Commuting - Bent rim? help please

Hello all,

My front and rear brakes both keep rubbing on the rim and there is a lot of brake marking on the rim. I thought it was a brake issue, but upon closer review, I notice that especially the back rim isn't spinning straight, it seems to "wobble" sort of, so on certain parts of a revolution, it gets closer to one side and rubs more on one of the brakes.

I'm guessing the rim is bent, possibly because I rode on a bumpy sidewalk a few times. I purchased my specialized crossroads '04 about a month ago in NJ before I moved to Washington, DC, and I don't know if this is covered by my 1 year warranty. I also didn't get the 1 month tuneup, since the store I purchased it from is in NJ and I'm in DC.

Does anyone from DC, or anyone in general know if this is covered under the warranty, or if I can carry over the warranty/tune up stuff over to this store? What would be the best way to do this - go to a specialized store and ask them, or contact specialized directly?

Also, should I stop riding the bike so it won't get worse?

Thank you all

Go to any bike shop and have them true your wheels. If it's not too bad, it should cost about 15 bucks a wheel.
Or you can ask for a spoke wrench and do it yourself.
Basically, the spokes of the wheel are always pulling on it to help it maintain shape. If the left side spokes have a little more tension at one spot, then it'll pull that part of the wheel a little bit to the left and cause a wobble. Say the tensions are equal to begin with but you slam into a curb and cause the rim to slightly bend towards the left at some point, all you have to do is tighten the spokes on the right side at that spot to pull the rim back over.
Do a search on the mechanics forum here to get some tips on how to true a wheel yourself.

Chances are your wheel is just "out of true", and I'd have someone fix that for you before you do cause the rim to get bent. Your wheels probably weren't built with enough care and now need to be re-trued.

I don't know about the warranty thing. You could just find out how many Specialized dealers their are in your area. Take the bike down to each and see if one of them will cut you a break.


Ron
Wasatch Mountian Range, Utah

Properly tensioned wheels should not come out of true easily. I hit a car dead-on at about 20 mph, and my front wheel, which I had retensioed myself, was still dead-on true...

thanks for your responses.

I went to Hudson Trail here in DC, they said about $15 a wheel to true it. I thought maybe I would buy the spoke wrench instead, and try to do it myself. But they only had the multi-size small 3 in one wrench. I know the size of my spoke, but they didn't have the wrench in my spoke size, which seems easier to use and more comfortable.

Is there a comfort or any other difference between the multi-size wrench all in one, and the one size wrench?

I wold try to buy a Park spoke wrench in the size you need. Screwing up a spoke nipple could cost more to repair than a simple truing. Id have them get it straight, buy/order the park wrench and read up on how to do it yourself. When the time comes youll be ready to do it yourself!

I second that. Get the wrench that fits your spoke nipples. Of the Park tool ones, each color represents a certain type (and sometimes brand) of spoke nips. Black and red are the most common.

The key to truing wheels is small increments at a time. Don't turn the wrench more than a quarter turn at a time. That and patience. Its a great skill to have!

When truing the wheels yourself, be certain not to move anything more than 1/4 turn at a time. My LBS owner friend said some of his best money comes from leaving spoke wrenches out where BMX grommets can steal them and then they come to him when they really screw up their wheels.

Another thing to be aware of: when truing a wheel, lefty is not "losey". To tighten a particular spoke, you turn the nipple to the left (counter clockwise), thereby driving the screw or spoke to the right and tightening it.

Good luck. I have gotten pretty good with true, but I cannot seem to do a thing about round.

Another thing to be aware of: when truing a wheel, lefty is not "losey". To tighten a particular spoke, you turn the nipple to the left (counter clockwise), thereby driving the screw or spoke to the right and tightening it.

Be careful with this particular bit of advice. It's only true when looking across the interior of the wheel at the part where you're truing. The thing to understand is that the nipple/spoke interface is right-hand threaded but sometime you work with the parts upside down. Get in the habit of thinking about how the nipple would be turning if it were rightside up.

Just imagine you're looking at the spoke in the direction from the rim to the hub, in that direction, the nipple works like a screw (in fact if you take the tire, tube, and rim tape off, the end of it even looks like a screw), so to tighten, turn clockwise, to loosen, turn counterclockwise.