On Tuesday, 21 July 2020 11:20:11 UTC-4, Frank Krygowski wrote:
On 7/21/2020 2:31 AM, Ralph Barone wrote:
AK wrote:
On Monday, July 20, 2020 at 10:49:43 AM UTC-5, Stephen Bauman wrote:
On Monday, July 20, 2020 at 9:59:59 AM UTC-4, AK wrote:

I just found a broken spoke on my rear wheel.

I think my bike is plain wore out.

I need a better bike, but everyone is out except those bikes costing $800+.

Does anyone have any mountain bikes in stock?

Andy

The broken spoke probably means the wheel is wobbling from side to side,
when it is spun. This means you had to increase the brake clearance to
make sure the brakes did not rub. The increased clearance meant that the
brakes did not lock onto the rim, when you applied the brakes.

The first order of business is to replace the broken spoke and true the
wheel. You may find there are more than one broken spoke. This is best
done by a bike shop.

Once the wheel is fixed, the brakes should be easy to adjust.

Bike is at the shop for spoke replacement and truing.

I saw some material on truing, but it was confusing at best.

Andy


If you know the right hand rule and have patience and common sense, you can
true a wheel.

Agreed. Or at least, some people can true a wheel. Bike books from the
1970s had illustrations on how to do it with the wheel in the bike,
watching for the wobble at the brake shoes. No tools but a spoke wrench
are really necessary. (And I remember making minor adjustments with a
little adjustable wrench.)

But it does get tricky for many people. There are those who get confused
about which way to spin the nipple to tighten a spoke. There are those
who don't grasp the idea that to move the rim to (say) the right, you
could tighten a right spoke or loosen a left one - or perhaps both.

I recall riding along one day and seeing a beginning cyclists I'd
recently met; he was walking toward a bike shop, carrying a wheel shaped
like a potato chip. I thought he must have had a bad crash, but no.

He said his wheel was a little out of true, so he bought a spoke wrench.
He inflicted the rest of the damage himself.


--
- Frank Krygowski

When I worked in bike shops some of the words we hated to hear when someone brought in a wheel to be trued were, "Can you straighten this heel? I tried to do it myself."

A lot of the times we'd just back all the spokes off so that it was like a newly laced wheel and start from there. That worked if the customer was honest in how the wheel got it of shape and it hadn't bent the wheel in an accident.

Cheers