Which hub and spoke diameter is correct for 1973 850?

Hi, I just got a 73 850 (with the typ low speed front end wobble if my hands are off the bars!!!) and was going to have a set of Akront aluminum rims, stainless spokes and new Avon tires put on my hubs but noticed that my front wheel has much thicker spokes than my rear! I don't want to waste $ building a wheel set that is wrong for this bike, does anyone know which wheel is correct? I don't remember having differant spoke diameters on any other Nortons that I've had. ???

According to the manual, front,8 swg for drum brake, 9swg for LH side & 8 swg RH side for disc brake.
Rear, 8/10 swg. ?. So you could have 10 swg in the back. This is British swg, so convert to USA.
Smaller the no., the bigger the spoke.
My whhels are rebuilt with larger spokes on the front.

gtsun said:

noticed that my front wheel has much thicker spokes than my rear! I don't want to waste $ building a wheel set that is wrong for this bike, does anyone know which wheel is correct?

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Unless you can say what SWG*/AWG gauge or diameter they are, then it will be difficult to give you a precise answer to your question.

However, according to the factory manual, front disc wheel spokes (disc on the right) are supposed to be "9 SWG" on the left-hand side , and "8 SWG" on the right-hand (disc) side.

And the rear wheel spokes are supposed to be "8/10 SWG" (so, double diameter = 'butted' spokes) therefore according to the manual data, the main part of each rear wheel spoke should be thinner diameter 10 SWG (.1280") compared to the front wheel's 9 SWG (.1440") & 8 SWG (.1600") spokes.

*SWG = British Standard Wire Gauge, which is slightly different to AWG = American Wire Gauge.

SWG-AWG Conversion chart http://www.reade.com/Conversion/wire_gauge.html