Noisy spokes after truing

[Ed Thomas]

I just made a truing stand and seemed to have reasonable success truing my front wheel. I used an indicator, and had the wheel pretty darn close in the stand.

To do the truing, I followed the general guidelines in repair books and online... loosen the bulging side spokes and tighten the other side, homing in from both directions of the bulge using small increments.

So the sum of the loosening and tightening of the spokes should have yielded roughly the same tension as when I started. I should mention that each spoke got a small dot of oil, both on the spoke nut and where it passed through the rim.

Before I trued the wheel, it did not make any noise. Now, however, in the quick test ride, the rim went "tink...tink...tink..." as it rotated and put spokes under tension or relaxed others. Applying the brake aggravated the sound.

I did not take the tire off and attempt truing the dish or any out-of-round... just the off-center bulges so far.

Soooo.... what made the difference? What is my next best step?

Thanks.
Ed

 

[SD2006]

Soooo.... what made the difference? What is my next best step?

Thanks.
Ed

I've noticed the same thing after adjusting spokes. Ride a little more and the noise may go away fairly quickly. I'm not a wheel expert (or any expert for that matter) but if the noise continues you may have uneven spoke tension or spoke tread issues.

When I true my wheels I'm more concerned about keeping uniform spoke tension. To me there's no reason to true a wheel down to the micron, +/- 0.5mm should be close enough. That's my $.02 anyway...

 

[tafi]

How badly was the wheel out of true before you trued it?

Usually this noise is due to spokes untwisting if spoke torsion hasn't been accounted for during truing. But this should not carry on for very long at all.

If it happens any longer than for the first few revolutions, then you may have a serious loss in tension of one or more spokes (such that it is buckling with each revolution). If this is true then your wheel is unlikely to last very much longer. You can check the tension for approximate even-ness by squeezing pairs of crossed spokes. You'll find any particularly loose ones very quickly.

If this is so (and assuming your technique is good) then it is likely that the wheel was too damaged in the original impact to be retrued.

If the hit was bad enough to permanently deform the rim, then the tension will definitely not be the same between sides and it will not be possible to equalise it. Often it is the case the the side opposite the "bulge" is already too tight (and the counterveiling spoke too loose) so that straightening the rim requires tightening a tight spoke and loosening a loose one. In these situations you could try belting the rim back to some sort of shape before truing but even this is only a temporary fix, you would need a new rim.

Sometimes in old wheels with eyelets the nipples can move in the eyelet causing a similar tinking noise. This can usually be solved temporarily with a drop of machine oil on each nipple at the eyelet.

 

[Ed Thomas]

Thanks for the help so far. As I said, the wheel was noise-free before I trued it, and it wasn't terribly out of whack... just enough that the brake rubbed unless it was opened too far. The sum of my tweaking should have given me about the same tension all around, and I did slip a drop of oil in each eyelet. The bike is older, but a very well maintained Bianchi Brava. New to me, and so far I like it a lot.

Since I didn't address dishing, I'm wondering if I got the wheel too far out that way. I'll have to look at that later today. Still learning.

 

[Ed Thomas]

To add one more thing... the rim looks okay to me and doesn't look like it was wrecked. Just slightly out of round.

 

[alfeng]

To add one more thing... the rim looks okay to me and doesn't look like it was wrecked. Just slightly out of round.

When in doubt, loosen all the spokes & re-tension them.

 

[tafi]

The sum of my tweaking should have given me about the same tension all around...

This is not always a given and must be checked. It sounds very much to me like there is a loose spoke somewhere.

the rim looks okay to me and doesn't look like it was wrecked. Just slightly out of round

So it was actually out of round? Or was it out of true?
How far our of round?
If the rim is actually dented inwards (at all) then the spokes at the dent will already be slacker than the rest. And it sounds like you would have loosened them more to try to bring the rim into round. I will repeat that if the rim has been permanently deformed at all then you will never get even tension.

A flat spotted rim usually needs to be chucked or belted back into shape.

 

[curby]

first off, this symptom is normal, wheels that get trued, tensioned or re-tensioned often 'king,king,king' esp. if the wheel was assembled some time ago and spoke prep was used.

the noise should go away after a few rides, sometimes only 1 ride does it, I have always attributed it to the spokes seating themselves.

fwiw, if you have loosened spokes on one side and tightened opposite them to achieve true, the tension has changed, you will find if it is a reliable wheel by riding it more and seeing if it needs regular truing.

good luck

 

[Ed Thomas]

Thanks again, all.

Tafi, I mean out of true, not necessarily out of round. I haven't had a chance to check round carefully yet, but it if is out, it isn't by much. I went through all the spokes and tightened to the same sound, which helped a lot. I don't have a tensioner, but did find a few that were noticeably looser than the rest.

Of course that pulled the wheel a little bit out of true, but not so much as before. I will play with it some more as I find time and get back.

 

[swampy1970]

I just made a truing stand and seemed to have reasonable success truing my front wheel. I used an indicator, and had the wheel pretty darn close in the stand.

To do the truing, I followed the general guidelines in repair books and online... loosen the bulging side spokes and tighten the other side, homing in from both directions of the bulge using small increments.

So the sum of the loosening and tightening of the spokes should have yielded roughly the same tension as when I started. I should mention that each spoke got a small dot of oil, both on the spoke nut and where it passed through the rim.

Before I trued the wheel, it did not make any noise. Now, however, in the quick test ride, the rim went "tink...tink...tink..." as it rotated and put spokes under tension or relaxed others. Applying the brake aggravated the sound.

I did not take the tire off and attempt truing the dish or any out-of-round... just the off-center bulges so far.

Soooo.... what made the difference? What is my next best step?

Thanks.
Ed

Once you've made significant changes to spoke tension, "stress relieve" the wheel. Take out the QR skewer, place the wheel on it's side and with slight pressure push down on the rim, with your hands on opposite sides of the rim. Rotate slightly and repeat then turn over and do the other side. Check that the wheel is still true - if it is then you're good to go.