Electric_Elvis

For the second time in the past few months I broke a spoke on my Alta Race wheels. The first time it was on the rear drive side, and I chalked it up to my powerful guads. I got the wheels last Nov. from Cambria, and I never had them checked out by a bike shop before putting them on. So I assumed when the first spoke broke, that once the shop hand trued and looked at them this was unlikely to happen again.

Well today, I was coming down an extremely steep hill that has a stop sign at the bottom, so I had no choice but to ride the brakes the entire time. I cant emphasis enough how steep this hill is, there is no doubt in my mind that coasting you could easily hit 40mph down it, and being on the brakes the entire time is no doubt tough on them and the wheels too. Well anyway, just as I was approaching the stop sign, I hear a pop, and a spoke from the front wheel was hanging loose. Luckily I was nearly stopped already because the wheel went totally out of true and pretty much locked up against the brake.

I cant remember hitting any potholes or rough spots going down the hill, its pretty smooth. Earlier in my ride I did go over a 1/4 mile section of road that was being repaved and was a total mess, it was basically like riding over coblestone or something, so this could have contributed to the spoke breakage.

So, could this have been caused by the heavy braking going down the hill, could it have been just a freak event, a crappy job of truing and tensioning the wheel by the LBS, or a bad wheelset?

I was totally stranded when the spoke broke and really dont want this to happen again, so my options seem to be:

A) I am just unlucky, bring the wheel back to the LBS, have them fix it and be on my way again. Hopefully they'll do it for free since they just trued the wheel a few months ago, and the spokes will hold up this time. (When I had the rear spoke replaced and both wheels trued, the LBS didnt put the rim tape back on the rear correctly. I ended up getting two flats and having to bring the wheel back to be redone, so its entirely possible that they didnt tension the spokes correctly and this is an issue caused by the LBS.)

B) Call up Reynolds and see if they will do anything since the wheels should still be covered under warranty. The only problem is I really dont have an adequate back-up set of wheels, and I assume it would take at least a week or two to get these back.

C) Have the wheels re-built with stronger spokes.

D) Get new wheels.

So what do you guys think? Any other similar problems with these wheels?


Edit: By the way, I only weigh 150lbs and have ridden the wheels for about 1700 miles.

Electric_Elvis

Anybody!?!?

Brian Ratliff

If they are 32 spoke wheels, I'd just rebuild them using double butted (14/15/14 gauge) spokes. It is not hard to do yourself; you'd need a truing stand, a spoke wrench and some patience, or most shops charge about $60 for the job per wheel.

Brian Ratliff

It sounds like others have had similar problems on roadbikereview.com. I'd still have the wheel rebuilt with better spokes, even though they are low spokecount. This will probably solve your problem permanently.

onRoffR

I have the Alta race wheels which I got from CBO and have approx. the same miles on them as you do. I remember reading, on this forum, that there was an issue with spokes and at some point in time Reynolds switched to DT spokes, My spokes are the DT ones. I have not had any spoke breaking issues with mine but mine came from The box with a weird tension issue where every other spoke on the rear drive side,cross, was out of tension. the wheel spun true but was flexy. I re-tensioned the whole rear wheel and re-trued it and have had no spoke issues. I did have to re-pack the rear bearings at 1500 miles, just disassembled the rear hub and re greased everything they run great now. That said they are nice light wheels for the money but I probably won't get Reynold wheels again in the future. If you have the old brand spokes which are Sapim or Pilar you should contact Reynolds they will probably replace them under warranty, but you will be without the wheels for sometime.

Electric_Elvis

I remember seeing that thread about the spokes, I think I have the DT ones. The symbol on the end of the spokes looks like a D with a T intersecting it at the top.

Just like the reviews on roadbike review, both spokes broke at the nipple.

Its really a shame because they are nice wheels, up until this point I would have had nothing but positive reviews. It seems like though, most wheels around this price, and some at higher prices too, weighing around what these do usually have mixed reviews!

So where would be a good place to get stronger spokes to rebuild these with?

Strong Bad

Shoot Reynolds an e-mail.
They are right near me (about 3 miles from my house), and they have great customer service.
I had one of my Alta races rebuild after I hit a huge pot-hole and dinged the rim.
Not the rims fault either. I think the hole would have destroyed about any wheel.
They replaced the rim under crash warranty for $70.
I'm sure they will work with you.

onRoffR

I'm pretty sure the Alta race wheels use DT Swiss double butted spokes so the breaking issues from front to back may be unrelated. It is common to have a spokes break where they cross because of the spoke to spoke contact. The front wheel has radial spokes and it may be possible that spoke tension was most likely the culprit. DT spokes are high quality and I have used them on my road and mountain bikes with very few broken spokes. You can get spokes from your LBS I have gotten them online from Jensonusa.com for a new wheel build up. But you may want to have a shop replace the bad spoke and re- tension/true the wheels and see if it happens again. If I was you I would Email Reynolds and describe your problem that way it will be before the warranty expires and if they continue to break Reynold's I'm sure will warranty it even it it is slightly past the 1 year.

Electric_Elvis

I dropped the wheel off at the LBS this morning. I kind of hinted that maybe the wheel wasnt retentioned correctly when I had it trued 2 months ago and could have caused the broken spoke. The owner didnt seem to bite, so it looks like i'll be paying full price when I pick it up.

I e-mailed and faxed Reynolds a description of my problem, so we will see what happens on that front.

Electric_Elvis

DAMN....almost exactly a month later now another spoke broke, this time on the rear.

I talked to Reynolds last time this happened, and they told me to send them back. The problem is that I am sure it is going to cost an arm and a leg to ship, and I dont have a back up set of wheels!

I think its time to go with a different wheelset!