Rims, Hubs and Spokes; Oh My.

"Strong, Light, Cheap; Pick Two."

That used to be Bontrager's motto, pre-Trek. Their products were bad-ass. Nowadays though, it seems they're just the new name thrown on Trek-owned product in a marketing effort to not simply have "Trek" on everything. Other notables in the Trek marketing graveyard are Matrix, Icon, Jazz, Rolf (sorta) and now Lemond.

Some of the products are really innovative and awesome. Some are downright terrible. Most are completely right in the middle. That is; you're not dying to replace them, but not dying to keep them either.

My roundabout (as per usual) point is, I bought a Lemond bike years ago and it came almost completely stocked with Bontrager parts. They are almost completely gone, and now it's almost time for the next one(s) to go away: the Bontrager Select Road Disc wheelset. There's nothing really wrong with them, except that I simply don't like them. Never have. I don't like the way they look, I don't like the fact that they're black, I don't like trying to true the stupid low-spoke count design. I just plain don't like them. And they don't ride poorly, nor very good.

Admittedly, buying a disc brake only "road" bike could be considered a mistake. Especially since Lemond/Trek decided to make it a true 130mm spaced road frame. This presents a problem since nearly all disc hubs are for mountain bikes and nearly all mountain bikes are 135mm spacing. But more on this in a moment...

I love Clementine, she's probably my most favoritest bike I've ever owned, I'll find a way to work around her limitations (like I did when I broke the carbon legged Bontrager fork, and found a better suited fork in the Vicious Cross fork, which seemed to be the only fork of the spec I wanted/needed). So I've been trying to determine what components I'll be using to build the Bontrager's replacements.

First of all, they'll be 32 spoke wheels. And they'll be all silver (polished where possible). I'm not looking for exotic on these wheels, just good solid wheels, so I'll be using Mavic Open Pro rims and Wheelsmith DB14 spokes. And for those curious on the "how", I use Sheldon Brown's wheelbuilding guide (plus a little knowledge I've picked up along the way), the Park SW-0/TW-1/TS-2 tools, a vintage Campy dishing tool, Rock N Roll Nipple Cream and an EVT 'Mulfinger'' Nipple Loader.

Initially and in my dreams, these wheels were to be Phil Wood hubs. But seriously, those things are fucking expensive (pardon my language, but they really are...). So being that I'm not really in any position to spend $500-1000 on hubs...
[pause for tangent]
a.) I'm not in the position to spend *any* money on new wheels, which is why this hasn't happened yet. I'll be repositioning some of my cycling-related assets to acquire these pieces one at a time. You should see me on the wheels described here sometime around 2012.
b.) Yes, even for me, even with an employee purchase program that costs below normal wholesale, the Phil Wood hubs I need are over $500 for the pair.
[/pause for tangent]
...I went in search of alternatives.

Finding a front was cake. When I raced MTB back in the '90's, I always wanted Paul stuff. It was pretty. When I saw their stuff again this week (not realizing they were still around...), it was still pretty and I still wanted it. So I've settled on the very reasonably priced Paul Component Disk FHUB. I wrote them, and spoke to Paul himself, who also informed me that he'd be able to high polish it for a small additional charge. I almost peed.

The rear is more of an issue, and seeing how long-winded this has gotten, I'm going to save that for tomorrow. You see, my research for a rear led me to a lot of questions with few answers (and some very incorrect ones)...