Help!! Broken spoke
 

I've posted before, this topic. New wrinkle!!! After 4 spokes on a rear wheel, it was completely re-laced. I went several 100 miles. I just did my first century on Saturday. Had my bike serviced on Thursday before ride. It made it 101 miles, then this afternoon first day back on bike, 1.23 miles snapped a spoke at the hub!! What the what!!!!???? Any advice? So frustrated, I like to be a good customer to my LBS , but dang. Before anyone asks, I'm 6'1", weigh 216.

Spokes break under stress, so the wheel is obv. being stressed in a way that overloads a spoke under certain circumstances. Do you care to share some more info about the wheel? Spoke count, spoke diameter, nipple material, hub brand, rim brand, specifically.

In any case, it seems unreasonable to keep breaking spokes if they rebuilt it recently. Take it back. You're a large guy, but not outside of the ordinary. I ride with plenty of guys that size who do not break spokes.

Ok, you're 216 pounds.

Tell us about your wheel.

Number of spokes?
BRAND of spokes? (is there a mark on the heads?)
Double Butted Spokes? Straight gauge spokes? Gauge?
Drive Side break?
Have you ever dropped the chain into the spokes?

Your LBS should have the data of the build.

As KBentley57 suggested, go back to the shop that rebuilt the wheel and talk to them. Apparently as you stress the bike (200+ lbs), things like even spoke tension are more important.

I'm curious too as I'm 220lbs right now but I've never broken a spoke, never, even when I was 268 a couple years ago and I've been on a set of Shimano Ultegra's with a 16/20 spoke count.

Lots of possibilities but bad riding habits (pothole magnetism?) and bad wheel build (uneven tensions) are the two top candidates. Learn to right "light", i.e. take road hazards standing with your knees bent and absorbing shocks like springs. Think of trying to catch someone falling from a building, how you try to decelerate the falling body gradually by moving downward as the weight is applied. That's how you should be taking road hazards except upside down. Unweighting the bike by absorbing the shock in your knees.

As for the wheel build, I can't explain the initial problem, but I would not rely on an LBS to build or rebuild a wheel. They may be expert, but in most cases are not. You need to learn to do it yourself the right way, or find a custom wheel builder to redo your wheels again.

But without the wheel details we cannot know whether a third factor, poor wheel design for your weight and riding style, is also operating here.

It is a Giant p-sl 1 wheel, 24 spokes in rear, straight pull, supposed to be relaced with DT Swiss. I try very hard to stand at all road hazards, and also ride at 100psi.

I had this happen 3 times with the stock wheels (Alex) that came with my Jamis Ventura Comp that I bought in '07. Purchased a new set of Mavic Askium's in '09 and have never had an issue since.

Some pertinent info here: http://www.bikeforums.net/road-cycli...l#post18067436

But not really anything outside of the fact that he bought a 2014 Giant TCR, but didn't say which model. He also didn't make it clear whether or not the wheel itself was rebuilt or replaced under warranty, but this post makes it sound like it was rebuilt.

So yeah, we know you're new here, but you need to learn how to internet if we're going to help you.

Edit: My apologies, it seems you did give us the info as I was posting this. I guess I need to learn how to internet. :lol:

So while I can't explain why your factory built wheel broke 4 spokes, the rebuild could have been done by an inexperienced mechanic. You can read up on wheel building, but there is an important step regarding stretching the spokes after the wheel is fully built. If you don't do this, the metal in the spokes are near their breaking point and an instantaneous load could easily snap them.

However, this would have been done to some extent on a factory built wheel, on which you managed to break 4 spokes.

Chiefsandme: Not to get lost in all the noise of this thread, what we are all saying is that you shouldn't be breaking spokes. Hell, you should be able to ride through cobblestone alley and still not break spokes. Keep taking it back until they get it right.

Thank you!! That's how I feel. I hate to be a complainer, but I'm SICK OF WALKING MY BIKE.

I love my LBS, but I'm thinking of taking it somewhere else! Any thoughts??? The mechanic is super cool, but maybe doesn't know as much as I would like him to know.

If you can, just talk to him. I know it sucks, even being mildly confrontational, but if I were in your spot the convo would go something like this. "Hey, I'm back again. It seems like the last time you replaced the broken spoke(s) they worked very well, but only for a few miles. I know you probably don't rebuild wheels that often, but since it keeps being an issue, do you think it would be possible to completely de-tension the wheel, and true it from slack spokes? I'm concerned that by only replacing the broken spoke and doing a touch up from there, that the others have become randomly tensioned, contributing to the newly broken spokes." I know it sounds overly nice and pandering, but lets be real, no mechanic builds wheels from scratch in general, and the ones that do, with exception of wheel builders, probably don't do it often. This gives them a chance to really fix the problem while saving face, it'll possibly give you a wheel that works, and everyone's mildly happy at the outcome. If that line of communication fails, or the wheel fails afterwards, then it'd be time to switch shops.

"Stock wheels don't stand up to Clyde" shock. ;)

I'd be looking to get a new rear wheel, with 32 spokes.

Can you give us an idea of the time-line? How long have you had the bike? How much time passed between the initial purchase and then breaking 4 spokes? Were the 4 spokes broken on the same ride? How many miles were on the bike on the original factory wheel? Where do you store the bike?

I can easily say that breaking a spoke after a rebuild can be attributed to a bad build, but it's hard to understand why you broke 4 spokes on a stock wheel when you aren't that heavy.

No, no, and no. I'm going to sound like a broken record again, but: 215-230 pounds on my stock Bontrager 18f/24r wheels, 1400+ miles and never needed truing. Chipseal, gravel, and even more chipseal that makes cobble stones look inviting. There is not a magic 200 lb. line where everybody needs 32 spokes front and rear, but somebody 199 lbs. can suddenly run a 20 spoke rear.

Good guesses, guys, but no.

Spokes generally break due to fatigue, or 'cyclic loading'. There are two components to fatigue - the amplitude of the stress as it goes from maximum to minimum and the average stress. If a wheel is not properly 'stress relieved' when built, then the spokes will lose a significant amount of tension after being ridden a few miles. If the spokes do not have enough tension, they go from completely unstressed when they are on the bottom of the rotation to 100% stress at the top of the rotation - a stress cycle with a huge amplitude - and this will result in broken spokes if the tension is not brought up. By raising the tension of the whole wheel (or keeping it high) the average stress is raised, but the amplitude of the stress cycles is much smaller - a spoke is never completely de-stressed, and it always has all the other spokes helping because no other spoke is de-stressed, so peak stress is also reduced.

For a heavier rider, a wheel needs to be either carefully and adequately de-stressed, or built with a higher tension initially so that when the spokes loosen from riding they still have adequate tension.

Congrats on being a single datapoint. And 1400 miles ain't that far to be talking about how they're holding up. The crappy 24 spoke wheels on my DB lasted 1000 miles before they died under me @ 290lbs.

I never said there was. However, 32 spokes at 220lbs will likely remove the issue completely. An extremely well built 24 spoke wheel will also work. A stock wheel is never going to be that, unless you find a really good wheelbuilder to rebuild it.

I'm not sure why you have to walk your bike. I have had several broken spokes over 32 years of riding and never had to cut a ride short. Just open up the brake calipers if that is where the wheel is rubbing. You can do that with the quick release, or if you need more room, just loosen the cable and let the brakes open to full width. Be careful regarding speed and traffic however. You won't have any braking to speak of on that wheel.

If the rubbing is on a chain stay, use a spoke wrench (do carry one!) to loosen the opposite spokes near the break and tighten the spokes nearby on the same side as the break. It doesn't have to be anywhere near perfect. That should provide enough clearance to get in a good ride and should allow you to close you brakes up enough to have some braking in both wheels.

I was talking specifically about the plasticity of the metal. If you look at the linear stress/strain curve of a given material, a metal stretched to near it's breaking point, and then not properly stress relieved is going to be near it's breaking point. The point of stress relieving is to push the spoke further in the plastic deformation range. Once it is stretched and then relaxes back to the length required, it now has a wider range of load that it can take before snapping.

It wasn't a guess.

EDIT: To be more specific, when building a wheel, get it close, stress relieve the spokes (the first time is where most of this plastic deformation is happening), true laterally and vertically, stress relieve spokes again, true, repeat as necessary.

great advice. Thank you!!

The 12th of this month was 1 year. The bike has 3500 miles, the first 4 spokes were all random durning first 4-5 months. The rebuild was I believe in May. Went well up thill this week. I store the bike indoors. It has its own room. Cleaned by hand after every ride. Not one scratch or scuff on it!! I take VERY good care of it.

Every time this has happened, ZERO chance of still rolling. I have tried to use release to get it off the brake, still NOTHING. I've never lessened any spokes.

I'm aware that 1400 miles is not a lot, but at my weight and the crap I've done on those wheels, it's enough to know whether or not they would instantly asplode, which seems to be the case for some of these posters lately. Honestly, the crappy 32 spoke wheels I got on my Cannondale CX bike (now on the new Crockett) have needed more work and they have far less miles. No broken spokes, but they don't stay true for very long.

That all seems pretty odd. My only outside thought was maybe a garage with pool chemicals. We got a lot of those bikes with spokes ready to snap. They might get away with it for a while, but then they start breaking spokes left and right.

Honestly, with 4 broken spokes on the factory wheel, and one broken on a fresh build, you might want to just look at some different wheels. Go with a higher spoke count if it makes you feel more comfortable. If you talk to the shop about it and can't resolve the issue with the stock wheel, see if they will give you a good price on a new set of wheels, either custom built if you can trust the shop (get more info on who builds wheels there), or one of their vendors will have lots of options for some factory built wheels.