be insufficient. I find its title a bit misleading. It is NOT a bench reference in my opinion. It is a INTRODUCTION to wheel building, and certainly not a bench reference for pros and "wheelaholics."

I enjoyed the book from the perspective of the vibe of the race mechanic or wheel builder. As a wheelbuilding resource it is both unnecessary and inaccurate. He has his own way of lacing a wheel which reverses the order. I guess it works but it isn't an improvement. He also seems to have held back what he actually knows, a real wheel tech should be able to inundate the home mechanic with information. Maters so trivial the pro has absorbed them often without thought. But for those who don't live in the world, depth helps us pull together the full pictures. Sadly not here.