First Free Tuneup
 

Picked up a 2012 Giant Escape 2 around the end of september which as of yesterday has 250 miles on it. After my first 20 mile ride, I noticed the wheels were out of true enough to rub the brake pads when I spin them. Im just wondering if my bike shop will true the wheels during the first "free tune up" or do I have to pay extra for wheel truing. I dont recall this happening so fast on my last bike shop bike, (1980 Schwinn Varsity) as a matter of fact, it never needed a "tune up" for as long as I owned it. Can I expect these wheels to require truing every 250 miles, this dont seem right or is this expected from an entry level bike shop bike. BTW, I weigh 155lbs and dont jump curbs or anything and other than the out of true wheels, love the bike.:D

Yes, the LBS should true up your rims. Prior to the bike leaving the shop, they should have tensioned the spokes. This tune up should be to retension the cables, adjust the brakes and derailluers, and true up the wheels.

Can I expect the properly tensioned wheels to stay true for longer than 250 miles or is this normal. Thanks for the reply!

if they have decent spokes, hubs, and rims, once trued up properly after the first umpteen miles, they should stay true a long time.

if they have cheap spokes, all bets are off. any wheels with non-stainless spokes are pretty much disposable as far as I'm concerned.

At your weight, those machine built wheels still shouldn't be that much out of true. It had to be a pretty crappy build job.
That said, I'd express that concern to your LBS and petition to have them retensioned.
Once that is done, the wheels should be good for THOUSANDS of miles.

those mass produced hybrid 32H wheels are slapped out pretty quickly, I'm not surprised they need tweaking after being ridden on. Even the 36H stuff I used to lace myself would need re-truing after they got broken in. of course, when I built my wheels, I didn't have a spoke tensioner, so I tuned them by plinking the spokes and listening :D very time consuming.

[TABLE="class: bike-specifications"]
[TR]
[TH="class: heading, colspan: 2"][h=3]Wheels[/h][/TH]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TH]Rims[/TH]
[TD]Giant Alloy, Double Wall[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TH]Hubs[/TH]
[TD]Alloy, 32h, QR[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TH]Spokes[/TH]
[TD]Stainless Steel[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TH]Tires[/TH]
[TD]Giant S-X3, 700x32[/TD]
[/TR]
[/TABLE]

I will be taking it in for its tune up soon and discuss with them. Thanks!

They are RUBBING the brake pads! That's a lot more than "tweaking".

Dropped it off today for its tune up and let them know the wheels needed to be trued. I will check them before I leave the bike shop just like I did when it was brand new.

:thumb:Bike shop did a nice job on the wheels and tune up. Hopefully the wheels will stay true longer than 250 miles.:thumb: