&gt; I suspect that a decent quality of steel is needed for spokes,<p>That&#x27;s a good guess, as &quot;Wire Wheels&quot; were first successfully used commercially for bicycles.<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Wire_wheel#On_bicycles" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Wire_wheel#On_bicycles</a><p>Not much has really changed since then. All my bikes have spoked wheels. Works great, light, relatively inexpensive.