on the path

What I initially thought was a spoke failure turned out to be a nipple failure. The nipple was corroded so badly that the head separated from the shaft of the nipple. Upon further inspection, another 18 nipples on the same wheel had significant corrosion and were doomed. All of the corrosion was below the rim tape and not visible on the hub side of the rim. The wheels were replaced under warrantee. My question is how to proceed from here.

It turns out that the nipples are made of aluminum, and not anodized. I'd prefer not to deal with more nipples failing so my inquiry is about prevention. In particular, I'm wondering what product to use and how to apply it to protect the nipples from corroding.

So far I've been told to use chain lube on the nipples at the tire side and the hub side of the nipples. I've also been told to use a penetrating oil followed by spoke freeze. I'm wondering what you all think.

Thanks for any help.

fietsbob

Spoke threading all the way inside the nipple proper length is flush with the slot in the head. Use Brass Nips.

Salted roads during the winter ? corrosion will Happen wash salt off with fresh Water. & soap.

Bill Kapaun

If the spoke is the proper length, the head supports the spoke and the barrel of the nipple is along for the ride.

DiabloScott

2nded

mconlonx

3rded

In New England, I've seen alloy nipples on new wheels disintegrating as soon as 3-5 years from new. When I build wheels for people, I very strongly recommend brass nipples unless they are looking for ultimate lightweight build or something and if a customer does specifically request alloy nipples for their everyday use wheels, I will let them know that they will be looking at a rebuild a few years down the road.

Not a fan of Mavic system wheels because it is all aluminum -- rims, the proprietary nipples used, and even spokes. Seen way too many of them with corrosion frozen nipples, and generally angered owners who expected more life out of them...

SquidPuppet

+ a million for Brass Nipples.

on the path

I purchased the wheels from a retailer. I did not build them. I'm fully aware that I have the option to rebuild the wheels with different materials, or even to purchase new wheels. I was hoping for suggestions for dealing with what I have and what's already been done. Thanks..

bikeman715

A drop of oil on every nipple once a month and/or any adjustments are done to the wheel . When rebuilding the wheel replace the nibbles with brass ones .

SquidPuppet

I'm not sure that anything can be done regarding the corrosion.

I'd inspect them closely to be certain that the spokes are long enough.

mconlonx

Chain lube on the inside and outside of the rim, as was suggested to you, is probably the best you can do. Since it is an already built wheel, I don't really see the point of penetrating oil and spoke freeze.

DiabloScott

I'm not entirely against aluminum nipples - I have a nice set of wheels built with them but they hardly ever see wet roads.
OP said 18 of his nipples are already far along the road to failure - you can't undo that... time to bite the bullet and rebuild.

nfmisso

Rebuild your wheels with nickel plated brass nipples - any choice leaving the alloy nipples in place is not going to be very effective.

FastJake

Your question is sort of like, "how do I keep my unpainted steel car from rusting?" Answer: in the long run, you can't.

+1 I bought a used wheelset very cheap that needed some truing and the spokes were way too loose. Aluminum nipples were all seized up. I tried lubricating to get them to move. No dice. Broke spokes trying to true the wheels. Cut all the spokes, threw them in the trash, and rebuilt with double butted stainless steel spokes and brass nipples like I always do. They're worth the extra few grams per wheel.

on the path

Thanks for all the helpful replies. I could have been and should have been a bit more clear. I didn't want to bother with the whole story, but I should fill in a little bit.

The entire wheel set was replaced by the retailer with no charge to me. The wheel with the 18 corroded nipples went back to the retailer. I didn't even bother to pull the rim tape off of the other wheel, knowing they would be replaced for free.

Now I have the replacement wheels, pretty much the same design as the ones that failed. I received the replacement wheels in January, but started riding them just this week. I've not ridden them in the rain and I probably won't.

So the wheels I have now are virtually new. I'm willing to dress, lube, apply product, etc. to the nipples to make them last as long as possible before rebuilding and replacing. It's a pretty simple question, albeit one that needs a lot of explanation.

Thanks for all the help..

davidad

I don't think you are going to get a simple answer. I have only built one wheel with Al. nipples and did not care for the end result. They began to break when I touched up the wheel after 5 to 10k miles.
You could drip thin oil into the bottom of the nipple and turn it back and forth to make sure it gets in. If you go through that much trouble you may as well replace the nipples with brass.

FastJake

Now that you have a set of new wheels my recommendation would be to replace all the nipples now with brass ones, before they get corroded and cause you problems. I'm assuming these are machine built wheels? If you take your time and do it right (prep the threads with grease or spoke prep, properly tension, stress relieve, etc) you can have a wheelset that's "better than new" and won't give you problems later on. That's what I'd do anyway, but you have to know wheelbuilding or at least wheel truing to do it.

From a cost standpoint the cost of new brass nipples should be nearly irrelevant since you already have the spokes.

CliffordK

I occasionally run into nipples that look like they're made out of Pot Metal

Brass seems to hold up fairly well, but at lest in the boating world, it is not salt resistant.

dsbrantjr

Make sure that the spokes are long enough and then redo the wheel with brass nipples. If the spokes do not reach the bottom of the driver slot they are too short and you are risking nipple failure down the road.

on the path

The wheel set is advertised as hand built. I have built a set of wheels and trued a bunch of others. That's not really the issue. Since the weather around here is finally decent for riding, that's what I want to do for now. I'm willing to treat the nipples for more longevity but don't feel like rebuilding them at this time.

FWIW, when I first learned the nipples were of AL, I was in disbelief. I thought, "why would they do that?" I've done plumbing and I play a brass instrument (which surprisingly, is almost the same thing). I know brass as a fairly corrosion resistant material. Apparently they used AL to save weight. I don't know how much weight is saved by using AL over brass, but I'd prefer to deal with the weight penalty as opposed to having the nipples disintegrate prematurely.

on the path

Except that the nipple is broken, it looks fairly normal. The corroded ones on mine were covered with a green, powdery type substance.. pretty bad.

DiabloScott

The other couple I've had break, cracked down the length of the barrel... perpendicular to the threads.



About 20g per wheel for 32 spoke build.

Drew Eckhardt 

I've never had problems with aluminum nipples in wheels I've built with spokes reaching at least the slot bottoms and properly lubricated threads and rim sockets, although I ran into a wheel built by someone else ridden in California which obviously wasn't done right and needed vise grips.

I built my first pair living in Boulder, CO in 1997 or 1998 where I rode them on roads with left over snow and a little salt although I used a spare pair with 27mm cross tires mounted when the snow didn't melt. Stored them living in Seattle 2006-2008. Moved to Silicon Valley in 2008 where I used the commuting up to 26 miles round trip including rain until using a Powertap September 2010-March 2011 and getting serious about training with power in April, 2014.

I Lubricated with grease or anti-seize the first time; it's been at least 17 years. I replaced the rear rim once or twice, and bent the original Reflex clincher front in 2011. The nipples always turned fine so I reused them (apart from the pair I made trapezoidal with an incompletely seated spoke wrench straightening the bent front rim in a late night road-side repair), taking the opportunity to re-lubricate threads and sockets with anti-seize.

The Powertap/Velocity Fusion set I built in April 2014 is doing great, although I've only done 6000 miles on them so far so it's too early to tell and I haven't needed to true them.

I used zinc anti-seize on those (not the standard aluminum) which is the correct engineering choice because the zinc corrodes preferentially to the aluminum; although I suspect any grease which keeps water out is just fine.

While I'd conservatively recommend brass for spoke length and lubrication tolerance, I think most of the problem with alloy nipples is builder-error in those areas.

FBinNY 

It's a complicated question. The original wheel probably failed because the spokes were short and didn't engage the nipple's head. Others have said that, and we're past that issue.

Now, the future.

First, remove the rim tape and see if the end of the spoke is within 1mm or so of the top of the nipple. That's a prerequisite for a proper build.

Then the corrosion which can be tricky, If the rim has eyelets, and you used brass nipples you don't need to do anything. You may want to apply some thin oil product like WD-40 or chain oil between the nipple and rim and spin it out (into the rim). If you do lots of winter riding, pressure wash the wheels forcing water between the nipple and rim to flush out salt (hold a directed spray steady and spin the wheel).

But if you use aluminum nipples and/or don't have eyelets in the rims, the hole will be super vulnerable to salt. Salt will wick into the gap between rim and nipple and start attacking the aluminum. Prevent this by applying a heavy oil, or grease thinned with solvent between the nipple and rim to keep water and salt out, and pressure with water and detergent every Spring.

on the path

So I pulled the rim tape off. It seems the end of each spoke is just about flush with the bottom of the slot for the nipple driver. Kosher? Spokes too short? The rim does not have eyelets.

I'm riding this weekend so between rides or after the weekend I'm gonna apply some kind of lube/barrier to the spokes at the nipples. I'll be working on a longer term strategy..

Bill Kapaun

Kosher