And surprise surprise, they have not failed..... Most people's understanding of wheel building is from what they read on the internet, we are not the first wheel company to use such large bracing angles, and there is no secret why all those that have test very well for lateral stiffness. Bladed spokes do not click, spokes for that matter do not click as it is almost impossible to replicate the sound you get from squeezing two spokes together when you load a rim while riding. There are many other reasons why there would be a clicking sound from the rear by the OP though, but it's impossible for us to diagnose unless we ride those wheels ourselves. It may even work out to be something else, and we can't know for sure just like any other clicking sound on a bike.
Originally Posted by
Eich
That doesn't sound too healthy. As I understand it, spokes will only click where they cross if one of them has gone into compression, bowed and then clicked against the other spoke as it tightened up. Received wisdom has it that when spokes completely lose tension in their load cycle they are subject to early fatigue failure at the j.
I have wondered about the durability of Soul wheels for just this reason. The Prodigy hubs have a very wide flange spacing and while this is good for wheel bracing it creates a big tension discrepancy between the drive side and non-drive side spokes. Maximum tension on the drive side is constrained by the maximum that the rim can handle. Minimum tension on the non-drive side is then constrained by the minimum tension required to centre the rim so with light rims that cant support a lot of tension and a big tension discrepancy its very easy to find your NDS spoke have insufficient tension to avoid losing all tension at the bottom of their load cycle.
I have been waiting for reports of either rim failure from over tensioning or NDS spoke failure from under tensioning. If they are not failing I'd like to know how this difficulty has been avoided.