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@Skant
It's a bit retrospective now, but still was part of the "Current Project" and felt it may (or not) be of interest.
The braking surface on my old front wheel (Navigator clincher x Formula) wore out and so I had to rebuild it to a new rim. Wanted to make the switch to a wider rim and also wanted a silver hub to match the rear Phil. Considered buying a new Hub but at the time had minimal available funds and this one's done me well for thousands of miles so it felt kind of sad to retire it.
I bought an Archetype rim and Sapim stainless spokes from Kinoko and had myself a crafty afternoon.
The old wheel and new bits.
Removed the axel and bearings then started cutting the spokes (nipples were old and knackered so this was the only option really)
Popped the hub into an old (not be used for cooking again) pan filled with a fairly strong sodium hydroxide solution.
After about 30mins (checking and turning regularly) the anodising was removed.
This leaves a pretty ugly aluminium oxide finish.
I sanded back the tarnished layer with 400 grit (the finest grade available in walking distance from my house) wet and dry paper. Then I hand polished it with Brasso for as long as I felt it was worth doing and reassembled the axel and bearings.
I gave the spokes a quick polish then began lacing the wheel up. It all went pretty smoothly considering I hadn't built a wheel in about 8 years and even then I'd only done a few BMX wheels way back when they were so over-built and had so many spokes that it didn't really matter how well they were built.