fietsbob

https://www.hedcycling.com/ardennes

I have gotten decades of reliable service on a Bike with 36 spoke wheels .


You chose otherwise and spent A bit More.


I'll add:
<guess> spoke nip that broke was Aluminum (they break more frequently than brass nips, because of the metal used)




./.

Wilfred Laurier

There is nothing, short of intentionally tightening spokes so much they pull through the rim, that you can do with a spoke wrench to cause a spoke to break. Spokes fail due to fatigue, so the spoke that broke was near the end of its life. The shop either caused the spoke failure to happen slightly sooner, or had no effect and it was just bad luck.

Most of the time, when spokes are starting to break en masse, indicating a rebuild is necessary, the breaks happen at the elbow and not at the nipple. Usually the cause of broken spokes is insufficient tension, which the shop possibly noticed and was trying to correct by re-tensioning, not knowing that at least one spoke only had 10 miles left in it.

MinnMan

LBS Report:

So, here's what happened at the LBS. I spoke to the fellow who had worked on the wheel. He said that while the wheel was true to begin with, it was substantially out of dish, and that therefore he had extensive work on the spokes to get it back into dish. He actually wasn't surprised that I had lost a spoke considering the amount of retensioning that had been required. He was surprised that the wheel had been so far out of dish (almost 4 mm) and wondered if it might not be a problem with the manufacture. Contrary to some insinuations earlier in this thread, the HED wheels are all hand built (here in Minnesota, BTW), but no source is perfect. He considered that we should perhaps go back to HED, who may consider this a warranty issue.

The spoke replacement and retensioning is covered under the LBS' labor warranty.

His thinking is that there's a possibility that the retensioning of the spokes from their former positions when it was far out of dish may be too much strain and that I may see spoke breakage again - say within the first 2 weeks of riding - in which case, the wheel will need a complete rebuild. This spooks me a little- yesterday I was riding on a local trail in town, but on the weekends I ride way out in the boonies. I would't be happy if the spoke broke out there.

Spoonrobot 

Go Jobst Brandt style to stress-relive the spokes:

Then just ride it and see. You'll probably be ok, mech was just CYA and to be honest his response sounds a little weird.

Sidebar, where did the spoke break? 4800 miles is well within normal range for me to break a spoke at the elbow.

bulldog1935

my LBS guy check spoke tension with every turn, then checks tension in every spoke again when he's done.

Of course crap happens, but except for really old wheels, I've never needed a true after the first 100 miles.

Wilfred Laurier

$200 for wheel truing, or a shop that won't be open for long?

bulldog1935

$12 and curb service - I show up when he does, 11a on a weekday (before they begin assembling new bikes - they sell like crazy)

The shop has of course moved 3 times, but has been in business 30 years - my mechanic is the son of the owner and grew up in the shop (the whole family works there with a few others)

https://www.brittonbikes.com/

and how can you beat a shop that has a Moser record bike on the wall behind the service counter

MinnMan

Weird in what way?

Spoke broke at nipple, as posted earlier. Not sure where you got 4800 miles from, though. 3800.

Lakerat

Did the wheel when first installed have any spacers installed or moved? Strange that a high end hand built wheel would be that far from properly dished when new.

Zef

Weird in the way that it is highly unusual for a handbuilt wheel to be "significantly" out of dish.

Weird in the way that a wheel that is "significantly" out of dish would cause your brakes to be cocked a bit to one side which you seemed to have overlooked and/or never commented on.

Weird in the way that a wheel that is "significantly" out of dish would not sit centered in the frame which indicates that you have never looked at how your wheel was ever situated in the frame or you have little knowledge of proper setup....please don't take this as a slam, I am just articulating an observation in response to your question.

Weird in the way that a shop usually does not throw a dishing tool on a wheel unless there is something that indicates the need for it, and re-dishing a wheel is usually not covered under the truing process normally included in a tune-up.

Occam's razor would have knowledgeable folks leaning towards whatever the mechanic initially did with the tension/truing of the wheel caused the dish to become screwy and subsequently had to do significant work to re-dish, re-tension, and re-true the wheel.

While there is always the possibility that this is indeed a manufacturer's error, a "significant" out of dish wheel is something that is noteworthy and should have been mentioned to you upon picking up the bike....it is weird that it wasn't mentioned to you until you developed a problem and went back and asked about it.

Also, since making a major adjustment such as fixing a "significantly" out of dish wheel increases the shop's liability it is weird that they corrected the problem without charging you additional labor....which could further lead someone to believe that the mechanic caused the problem in the first place.

Wheels don't go "significantly" out of dish on their own.

It was nice of them to give you a warranty on the labor and the broken spoke.

-j

Bike Gremlin

Spoke breaking with a straight, clean brake pattern, that leaves two pieces that can be put back together by hand and aligned, indicates fatigue failure.

Andy_K 

My wheel builder does stuff like that. He also offers lifetime ride-along assistance. He's not a great wheel builder, but the customer service is second to none.

Lakerat

and how can you beat a shop that has a Moser record bike on the wall behind the service counter



That's a tough one to beat