Calling upon the expertise of wheel gurus...

[Paul Kopit]

On Fri, 07 Apr 2006 19:00:53 +0100, Zog The Undeniable
<[email protected]> wrote:

>I do that because, as the pinging indicates, it's the most effective way
>to remove any twist. It is a very tough test of the wheel though, and
>not to be done too violently. You must also squeeze pairs of spokes to
>stress-relieve/straighten/reshape (delete according to your own
>religious beliefs) the spokes.

One of the last steps I do before finishing a wheel is to get rid of
any spoke twist. I put a tire on the wheel and roll the bike down the
driveway and pedal slowly around the cul-de-sac. Then I bring the
wheel in to finish it.

 

[Paul Kopit]

On Fri, 07 Apr 2006 19:02:40 +0100, Zog The Undeniable
<[email protected]> wrote:

>IME it takes a fair bit of abuse to permanently deform a rim. Anyway,
>taking the wheel apart and putting the rim on a window pane will soon
>show if it's flat.

Hold the rim against a new rim to check for flatness.

 

[[email protected]]

Paul Kopit writes:

>> I do that because, as the pinging indicates, it's the most
>> effective way to remove any twist. It is a very tough test of the
>> wheel though, and not to be done too violently. You must also
>> squeeze pairs of spokes to stress-relieve/straighten/reshape
>> (delete according to your own religious beliefs) the spokes.

> One of the last steps I do before finishing a wheel is to get rid of
> any spoke twist. I put a tire on the wheel and roll the bike down
> the driveway and pedal slowly around the cul-de-sac. Then I bring
> the wheel in to finish it.

That doesn't do you any favors. So how do you finish the wheel if you
your spoke adjusting method causes twist. This sounds like infinite
loops that machines perform when truing tight wheels. Manually, an
automatic back twist with every adjustment is trivial and it prevents
twist while getting alignment that is real and stable. If you don't
do that there can be as much as a quarter turn in the last spokes
adjusted. That will not come out with a ride around the block, but
more likely in a few miles of descending bumpy roads.

It is from these after-the-fact misalignments that lead people to
believe the spokes are settling in and that re-truing is a natural
requirement. The truth is that these wheels are full of twist and are
not stress relieved. Stress relieving has nothing to do with residual
spoke twist, by the way, although it is often claimed to do so.

How to prevent twist is explained in detail in the book that people
seem not to read for odd reasons, especially people who work with
wheels professionally. Just the idea of using pliers to prevent twist
gives me the willies. Year after year on wreck.bike, I see advice
given on how to build wheels the hard way and without good results.
You can lead a horse to water but... and don't let the camel get its
nose in the tent.

Jobst Brandt

 

[Paul Kopit]

On 09 Apr 2006 03:55:09 GMT, [email protected] wrote:

>That doesn't do you any favors. So how do you finish the wheel if you
>your spoke adjusting method causes twist.

On the last ¼ turns of the spokes, I turn them about 3/4 turn and then
back to the ¼ turn. The nipples are greased and the spokes oiled.
The only thing I read about building wheels was your book and some of
what is offered here on r.b.t.

My method of riding a flatted wheel seems to make for wheels that are
silent from the first roll and they don't come back to be touched up
after a couple of hundred miles. I like to build boring wheels.
These need no attention.

 

[Alex Rodriguez]

In article <[email protected]>,
[email protected] says...
>I have been building wheels for about 10 years. I'm don't consider
>myself to be an expert or any great wheel builder, but what I build, I
>ride and it works.
>Recently, I bought a set of pre-built wheels from Performance because
>they were exactly what I would have built for myself, and they were
>cheaper than what I could have done it for. They are your
>garden-variety Ultegra 9-speed 32 hole hubs, laced 3x with DT 14/15 DB
>spokes on Open Pro rims.
>Over the first couple of hundred miles they went slightly out of true
>so I trued them up and using a Wheelsmith tensiometer and the
>recommended 80 to 110 kgf as a guide (I typically shoot for right
>around 90-95), I brought the wheel back into true and with consistent
>tension across all the spokes.
>Over the next couple of hundred they went out of true again and I
>noticed that some of the spokes were detensioning noticeably (non-drive
>side predominantly). I repeated the aforementioned process to bring
>them back into true and tension. Shortly thereafter, broke a spoke.
>A thousand or so miles later, I broke another, some time later,
>another. Today, I broke number 5, all in the course of one year and
>5000 miles. They have all been on the non-drive side of the rear wheel,
>and have been trailing spokes (on these particular wheels the spoke
>heads are facing out on the trailing spokes).

Since you have a tensiometer, did you check to see that the spoke tension
was even all around? Uneven tension will cause the wheel to go out of
true. The snapping spoke are probably due to fatigue failures because the
wheels were not stress-relieved.

>Generally speaking, is a non-drive spoke more apt to break from too
>much tension or too little?

From not being stress relieved.

>What significance is there (if any) that these are all the same side
>and orientation?

They were all not stress relieved.

>What can I do besides tear them apart and re-do them? I have
>considered detensioning the whole wheel enough to expose a few spoke
>threads, use a few drops of Loctite 242 and then retension the wheel as
>I normally would, but I would like some opinions on "my choice" of
>tension that I build into a wheel (mentioned above).

Loctite is not necessary on a properly built wheel. Also, if the spokes
are fatigued, the loctite is not going to help. Most spokes will probably
fail in the near future. You can try stress relieving now, but be careful.
Wear gloves and eye protection. Keep in mind that a spoke may break when you
stress relieve, so point the spoke head away from anthing that might get
damaged by a spoke end that snaps.

----------------
Alex