The hub's good, but it's intended for commuters; for a
distance cyclist like you, there is a point to getting the better hub. Dan has already addressed the other issues. It is probably worth adding that machine-built wheels can be a lottery, depending on who built them, and for whom, and how the builders were supervised. Anecdote: You'd think Gazelle, "the Mercedes of bicycles" would be superior, including its wheels. Er... My Gazelle Toulouse, otherwise very well built, arrived with excellent hubs, choice Rigida rims, spokes and rim tape, but careless build quality in the wheels. Spokes in both wheels were loose enough to
clatter after a few rides. This was my first good bike, and it gave me a sinking heart, as then I knew nothing about bikes except that I no longer wanted ill-fitting mountain bikes from the LBS wrecking my back. I haunted the net, made friends with Sheldon and Jobst, then detensioned the spokes, retensioned them, and STRESS RELIEVED the spokes hard with a tyre iron, and then over a period of weeks with an eighth of a turn here and there at roadside stops perfected those wheels. A decade later those rebuilt wheels are still rock solid, so they could have built them right in the beginning, and didn't.
By contrast, I have some Trek wheels on my Cyber Nexus that arrived rock solid, and are still, despite some hard advertures, rock solid. But the Cyber Nexus was a top of the line prestige bike for a market Trek was trying to sneak into, they built a 100 and presumably had one guy supervise every detail; Mr Bontrager himself designed, specified and tested these new wheels, which later went on sale as their priciest option-wheel. The wheels on my Kranich too were built like prototypes for a gorgon of a supervisor, delivered with a spoke tension sheet, solid, a work of art in itself. Surprisingly, the Kranich wheels are computer-built, but then carefully hand-inspected, and presumably selected.
I were you, I'd wait for the better wheel. You can't ride anyway until the weather improves, and now it is raining heavily outside my window, and presumably not too nice further upcountry.
You haven't forgotten that you must check that the Shimano hub dynamo connector is included in the wheel order, have you? The connector
come with the dynamo because it is supposed to go on your lamp wiring. (Duh.) Looks like this, the grey part being attached to the lamp wiring, then fitting inside the black wire-lock, the assembly on the wire then plugging onto the mating part on the hub:
Gee, I can remember when this little plastic part cost a quid...
Andre Jute
