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Phil Wood have been making the highest quality hubs, spokes, lubes & grease since the 70s. Find Phil Wood spokes, Bio-Lube, Tenacious Oil & more here.
Custom cut Phil Wood spokes
Need Custom cut spokes? Phil Wood is the brand we use for our inhouse wheel builds for their high quality & reliability. We custom cut spokes in our workshop so you can get the exact length you need for your wheel build.
At Abbotsford Cycles we custom cut spokes to your required length using our Phil Wood Spoke cutter. If you are unsure what length spoke you need, give us a call & we can help.
Phil Wood spokes are some of the best you can buy. We would not hesitate to build any high quality wheelset with Phil Wood spokes. But if you have another brand in mind – DT Swiss, Sapim, Pillar, Mach1 – we can get them in for you & build your wheels up with them.
When it comes to spoke nipples we absolutely recommend brass nipples. Thi is to avoid galvanic corrosion. And Phil Wood nipples can be used with Phil Wood Spokes as well as other brands to ensure your wheelset lasts and performs reliably for the life of your bike!
Need components for a wheel build?
Whether you need a rim, a hub, spokes or nipples, we stock the best. Check out our DT Swiss rims & hubs & Phil Wood spokes & nipples.
At Abbotsford Cycles we hand-build wheels in our workshop everyday. On our site you can find some of our recommended rims, hubs & spokes that we would use for any quality wheel build. You can choose the components you are keen on, and have your wheel built by our wheel builders. Or if you were doing your own wheel build you can find everything you need here!
Need more advice on building up a new wheelset? Call us at our Richmond bike shop & have a chat about your dream wheel build with our mechanics and sales staff who love talkin’ wheels!
Are hand built wheels better?
Yes, hand-built wheels are better. But only when they are built by an experienced wheel builder.
Most wheels on most bikes you buy will be built by machines. This means the machine has been programmed to perform the same tensioning to every wheel. The problem with this method is that it doesn’t take material differences into account.
For example, you will find that not every rim is identical in a batch, and nor is every cut spoke exactly identical. A machine will treat them as such, and tension them all the same for consistency. This degree of rigid consistency simply doesn’t exist in reality.
The next problem we will see with machine built wheels is that the tension becomes very poor very quickly. This is because the uniform tensioning can put some spokes under a lot of pressure, and some under none. You will need correct even tensioning on a wheel for it to remain strong & true.
Hand building wheels is by it’s nature accounting for the wheel in hand. A wheel builder will tension according to the wheels components, and not to a programmed series of numbers.
The result is a wheel which will last you longer & perform better than a machine built wheel.
You may not be provided an option for hand built wheels at your average bike shop. This is because it is still very much a specialised field. Many workshops and many mechanics will go their entire careers without building a wheel. And this is perfectly fine! Bike’s are exceedingly complicated and you will find that every bike shop specializes in different aspects. Just like not all shop with perform service suspensions, not all bike shops will be able to build you wheels.
