Hi hope all are doing great On my Jeunet single speed I am using the wheels that came on it so I would think they are as old as the bike. They are steel rims with normandy hubs. The rear wheel spins straight and true no problems. The front wheel however is out of sorts. I did the best I could to get it straight and it is not bad just not as good as it could be. When I ride the front wheel spokes pop, creak make more noise at times than I like. Should I just replace it, or should I take it to a bike shop and have them do what they can ? I'd like to keep it. Could I replace the spokes ?
any and all help would be great!!!


again thanks a ton

rc

I would unlace the wheel, loosening the spokes gradually, going around the wheel multiple times until there's zero tension, and then take them off. Then set the rim down on a flat surface and see how warped it is. If the worst spot is no more than than 4-5 mm off, you can probably have the wheel rebuilt (or do it yourself). If it's worse than that, you'll have nothing but problems. If you do rebuild, use all new spokes.

Before I dismantled the wheel, I'd first take it to a good bike shop and let them try to true it. If they tell you they can't, then proceed as above.

Those pops are most likely the spokes suddenly releasing tension as they are weighted/unweighted while the wheel turns. There are some subtle things about getting a bicycle wheel built right.

I'd either take the wheel to a shop as mentioned above or if you really want to do it yourself, read up on how to build wheels. There is a lot of information available on the net if you search for it.

Sorry. I read pop, and thought the spokes were breaking. Sounds like the wheel is not only not trued, but improperly tensioned and stress relieved. Definitely see if the LBS thinks they can true it first - unless you want to give it a shot before that.

When you tighten a spoke, go a quarter turn to far and then come back. When you put a lot of torque on a spoke it gets a little twist in it and some of that popping is spokes untwisting. bringing them back a quarter turn takes some of that twist out.