Wheels!

When the rims arrived, both were unpainted aluminum. Since this bike will not have caliper brakes (discs for me), I had them painted. The overall color scheme is red, white, and black. White powder coat was applied by a local shop with very nice results. Makes me want to paint my other bikes' wheels. 

I had the rear wheel laced at my local bike shop. Short spokes (I cut commercially purchased spokes and rethreaded them) go at crazy angles to the hub. I'm also a complete novice at building wheels. So...I chose the lace the big wheel myself and learn. After A LOT of online research and some guessing, I selected a 6 cross lacing pattern. Compare that to a typical 3 cross for regular bikes. It took around 3 hours to lace all 64 spokes and get it initially true. It was so nice to finally have both wheels. 

Front and rear. big and small.