Homemade wood rims

The tires are more difficult to remove than to mount. A small chip occurred where one of the 4 plastic irons leveraged it off. Touch up will be required after tire removal. Riding will be the proof of the pudding, but that will take awhile to see how flexable this stuff really is. I’ll post developments later. 69A79A6F-76EB-418B-A323-58EDC0271E88.jpeg
 
I put the first thin layer of wood epoxy on my second hoop today. It takes three layers and you can’t do the whole hoop at once, so about a week of mostly waiting. I’ll coat the top where it’s hanging tomorrow. Then sand, stain twice and a top coat of flex. Once the epoxy wood is sanded I drill out the valve and spoke holes. This way I can hang it to dry the stain and top coats. About two weeks + to make one rim. image.jpg
 
I put a second top coat of flexible marine epoxy on the fake wood and now the edge doesn’t chip with multiple mounts and dismounts. Something I didn’t consider was truing the wheel. The epoxy wood putty layer is thin but it’s not perfectly even so truing was a little bit harder than usual, but not too bad. I used salvaged long brass spoke nipples from vintage trashed wheels. Their longer than what is used now. 2A8A1704-A94B-4A1A-915C-0BBD47AB8422.jpeg 0D9DDE76-A280-47ED-BFCD-D796AA087F75.jpeg
 
These faux wood wheels are replacements for these. EE61D014-E320-48D3-97EC-857968E47FBB.jpeg
They came from this 1892 -1899 bicycle, the only years this company was in existence. 4B2BDF9C-26D8-4924-96B8-35CC51C2471B.jpeg 13022D81-8213-445F-847B-F378891D4AC5.jpeg 864C08E0-EB3F-4536-936B-BE8C5E42B575.jpeg
 
Is that the remnants of a tyre going round those wheels?
Yes a tyre, as you can see it originally had a white outer cover. It’s petrified hard and brittle, as we’re the rubber inserts on the pedals, the cork grips, the wood rims and the leather seat. All organics, including the original lube is rotted. Moving this stuff leaves chunks and dust every time their moved. The bike is rusty and most of the nickel plating is gone.
 
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I love the look of these, but that is alot of work.
This might be a stupid question, but is the braking surface ok?
 
That was going to be my question...^ .....how does the braking work? Or are you going over to drums?
 
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