“New” wheels for the Stellar
Somewhere around Y2K I bought Odette a Rodriguez Stellar. She had been riding a very heavy Hardrock and didn’t like going out with Will and me because she couldn’t keep up. It was the first expensive bike we owned – costing maybe $2,000 – and it made a real difference in her speed. While it was billed as “semi-custom” there were only about half-a-dozen frame sizes to choose among and I don’t remember having any options with regards to components. (It came with a Campagnolo Mirage drive train and neither Odette nor I had any idea that it was anything special.)
Twenty years later I had not messed much with her bike. It had Dia Comp cantilever brakes that she complained didn’t stop it very well so I inserted some Paul’s cross levers that were a little easier for her to grab. It had a steel frame and tires that I understood to be 26″ – although they were likely 650C rims. 26 X 1 or 26 X 1-1/4 tires fit okay and rode just fine. The real magic was that they did a good fitting and set it up with a stem extender that gave her a really upright position. The bike didn’t get a lot of use, but it worked well for her and was her benchmark when riding other things. (In 2016 I again felt sorry for her having a heavy bike and built her a Litespeed Tuscany that was intended to mimic the dimensions and gearing of her Rodriguez. It got even less use.)
For some reason while riding in the fall of 2024 I started thinking about Busch + Müller’s BrakeTec system. “Dynamo rear lights with the BrakeTec function must be connected to Dynamo powered front lights. The BrakeTec Rear lights analyse a signal given off from the headlight, and if speed drops significantly, a chip in the rear light will detect this and cause the rear light to light brighter in pulses.” I wasn’t in the market for a frequency-shift-triggered brake light for myself, but I thought that it might be a good addition to Odette’s bike. I wasn’t optimistic that a set of lights would get Odette out on her bike more, but I thought she would enjoy the convenience of always having lights mounted and charged and that the brake light function might be interesting to her.
After toying with the idea for a while I decided to get dynamo-powered lights for her Rodriguez which would also mean getting a new front wheel. As I was thinking that through I realized that I still had the rims I’d taken off the Tuscany. Those rims were silver Sunrim Venus 650C. They were pretty chunky and I was happy to replace them on the Litespeed, but they would look pretty good (and be period appropriate) on her Rodriguez. That would also mean building two wheels instead of one, and to keep the existing wheelset intact I’d need to get a Campy rear hub.
I stopped in to Recycled Cycles to see if they had a 32-hole 9-speed Campy hub. It took some digging but they came up with a Campy Record hub that fit the bill and which seemed very clean. A few days later I called Peter White and ordered a SONdelux hub, an Edelux II headlight, and a Toplight Line Plus (BrakeTec) taillight. (Peter answered the phone himself and wanted to know what kind of mount I wanted for the headlight – I said one of the CYO mounts made from stainless rod and he seemed to conclude that I was not just another Jan Heine wannabe.) The hub and lights cost somewhat more than they had the last time I’d done this sort of project, but, as usual, you get what you pay for.
I dropped the rims and hubs off at Recycled Cycles to have them laced up. (Odette was shopping when I got back from a short ride and I got in and out of the garage with the rims slung across my chest without her seeing.) The woman at Recycled Cycles made sure I knew that mounting used rims would mean I couldn’t get them adjusted for free if they went out of true, but all of the techs came by to see what I was doing and they all seemed to think that it would make a classic wheelset.
While waiting for the wheels to be built, I mounted the tail light on the rear rack. I’m not sure where it came from, but I had a bracket with a 50mm pair of holes on one end and a single hole on the other. In the end I was concerned that it would rattle and instead went with two small P-clamps, padded with strips of rubber, like I had done on the Ibis.
It came out professional looking and totally solid. I noted that I needed to figure out how to run the wires under that center plate so that they wouldn’t interfere with pannier clips.
The headlight was a little tricker. I removed the bolt through the fork crown and found that it was an M6, maybe 40mm long. It supported the front fender with an eye-bolt inside the fork which meant you had to loosen a rusty nut inside the fender to get the crown bolt out. I didn’t have anything longer and I could see that I needed a couple of spacers to keep the mount away from the bearing race. I fiddled with it for a couple of days, considering buying a longer bolt or a recessed nut but I finally found a piece of hex stock with a threaded 6mm hole. I flipped the bolt so that the head was in the back of the fork and tightened it down with the hex extender serving as a nut on the front. (I probably should have put a lock washer in the stack but it’s not structural so if it loosens I’ll just tighten it back up.) I screwed a shorter M6 bolt into the other end of the hex piece to catch the headlight mount. This set up positioned the mount out in front of the cantilever yoke, barely cleared the fender, and it certainly seemed substantial enough to hold a headlight. I thought it was pretty elegant and was pleased that I had been able to improvise a solution with parts on hand. (I still don’t know where that piece of hex stock came from or what it was originally for – it had a barrel adjuster screwed into each end but I don’t think that was really functional.)
I had asked the woman at Recycled Cycles if they could get me a 9-speed Campy cassette with a 28T big cog. She said she didn’t see one on-line but if I could accept a used one she’d check their inventory. I also asked about 650C tires and all she had to offer were a pair of slightly used 23s for $10 each.
When I got home I got on Ebay and found a choice between a used 13-28 cassette and a NOS one in the original packaging. They wanted about $100 more for new one but I’m leery about somebody else’s used cassette – probably not a legitimate concern since Campagnolo cassettes of that vintage allow you to change out individual cogs. I hesitated and decided to wait and see if Recycled Cycles could come up with something. A couple of days later I got an email saying that if I bought the Campagnolo item in my shopping cart in the next 96 hours they’t take 25% off. I sat on it overnight and then decided that it didn’t make sense to cut corners so I went onto Ebay and pushed the buy now button. As I approved the payment I thought that I’d gotten more of a credit than I was expecting and when I got the purchase confirmation I realized that I’d evidently left a campy rear hub in my shopping cart and that it was what I’d gotten the promotional offer on, not the cassette that I wanted. It was a disturbing but not a super expensive lesson. I went ahead and bought the NOS cassette, too. The hub shipped that night. A week later I emailed the cassette seller asking why he’d gone silent on me and a few hours later I was notified that it had shipped – only to find out that “shipped” meant that a tracking number had been created but the package didn’t get handed off to the carrier for another couple of days and consequently the estimated delivery date got pushed out a few days from what was originally advertised. Odette noticed when the hub showed up, but I was in the process of getting the tandem ready to be repainted and she assumed it was bike parts related to that and didn’t inquire any further.
I got a call from Recycled Cycles when the wheels were done and stopped by the store on my way home from a ride. I slung the wheels around my shoulders with a runner and rode home with them on my back (I started out with a vertical arrangement but the upper wheel banged into my helmet and I couldn’t tilt my head back to see up the hill – I stopped and reconfigured it on the horizontal so that I was too wide for the bike lane but considerably more comfortable.) Once again, I got the wheels back into the garage without Odette noticing.
I realized that there was a lot of clearance under those fenders and that the 23s were going to feel twitchy and give an unforgiving ride so I ordered a pair of Panaracer Pascella 650C X 28s that would more nearly match the 26 X 1.25 Pascellas she had on there. I was taking a chance that 28s would be too big but it did seem like I had a lot of clearance…
While waiting for the deliveries, I went ahead and mounted the headlight and the new front wheel and it worked like a charm when I plugged it in. I ran the wire between the headlight and tail light and found that there was more than enough wire for a small frame. I undid the plate on the rack and pushed the wire near to the center, then tightened it up again but not so tight as to crimp the wire. I wrapped the wire around the rack strut, around the brake cable and still had enough left to wrap it around the head tube a couple of times. This version of the tail light wire had a ring terminal with a male spade connector that I could put under the nut on the headlight mount for a ground. This made the connection much simpler than the ones I’d done before since it meant not having to crimp any connectors onto the wires. When I got both conductors plugged in I spun the wheel and both lights lit up which made me happy. I’ll have to go for a ride with Odette to observe the brake light pulses. I probably still need to point the headlight a little lower, but getting the lights mounted turned to be much easier than expected.
That evening the NOS cassette arrived. Odette noticed the package but didn’t ask any questions. I mounted the cassette on the hub without any issues. I mounted the new wheel on the bike without any issues. I always worry about an old chain on a new cassette, but it seemed to shift okay – at least I could run it through the full range and it didn’t skip or clatter. We’ll see if that’s just on the stand or if it also works on the road.
Here’s how the bike looks with 23s. I still think that the 28s will fit (Google says 28mm is 1.102 inches…) The Venus rims are evidently narrower than the old ones (at least on the exterior) because I had to adjust the brakes to eliminate a couple mm of travel on each side. Including the mistake on the hub, the new lights & wheels cost me just over $1,400.
Here’s what the 28s look like (notice the tan sidewalls.) There was a blip where the bead wasn’t setting properly by the valve stem on the rear and the next day I came out to a flat tire. I put a patched tube on, and just like that the bump was gone.
