Bike Forums - Broken spoke again and again. Help!

Quote:

Originally Posted by hueyhoolihan (Post 14413024)

although it is possible that the problem is due to inadequate spokes, it is also possible that the rim itself is not round or laterally true (or flat). if so, in order to make it true, the spoke tension is necessarily uneven resulting in premature spoke wear.

a new rim and spokes may be necessary as previously mentioned.

While I agree that a moderately distorted (i.e. one that a reasonable mechanic would use, not a "tacoed" rim) rim may possibly skew spoke to spoke tension consistency, it would have to be an extremely stiff rim to really start to play a role in spoke tension consistency and corresponding fatigue failures. When it comes to pulling the rim into "round" and "true", the spokes are the boss. The rim has very little to say about it. Almost all of what the the rim is doing is offering compressive resistance in the hoop direction so that the spokes have something to build tension against.
You can observe this yourself. How many turns of a spoke wrench does it take to make a true and evenly tensioned wheel impossibly untrue? If you were to totally unlace the wheel at that point (evenly detensioning the spokes as you go), would the rim be distorted? I doubt it. Think about it in reverse. Take a bare rim with 1/4" of runout, lace it up and true it. How much unevenness in the spoke tension do you think there would be, assuming even tension except that needed to correct the rim?