Clydesdales/Athenas (200+ lb / 91+ kg) - 4 spokes in 1 year. Whasss Up?

I bought a Raleigh C500 51 weeks ago. 1st 4 months no problem. Then a spoke broke. 2 weeks later a 2nd spoke broke. The shop replaced with new wheel under warranty with a shimano hub, DT 14 spokes and CR18 rim. Broke a spoke 6 weeks ago, spoke replaced and wheel trued. Tonight hit a manhole which sunk about an inch, 500 yards later...dunk. Oh shoot. Broken spoke. I try to ride carefully. I weigh in at 240. What can I do? (BTW all rear spokes)

Peace,
Steve

Find a shop that can build you a better wheel.

I had a wheel that was breaking spokes every few weeks. Every time they'd replace one spoke, another would pop. I finally had a good wheelbuilder strip the wheel, replace all the spokes and rebuild the wheel from scratch. Two years later, the wheel is still true with no broken spokes.

Another thing to look at is the actual wheel. I weigh in around 250 and had issues with spokes because the bontarager wheels that came on the lemond I was riding simply flexed too much with the added weight. I switched them out for some mavic equipes (which is one of mavics lower end wheels cause they are pretty heavy but extremely strong) and had no issues over 6k miles now. it was amazing to me that I could go from a spoke everey other time I rode to nothing that fast.

Another thing to look at is the actual wheel. I weigh in around 250 and had issues with spokes because the bontarager wheels that came on the lemond I was riding simply flexed too much with the added weight. I switched them out for some mavic equipes (which is one of mavics lower end wheels cause they are pretty heavy but extremely strong) and had no issues over 6k miles now. it was amazing to me that I could go from a spoke everey other time I rode to nothing that fast.

Yeah, my Bontrager Race rear lasted about 4000 before the eyelets began to tear out. I'll likely have to replace them toward the end of this season. Good riddance.

I had an old set of mavic cxp30s (deep section) with ultegra hubs on my Cannondale before it died, they were bulletproof.

Once you start breaking more than one spoke, you are better off replacing all of them. Broken spokes tend to cascade. You need that wheel to be re-built. Maybe go with thicker spokes, and go to a decent place that tensions spokes as well. That is what I had to do for my back tire. Good luck.

Thanks. One more and I'll have the spokes replaced.

Sounds like your spokes my not be tensioned right. I have the wheel rebuilt with all the spokes replaced or get a stiffer rim. I had this issue on my oem alex rims. I have not busted a spoke since I got a better rim and stronger spokes. That has been almost 15 months.

1) Tension, tension, tension.
2) The CR18 did not get good reviews when I was inquiring about wheels in the mech (http://bikeforums.net/showthread.php?t=349283) section (bunch of links in my sig; apparently wheels have been my obsession for 2007). I would have them rebuild the wheel with a Velocity Deep-V rim (especially if your routes have a bunch of potholes) for something that approaches bombproof.

Are you running DTs in the wheels?
DT went to a longer neck spoke and some folks have been experiencing spoke breakage claimed to be due to the longer necks.