I recently ordered a complete bike off a website and I noticed my wheel was a bit wobbly. I found a short video about wheel truing and had a go with it as it didn't seem to hard..
But I ended up not doing much. I'm not sure if I made it worse, or better, but I know it's still wobbly.
Any tips on truing wheels? Should I just take it to the shop? I'm not sure if I can damage my wheel doing this the wrong way.. in order to tune wheels properly.... you should have a truing stand.......
if you do not really know what you are doing... take it to a bike shop. If you are unsure...take it to the shop. Its not that expensive to get your wheels trued. I say go for it. Your bike is not the space shuttle. If you have "extra" money and you don't want to take your bikelife to another level then take it to the shop.
Otherwise, see: http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;...
I.e., that's another answer on truing wheels. My advice - be bold on spoke changes. Probably if you were following the guidance of the video without effect, you were not loosening/tightening enough. Don't go crazy on each adjustment, but at the same time, make them count, you're pulling the whole wheel into alignment. Give it another try, stand or no stand. . . hit a curb, to the shop. hit a rock.. shop... hop a bump. . shop..... is that what you want?. . . otherwise, practice. . I'm just a hacker myself but I think you'd have to be pretty silly to actually damage your rim doing this, you might just be being a little over cautious. Worst case, you're going to screw it up so much you have to take it to the shop and they'll fix it - you're not going to do permanent damage.... give it another go.... you can mess them up prety bad, broken spokes, damage hub while riding. wheel trueing stand is suggested. the main thing is to not torque down each spoke skip spokes and lightly tighten them around the wheel. you should take it to a shop though if you don't know what you are doing. Mmm . . . what do you mean by wobbly?
Check the cones and rim before your spokes.
Truing is not rocket science. You don't need a truing stand anymore than you need a launch pad!
With a new wheel, follow these simple steps and you can not go wrong.
1) First remove tire tube and rim tape.
2) Get yourself a screw driver.
3) Loosen all the nipples with the screw driver only one quarter turn (anymore could over tension and snap spokes)
4) repeat step three
5) Now loosen all nipples until the nipples expose only one thread on the spoke.
6) Get yourself a spoke key.
7) Tighten all spokes a quarter turn.
8) Keep repeating step seven until the tension on each spoke is identical and firm but not super tense.
9) Between each quarter turn push and squeeze the spokes around the hub flange so that they "bed in"
If the wheel is still wobbly - rim may be bent, spokes may be different lengths, wheel maybe laced incorrectly. Return to manufacturer.
Takes time, but if you do it right, your wheel will be sweet, ride better and last longer.
Edit: hey sfr1224, you ever actually built a wheel? Dish is dictated by spoke length, as is radial true. Tension is felt not heard. This is one of many problems with buying a bike online instead of from your local store. Assuming this was a new bike, I suspect one of two things has happened. First, the seller sent you a bike with an out of true wheel. Second, the seller didn't pack the bike correctly and it got damaged in transit. Either way, a reputable seller should repair the wheel. If the seller refuses to repair the wheel, you are going to have to suck it up and repair it yourself or take it to a shop and have them true the wheel.
In answer to your last query, you can absolutely damage a wheel if you do not know what you're doing. If this worries you, take it to a shop. Otherwise, wheel truing is not difficult, it is just persnickety and time consuming.
It is not utterly necessary to have a truing stand. With your bike in a stand, you can use a rim brake as a guide. It is just a bit of a pain. Before you start truing your wheels, you need to clean the spoke threads with a rag and perhaps some rubbing alcohol. Then put a tiny drop of oil on each spoke thread. When tightening and loosening spokes, make sure the nipple is rotating and the spoke is staying stationary. If the entire spoke is rotating with the nipple you are putting extreme stress on the spoke and not affecting the trueness of the wheel.
Four things must happen to true a wheel. First, you must bring the spokes into comparable tension. Secondly, you must bring the wheel into lateral true. In other words, you don't want any side to side wobble. Thirdly, you must bring the wheel into radial true. In other words, you want a round wheel, not an oval wheel. Finally, you want to keep the wheel correctly dished, or centered. Neglecting any part of this is a problem. I view truing a wheel as an iterative exercise. First you equalize tensions, then you laterally true, then you radially true, check dishing, then you go back to checking tensions...
Check spoke tensions by plucking each spoke with a fingernail. On a front wheel, each spoke should make roughly the same tone. On a back wheel, due to dishing of the wheel to accomodate the gears, the two sides will have unequal spoke tensions. Thus, each spoke on the drive side of the wheel should make the same tone. Each spoke on the non-drive side will make the same tone. The tones, however, will be completely different between the two sides.
If a spoke makes a very different tone that the other spokes, tighten or loosen that spoke to bring it into tension with the other spokes.
Now check lateral trueness. In a spot where the wheel wobbles to the right, slightly loosen the spokes on the right around the wobble. Then slightly tighten the spokes on the left around the wobble. When adjusting spokes, you want to tighten and loosen the most right at the wobble. Tighten and loosen less as move away from the wobble. At most, I like to work in quarter turns. You don't need or want to be radical in this process. Furthermore, you don't need or want to entirely correct the problem on the first go round.
Now check radial trueness. If you are developing a flat spot, you need to very slightly loosen spokes on both side in the vicinity of the flat spot, and very slightly tighten spokes on both sides around the rest of the wheel.
Now check centering of the rim over the hub. If the rim is not centered over the hub, you need to very slightly loosen all spokes on one side and very slightly tighten all spokes on the other side to correctly dish the wheel.
You have finished iteration one! Before proceeding with iteration two, you need to "de-stress" the wheel. Starting at the valve, grab pairs of spokes on either side of the wheel and give them a gentle but firm squeeze. You don't want to squeeze hard enough to bend or stretch a spoke. All you are attempting to do is release stress built up in the wheel as a result of the retentioning that is occuring.
Spin the wheel and see how you are doing. Hopefully, all four issues of tension, radial, lateral and centering will be better than before your first go round! Now begin iteration two.
There is a good article on wheel truing on Park Tool Web site. Here is the link:
http://parktool.com/repair/readhowto.asp...
Hope this helps. Go get The Bicycle Wheel by Jobst Brandt. Read it and you will have a VERY solid understanding of the physics behind bicycle wheels as well as a good idea of what to do to fix your wheels.
Or you can take your bike to a shop before you destroy your wheelset. |
