If you like our site, please consider joining our club!
By joining you will help ensure that we can continue to provide this service
JOIN HERE!

Wheel truing problem

User avatar
Micha
Posts: 759
Joined: Fri Oct 12, 2007 2:24 am
Location: Israel
Has thanked: 10 times
Been thanked: 4 times

Re: Wheel truing problem

Post by Micha »

Seek wrote:
Fri May 05, 2023 12:56 am
New is rarely better. Last year I rebuild my R 25 wheels with one old and one new rim. The old one was a doddle. Very easy to true. The new one was much harder. It is a spare wheel I have and would like to arrange it to have as a backup
Where do you have problems? Around the weld you will never get it true. There will always be a hump. And maybe you are too hard on yourself? Everything within a mm or so is fine. I don’t remember exactly but it certainly wasn’t perfect. No problem while riding.
Thanks Seek. I know that the seam is problematic but the complete rim is dancing left to right...
Michael Steinmann
R51/3 1952
Engine Nr. 529466

User avatar
caker
Posts: 201
Joined: Sat Nov 12, 2011 10:49 pm
Location: Haddonfield, NJ, USA
Has thanked: 1 time
Been thanked: 5 times

Re: Wheel truing problem

Post by caker »

Hi. For me:

Lace up the spokes, leaving everything loose. Then, lay the hub on a flat surface, figure out the correct rim offset referencing off said surface, and use some parallels or washers or something else to raise the rim to the correct offset (in three or more places). Then go around and start removing the slack from the spokes, around and around. This will get you close. Then I put the wheel in the trueing stand and get to work tightening everything, round and round making sure the offset doesn't change, and making sure the wheel stays round. Eventually, all the spokes should have a similar ring when struck - or at least in the same scale :)

The "art" of trueing, I find, is sometimes loosening the neighboring spokes can be just as important as tightening. There are even situations, for example, where loosening (or tightening) the spokes OPPOSITE the rim can have an effect, too.

If you don't have the offset gauge (flat piece of steel with the correct offsets), I have them and can give you the measurements. It's a drag to lace and true a wheel only to find the rim is off-center...

Good luck,
-Chris

User avatar
Micha
Posts: 759
Joined: Fri Oct 12, 2007 2:24 am
Location: Israel
Has thanked: 10 times
Been thanked: 4 times

Re: Wheel truing problem

Post by Micha »

Thanks all for your effort. Will try it this evening.
Michael Steinmann
R51/3 1952
Engine Nr. 529466

User avatar
Flx48
Posts: 259
Joined: Sun Oct 25, 2020 3:11 pm
Location: NW CT
Has thanked: 2 times
Been thanked: 5 times

Re: Wheel truing problem

Post by Flx48 »

Michael-
I'm very much the amateur wheel builder; doing two at the moment, and one last year, four maybe five years ago, and probably ten years back for the last pair before that, so take my thoughts accordingly- I'm not a professional.

Lacing is simpler and less time consuming than truing.
Both tasks require time, patience, and thought, with truing taking more of all.
Lacing is much more expedient with an example on hand for reference.
Before starting to lace, I inspect the new spokes for equal overall length and equal length threading, helpful later when truing.
I lubricate all spoke threads and the nipple pocket before starting, (I use anti-seize, because usually using SS) lubing nipple pockets so to be sure when doing final tightening of the spokes I'm only feeling the thread resistance. 

Rims are dimpled and drilled in groups of four, (for the twins) so ten groups of four on a forty spoke wheel, in each group two spokes are leading, and two are trailing.
Viewed from the hub/drum perspective, one pair of spokes of a group on the hub side cross each other going to the rim, and the other pair do the same on the drum side.

So with drum face down and rim shimmed up for the appropriate offset, all ten of one spoke are installed with their nipples, (leading or trailing) followed by all ten of the second spoke.
How far to thread the nipple up the thread is not as important as threading all ten spokes of the same spoke the same amount, and then all ten of the second group that same amount.
My aim is to take up the looseness between hub and rim without actually lifting the rim up off the offset shims.
The whole plot is then turned over and the process repeated, again bringing all the spokes from the 3rd and 4th groups up in equal amounts, till ALL spokes are EQUALLY threaded and the hub feels stable.

Perhaps counterintuitively, it is less time consuming, overall, to bring all the nipples up slowly and equally, rather than running them up quickly individually.
This will save time in the truing phase, and lessen the chances of having to backtrack if one or more areas have been inadvertently made too tight.

I realize you've had no issue with lacing, and mention all this only because where you finish with lacing is where you start with the truing.

After putting the wheel in the truing stand, I've found correcting radial runout first to be most productive, then going after axial runout.
Radial runout (wheel hop or egg shape) involves tightening at the high spots, and possibly loosening at the opposite side. (180' across the rim) 
With radial under control then axial runout (wheel wobble or side to side) can be addressed and tightening to pull the rim to center and possibly loosening opposite edge of rim.

Again, it's a simpler (and ultimately less time consuming) procedure to go round and round to slowly sneak up on the correct location and tightness, constantly checking both radial and axial, than go too far too early in any one area, in the process and then have to figure out where to loosen; do not try to correct too much at once.
Feeler gauge can be used where spokes cross to compare and check for evenness.

Be aware to have points of reference, so you can keep track of where you're at in the process.
Most obvious is the tube stem hole, and then, if the rim has them, the safety dents.
I've also stuck on a little bit of tape if I think I need to remember a certain spot.

I choose to use copper wire as my truing stand pointer, for ease of quick distance or location changes.
And I choose to use the inside of the rim for pointer reference rather than the outside, because more than half the wheels I've put together have original rims and are rarely perfect on the outside lip, particularly the soft Weinmann alloys, usually well abused by curbs and/or tire irons.

As Seek mentioned, though possible, the hub/drum is the last thing to be problematic, I'd suspect the rim before that, and have seen some examples that will not lay flat, and trying to correct by spoke tightening is not a sound practice.

Again, going slowly and evenly, to see the whole picture, to not have to backtrack, is key for those of us not doing wheels all the time.
Best-
George
IMG-3470.jpg
IMG-3475.jpg
IMG-3472.jpg

Post Reply