Question re: HED/Specialized tri-spokes

[enforme]

As I understand it, Specialized (and later, HED) made a tri-spoke
carbon wheel with freewheel threading. It could be adapted for front
(100mm) or rear use (road or track (120mm) spacing) by switching to the
appropriate axle and spacer combo.

Question is: did either Specialized or HED ever make a threaded-hub
wheel that could be used ONLY for road rear use? That is, was there
ever a model with threaded hub that did NOT allow the user to alter
axle and spacers to fit as a front wheel or for rear track use?

Thanks much for the wisdom... ccc

 

[JeffWills]

enforme wrote:
>
> Question is: did either Specialized or HED ever make a threaded-hub
> wheel that could be used ONLY for road rear use? That is, was there
> ever a model with threaded hub that did NOT allow the user to alter
> axle and spacers to fit as a front wheel or for rear track use?
>
> Thanks much for the wisdom... ccc

I don't think so- and I don't see how you could make a wheel like the
Specialized/HED with a threaded hub that *couldn't* be adapted to the
front with a simple axle and spacer swap. The *only* possibility would
be to create a "hub" that extended to the dropout on the left far
enough that centering the rim in front dropouts would be impossible.
IMO, Specialized/HED would be pretty stupid to do this.

However, I'm guessing. Stranger things have happened in the bicycle
business.

Jeff

 

[[email protected]]

enforme wrote:
> As I understand it, Specialized (and later, HED) made a tri-spoke
> carbon wheel with freewheel threading. It could be adapted for front
> (100mm) or rear use (road or track (120mm) spacing) by switching to the
> appropriate axle and spacer combo.
>
> Question is: did either Specialized or HED ever make a threaded-hub
> wheel that could be used ONLY for road rear use? That is, was there
> ever a model with threaded hub that did NOT allow the user to alter
> axle and spacers to fit as a front wheel or for rear track use?
>
> Thanks much for the wisdom... ccc

Who knows what *might* have been made! ;-)

However, all the freewheel DuPont trispokes (or Specialized or Hed
trispokes) I've seen can be made into fronts by changing the spacing.

Little known factiod #1: Even if you don't have the M9x1 "front" axle
set you can still make a freewheel rear into a front. Using the
existing M10x1 axle set, get the spacing to 100mm and the axle length
to about 108mm, then grind down the OD of the axle to 9mm over the 4mm
length on each side that fits into the fork. The M10x1 threads are
neatly consumed in this step so the smooth 9mm diameter fits right into
the fork ends.

Little known factoid #2: Some loose-ball front hubs use an M10x1 axle
with the last 4mm or so on each side ground down to 9mm OD... I've used
an axle from a Bontrager Select hub that's like this. There are
probably others as well.