Good Riddance to Rim Tape

[robertbb]

Originally Posted by robt57

Not used 'rim tape' for ling long time. I use Kapton tape for tubed and tubeless...

oooh, interesting. Looks very similar to the effetto mariposa stuff, just a different colour and of course WAYYY cheaper.

Assume it works well, any pointers?

[iPaul]

Still feel tape will always be needed until tire and rim folks speak the same language. Many times I’ve needed to adjust the layers to get a tire to seat and hold air.
I am interested in the alternative tape ideas.

[Louis]

Originally Posted by iPaul

I am interested in the alternative tape ideas.

Here ya go:

[Bici-Sonora]

Originally Posted by bicycletricycle

Easier to manufacture
Easier to build
Easier to work on

These are compelling reasons IMHO

Drilling holes in the rim and then covering them with tape is a compromise and ideally wheels wouldn’t be in drilled as you prefer. The increased cost to manufacture, material limitations and in some cases increased difficulty of repair seems to keep this compromise going.

I have one wheel with those little velocity rim plugs, they are great

I got curious about this when I was shopping for Chinese carbon wheels and noticed that Light Bicycle and Farsports offer wheels without rim holes with no additional cost for the hole-less rim or additional labor to build. So the cost to manufacture the rims and building must be coming close to a conventional set up—at least with high end wheels built by hand. I doubt they have a machine to do this for mass production wheels—but I could be wrong.

Here is how they do it—and I’ve got to say that it doesn’t look that bad or different than standard wheel building.

https://youtu.be/nXeZfRD-fQ4


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[iPaul]

Ha @Louis. I have boxes filled of those and I’m sure I can spare a few Air Supply tapes for the sole purpose of air tight tires.

[cmbicycles]

Originally Posted by Louis

Here ya go:

A new recycling project for VHS and beta tapes. Free materials! Someone will be getting rich on this for sure.

[bicycletricycle]

Probably increases wheel build time 1.5 to 2x. Huge difference. Your assumption about the cost coming close is right and wrong, depends on the wages the wheel builder is being paid.

Originally Posted by Bici-Sonora

I got curious about this when I was shopping for Chinese carbon wheels and noticed that Light Bicycle and Farsports offer wheels without rim holes with no additional cost for the hole-less rim or additional labor to build. So the cost to manufacture the rims and building must be coming close to a conventional set up—at least with high end wheels built by hand. I doubt they have a machine to do this for mass production wheels—but I could be wrong.

Here is how they do it—and I’ve got to say that it doesn’t look that bad or different than standard wheel building.

https://youtu.be/nXeZfRD-fQ4


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[benb]

My Mavic UST wheels are almost old enough to drive. Never needed rim tape and never had any problems running tubeless all through the years till the valve holes corroded.

It seems pretty basic to get rid of the tape and holes for tubeless.

Most of my rim tape issues were never with tubeless and were years ago. More with cheap wheels early on that had sharp edge plastic tape. As soon as any of those wheels got the Velox tape the flats went away. And then at some point the factory plastic tape got good as well.

[joevers]

Originally Posted by bicycletricycle

Probably increases wheel build time 1.5 to 2x.

Definitely. If a wheel takes me 40-50 mins to build, the lacing only takes 10-15 mins tops.

I'd probably figure 1-2 mins per spoke building a rim like that, sometimes more.

I'm sure someone who builds those specific wheels all day gets really quick with it, but still, it's a chore.

[robt57]

I used velox for an eon. But once tubeless, especially early rims took over, done. Just too thick for the fights mounting tires with shallow center wells.

Enter kapton, crazy thin, cheap, and easy. The adhesive being high temp a plus if you have ever had a twisted tube move velox off spoke holes and flatted thru a spoke hole.

[David Kirk]

When I was a kid I worked at a shop that did a massive volume of repairs of cheap English 3 speeds. One of the surprising things was that many of these bikes used "rim ropes" to protect the inner tube from the spoke nipples. These rim ropes were a white cotton rope that was very soft and it would bed into the rim well and more or less keep the nipples from damaging the tube.

The other thing that they did very well was hold moisture....so bikes stored outside or ridden in the wet would end up with soaking wet rim ropes pressed up against the steel rim and in time rust the rim from the inside out. Nipples would seize to the rusted rim and when you'd put a spoke wrench to them they would break before they would allow an adjustment.

I recall that we had a loft above the work stations that had a massive pile of rim ropes and we used them for all kinds or projects but tried to never put them in rims.

Rim tape is awesome compared to rim ropes!

dave

[bicycletricycle]

Mavic UST rims are pretty cool but that technology requires an aluminum rim with a relatively boxy profile.

Nobody wants that these days.

Originally Posted by benb

My Mavic UST wheels are almost old enough to drive. Never needed rim tape and never had any problems running tubeless all through the years till the valve holes corroded.

It seems pretty basic to get rid of the tape and holes for tubeless.

Most of my rim tape issues were never with tubeless and were years ago. More with cheap wheels early on that had sharp edge plastic tape. As soon as any of those wheels got the Velox tape the flats went away. And then at some point the factory plastic tape got good as well.

[RudAwkning]

Originally Posted by Bici-Sonora

I got curious about this when I was shopping for Chinese carbon wheels and noticed that Light Bicycle and Farsports offer wheels without rim holes with no additional cost for the hole-less rim or additional labor to build. So the cost to manufacture the rims and building must be coming close to a conventional set up—at least with high end wheels built by hand. I doubt they have a machine to do this for mass production wheels—but I could be wrong.

Here is how they do it—and I’ve got to say that it doesn’t look that bad or different than standard wheel building.

https://youtu.be/nXeZfRD-fQ4


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Holy crap. That seems like a nightmare for a wheel builder. Give me 2 wraps of DT rim tape and a Wheel Fanatyik nipple inserter and shuffler/tray and I'm good.

[Bici-Sonora]

At least from method shown in the video, I think you are right that a build would take at least 1.5x as long as traditional . But I can also imagine some efficiencies (that are not shown in the light bicycle video) if you were building wheels a production scale. One that comes to mind:

You could have boxes of nipples with the magnetic steel stubs already threaded on.

Originally Posted by bicycletricycle

Probably increases wheel build time 1.5 to 2x. Huge difference. Your assumption about the cost coming close is right and wrong, depends on the wages the wheel builder is being paid.

[Bici-Sonora]

Your post reminded me of seeing those ropes for the first time and wondering what crazy person installed them. Along with the hardwood plugs we would find in Peugeot PX10 steerer tubes, they were curiosities from the old country.

My distaste for rim strips began when when I was the low man on the totem pole at a shop across the street from a college in the early 90s. So many broken, rotted, and shifted rim strips and flats because of spoke heads on single walled steel rims found on Huffys and Murrays. Those were cases where heavy duty tubes actually made some sense just to add some protection if the rubber rim strip slipped out of place.

So compared to rope and rubber, good rim tape is a modern marvel.

Originally Posted by David Kirk

When I was a kid I worked at a shop that did a massive volume of repairs of cheap English 3 speeds. One of the surprising things was that many of these bikes used "rim ropes" to protect the inner tube from the spoke nipples. These rim ropes were a white cotton rope that was very soft and it would bed into the rim well and more or less keep the nipples from damaging the tube.

The other thing that they did very well was hold moisture....so bikes stored outside or ridden in the wet would end up with soaking wet rim ropes pressed up against the steel rim and in time rust the rim from the inside out. Nipples would seize to the rusted rim and when you'd put a spoke wrench to them they would break before they would allow an adjustment.

I recall that we had a loft above the work stations that had a massive pile of rim ropes and we used them for all kinds or projects but tried to never put them in rims.

Rim tape is awesome compared to rim ropes!

dave