Rear rim warped..

[offcamber]

So it looks like my rear rim is warped...you can see it has a slight wobble when you run it on the center stand. I never hit anything with it....other that the usual pothole...certainly nothing that should have bent it....The reason more likely was me....torque the spokes...pretty sure I smurfed it up. Over tighted some for about a minute before I realized I had the torque wrench set wrong....reset them right away but I guess the damage was done I don't have acces to a dial indicator to check the actual run out on it.



How much damage will I do to the rear bearings and final drive if I run it for a while like this??
I can't feel it when I ride, at any speed...and the brake rotor looks to run true...
I have a trip coming up in a few weeks and doubt I will be able to get it fixed by then short of replacing the rim.

So can these be straightened or am I looking at a new $400 rim?? There is an independent shop in town I may ask them. Or I can go the dealer route and play dumb and hopefully get it warrantied.
Thanks

 

[~TABASCO~]

No damage to the bearings. Just jet your tools back
out, make yourself a little trueing stand (keep the wheel on the bike) and true it up. By tightening and loosening the correct spokes.

 

[PowersUSA]

Having seen the wobble I'm confident you will be able to true the wheel by adjusting the spoke tension. Only in an ideal world would all the spokes be 100% the same tension. No rim is 100% true and the spoke need to be adjusted to pull the rim into true. Setup a datum point with a screwdriver (or some other convenient pointer) taped the swing arm pointed just far enough from the he leading edge of the rim that it does not touch during a full rotation of the wheel. Your goal is the have the rim be a constant distance from the end of datum point. As you rotate the wheel if, for example, the rim drifts to the left then loosen the closest left pulling spoke(s) and/or tighten the equivalent right pulling spoke(s). Its a balancing act, creep up on it with small changes. In the end be sure to not have spokes that have too high a tension or are too loose.

 

[jonkertb]

just a FYI
be cautious in not getting toooo carried away cranking on spokes to get a wheel to be 'flat" in the lateral plane and then end up with it being oval....
one thing to remember is to not do all the movement with a few spokes but to true over a section of wheel so that it stays in the round also
tom

 

[jajpko]

Use Google and search for truing a spoke wheel, or motorcycle wheel, ect.
You can buy a cheap dial indicator at HF and it will work for what you are doing.

Take your time, like others have said. You never want to do a group of spokes together at the same time, always stagger or skip the same amount of spokes until you get to the very end and the wheel is very,very close to being in true. Then you can tweak a little, but not until you understand what you are doing.
Good luck

 

[scott123007]

I have a novel idea...take it to someone that knows what the hell they're doing. Truing a wheel is not something you just learn to do by watching a YouTube video, and presto, you are an expert. There is an art to it and practice is key. It is way easier to screw it up worse than to make it right.

 

[offcamber]

I have a novel idea...take it to someone that knows what the hell they're doing. Truing a wheel is not something you just learn to do by watching a YouTube video, and presto, you are an expert. There is an art to it and practice is key. It is way easier to screw it up worse than to make it right.

and thats kinda my concern....I'm not sure I feel confident attempting it. I'm going to check with the local shop and see if they can do it....they fix all bikes....and shop is always packed so its a good bet they know what their doing. I don't have a junk rim to mess with....if I did I might try that first.

 

[mcbrien]

That sounds like a good plan . I would feel better doing a valve adj than trueing a wheel :-[

 

[avc8130]

I have a novel idea...take it to someone that knows what the hell they're doing. Truing a wheel is not something you just learn to do by watching a YouTube video, and presto, you are an expert. There is an art to it and practice is key. It is way easier to screw it up worse than to make it right.

Where do you find an "expert"?

Street bikes really haven't had spoked wheels in a LONG time.

Dirt bike guys really don't care how true their rims are.

Harley shop? 1/2 their bikes might have spokes.

Bicycle shop? Those roadie guys do 45 mph on 1" wide tires...I bet they are true.

I know where I would start in North NJ, but realistically, how does one find a spoked wheel "expert" these days?

At least if he watches videos and reads some articles he can take his time and work until it is right enough for him. That is better than most shops will do charging $75/hour to have some guy making ~$20/hour give it their "best".

I guess you could always box it up and ship it to Woody...

ac

 

[offcamber]

Luckily the shop in town works on mostly old bikes...They have a good reputation all be it a bit slow. That may be because they have so many bikes to work on and its only two guys. There is a Harley Dealer in town and I know the shop/part manager. May be worth asking him if he thinks they can handle it.

 

[jajpko]

Luckily the shop in town works on mostly old bikes...They have a good reputation all be it a bit slow. That may be because they have so many bikes to work on and its only two guys. There is a Harley Dealer in town and I know the shop/part manager. May be worth asking him if he thinks they can handle it.

Dude, if you are going to take it to and "expert", at least sit down and try it yourself. If you make it better, you have learned something, if not,
have the expert let you watch. Most guys, if they are really good, like to show off there skills to someone that thinks its magic...

At least when all is done, you will have learned something.. ::025::

 

[Mchaskell]

Time, talent and money. What is the combination that works for you?

 

[fredz43]

In one of my recent Bultaco restorations I was able to buy a very nice rear wheel with new spokes, but all were loose, having never been tightened or trued since the new spokes were installed. On the advice of a fellow motorcyclist who also rides a high tech bicycle, I took the wheel to the bike shop and they trued it up for me for $25. I don't know if this guy could do the same with a wheel still on the S10 or if he could fit the wheel alone onto his truing stand, but it wouldn't hurt to ask, especially if you were unsure if you could do a proper job.

 

[markjenn]

The principles are identical to bicycle wheel truing. It's not that tough - I taught myself to lace/true bicycle wheels with web resources, for example....

http://sheldonbrown.com/wheelbuild.html

Certainly taking it in to someone is a good plan too but not a lot of shops have the expertise any more. Worth a try, but I wouldn't be terribly optimistic about finding a bicycle shop that would do it - their wheel truing stands are not setup to hold a motorcycle wheel; you'd have to find one that wants the challenge of jury rigging something to work and not charging you for their messing around.

I'm not a fan of using torque wrenches to tension wheels. It doesn't work very well on bicycles and I don't think it works very well on motorcycles. Nipple torque is a poor surrogate for actually measuring spoke tension (bicycle wheel builders instead use a tool which directly measures spoke tension by deflecting the spoke) and it is acceptable to have considerably variation in spoke tension to get the rim true. (The generally accepted guideline for bicycle wheels is +/- 20% variance in spoke tension and even larger variances are acceptable in rear wheels which vary in spoke length between the drive and non-drive sides.) A spoke torque wrench would be a nice thing to have building a wheel and bringing it to tension, but for routine maintenance and truing - getting the wheel true trumps equal tension. Honestly, I think the tried-and-true "ping test" (striking spokes with a screwdriver and seeing how they sound), is as good as any for ID'ing any spokes that are significantly under-tensioned. If you find one that is noticeably duller than the rest, you bring it up to more/less equal tension, then do the truing.

- Mark

 

[offcamber]

Talked to the guy at the local shop he said they could do it no problem. Probably about $75. Well worth it considering the cost of a new rim if I muck it bad. As I said they work on a lot of older bikes so I pretty sure they know what they are doing. The down side is it may take a while because of the back log of work...its only two guys and they have a ton of bikes in the shop. I may wait till winter...I don't want to be stuck riding the KLR everywhere LOL..

 

[scott123007]

You're doing the right thing, offcamber. Now, stop returning to this thread. Pretty soon you'll be getting advise to Loctite your spoke threads too ???

 

[Mchaskell]

You're doing the right thing, offcamber. Now, stop returning to this thread. Pretty soon you'll be getting advise to Loctite your spoke threads too ???

::026::

 

[jajpko]

Oh yea of little faith and knowledge..

 

[snakebitten]

Dude, if you are going to take it to and "expert", at least sit down and try it yourself. If you make it better, you have learned something, if not,
have the expert let you watch. Most guys, if they are really good, like to show off there skills to someone that thinks its magic...

At least when all is done, you will have learned something.. ::025::

It's an "adventure" bike.
Giving this a try, is part of the adventure.