My First Wheel!

OK, I did it. I built a wheel from scratch, rode it around the neighborhood and it didn't taco or even ping.

Since this is the rear wheel on a fixie/ss flip-flop hub, it's symmetrical, so it isn't quite the challenge that building a dished rear wheel is.

Components:

• White Industries Eric's Eccentric Hub, 130mm width (yep, this Bridgestone has 130mm rear spacing)
• Salsa Delgado 559 rim, black, welded (the weld is kinda ugly and a little rough)
• Wheelsmith double butted 14/15 gauge black spokes with silver brass nipples

At first I thought the black spokes were going to be a mistake because of the highly polished silver hub, but now that it's all together, I must say it's a very pretty combo, alternating silver/black out from the hub to the spokes to the nipples to the rim at the spoke holes to the machined braking surface. That silver/black theme runs through the whole bike, becoming a white/black combo at the rack, the saddle and the bar tape being white on a black frame.

Mistakes/issues:

• The third set of spokes during lacing, I of course put them on the wrong holes and had to redo them.
• I'm not sure I have the "improving the spoke line" stuff suggested by both Jobst Brandt and Sheldon Brown in their wheelbuilding guides quite right. I pressed the spokes at the hub and squeezed crossing pairs before tensioning up, but it still doesn't look quite like the drawings in Jobst's book.
  
• I don't have any other wheels with double butted spokes, so I can't use the suggestions to compare the plucked tone with that of a known-good wheel of the same gauge spoke (and presumably the same wheel diameter). The tone is higher than most of my wheels, including the drive side of rear wheels, but when I squeeze the spokes, they seem more flexy. I suppose that might be a good thing with the double butted spokes being more resilient, or it could mean my tension isn't high enough yet. I'll probably give all the spokes another turn and see how that goes.

I still don't have any pictures yet, but the wheel is really nice looking, IMHO.
[EDIT--obviously I've since posted pictures :-)]