Singlespeed & Fixed Gear - cheapo wheel truing

I needed to respace my rear wheel and I am too cheap to pay a shop to true my wheel so I came up with this...

http://www.celluloidandsilver.com/Bike_Images/wheel_truing_1.jpg
http://www.celluloidandsilver.com/Bike_Images/wheel_truing_2.jpg


Surely its been done before though.

http://www.rda-forever.com/Galleries/galleries/PromosPics/Macgyver/Macgyver_EP001_0009.jpg

i do something similar but with #2 pencil.

i just put it in the rear of a road frame and use the brake pads as guides

A magnetic dial guage is cheap and slightly more elegant than the caliper and clamp. An old steel fork can be used as a truing stand with a little bending.

Az

A magnetic dial guage is cheap and slightly more elegant than the caliper and clamp. An old steel fork can be used as a truing stand with a little bending.

Az

Yeah but don't hubs like differ in width?

I needed to respace my rear wheel and I am too cheap to pay a shop to true my wheel so I came up with this...

http://www.celluloidandsilver.com/Bike_Images/wheel_truing_1.jpg
http://www.celluloidandsilver.com/Bike_Images/wheel_truing_2.jpg


Surely its been done before though.

I'd start off by putting a single drop of oil on each of the nippppppples just where they go through the rim…

…but you were going to do that anyway, weren't you? ;)

- Wil

i just put it in the rear of a road frame and use the brake pads as guides

+1

dude, I do the same exact thing, except that I use the other side of the micrometer, and the inside of the rear triangle next to the brake bridge.

I'd start off by putting a single drop of oil on each of the nippppppples just where they go through the rim…

…but you were going to do that anyway, weren't you? ;)

- Wil

Yeah, I did that. This wheel is pretty janky to begin with. Once I burn through the tire I think I'm going to build up a new rear.

I use a sharpie. Slowly move it toward the spinning wheel until it starts marking the high spots, do it on each side, twist the nipples, wipe off the ink with some alcohol, and repeat as necessary. Pretty ghetto, but it works okay.

I use a truing stand. Works great, gives great results...I'm saving up for some pencils and sharpies, though.

If you are missing one or more sets of brake calipers, a pencil, your bike frame (fork or rear triangle, as appropriate) and a rubber band to keep the pencil in place is good.

you need the right tools man

Remove tire/tube. Clamp a Popsicle stick or something equally stiff onto your frame/fork below the bridge/crown so that it's only a couple of mm from the rim. Measure and mark the center, then measure the rim width and mark 1/2 of that on either side of the center mark with a thin pen or sharp pencil. You can get scary good results with this doing lateral truing, I've put wheels I've done this way on park stands and it took a dial indicator to find any deviance. You can do radial this way as well, you just have to move the stick a lot so it's hard to go back and forth between radial and lateral.

i just put it in the rear of a road frame and use the brake pads as guides

i true wheels every day like this. Practice enough and you can get the wheel dead straight. The trick is adjusting the brakes as tight as possible (before the wheel binds, but rubbing on the high spots is good) before you start.

That must be super accurate... I mean, you're using a micrometer.