Rim failure. Common?

Yesterday I noticed that the rear wheel (Bontrager Race Lite) on my 16
month old Trek 52k had a worsening wobble. Taking it into the LBS I
purchased it from for (another) consultation they found that the rim had
failed at a spoke eyelet... i.e., trashed.
Mechanic says that this isn't a to uncommon occurrence given the higher
spoke tension coupled with lighter alloys that go into such a wheel and
if I'm riding on it "a lot" then it increases such chances. Okay, so I
actually ride my bike... sue me!
Historically this wheel had problems early on. It had to be redished
within the first week and has been in at least twice for a truing to
which never seemed to get it completely straight claiming that this was
virtually impossible given the reduced number of spokes. I suspect that
this had failed even earlier but went undetected and was made worse with
their attempts at truing it but of course I can't prove this. This bike
has not been abused, as I use it for road riding mainly on normal
blacktop averaging maybe 90-150 miles per week, mostly to and from work.
Should this really be considered a "Not too uncommon" event? Should such
a wheel not be used for daily use as it's too brittle for such an
application? It doesn't appear to be marketed this way.
And, now that I'm apparently in the market for a new set of wheels (they
can build up the same rear wheel for me for ~$110 which I'm thinking of
avoiding) any recommendations?

thanks for listenting!

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See the MA3 thread below ;-)

K2 wrote:
Yesterday I noticed that the rear wheel (Bontrager Race Lite) on my 16
month old Trek 52k had a worsening wobble. Taking it into the LBS I
purchased it from for (another) consultation they found that the rim had
failed at a spoke eyelet... i.e., trashed.
Mechanic says that this isn't a to uncommon occurrence given the higher
spoke tension coupled with lighter alloys that go into such a wheel and
if I'm riding on it "a lot" then it increases such chances. Okay, so I
actually ride my bike... sue me!
Historically this wheel had problems early on. It had to be redished
within the first week and has been in at least twice for a truing to
which never seemed to get it completely straight claiming that this was
virtually impossible given the reduced number of spokes.

rubbish.

I suspect that
this had failed even earlier but went undetected and was made worse with
their attempts at truing it but of course I can't prove this. This bike
has not been abused, as I use it for road riding mainly on normal
blacktop averaging maybe 90-150 miles per week, mostly to and from work.
Should this really be considered a "Not too uncommon" event? Should such
a wheel not be used for daily use as it's too brittle for such an
application? It doesn't appear to be marketed this way.
And, now that I'm apparently in the market for a new set of wheels (they
can build up the same rear wheel for me for ~$110 which I'm thinking of
avoiding) any recommendations?

thanks for listenting!

i think your problem is your lbs, not the wheel. i'd buy a replacement
name brand pre-built wheel mail order and put it on my bike myself.

low spoke count is not the issue. i weigh #205 and run two low spoke
pairs of wheels - shimano r540 & mavic cosmos. both are perfectly true
and have never been touched by a bike shop [or me for that matter].
friends otoh, have had almost unlimited problems with the exact same
wheels - constantly needing to be re-trued. one gave me a wheel - as in
"i don't want this crap any more". his lbs had messed with it every
couple of weeks for /months/. i re-trued it properly with correct
tension & gave it back to him. he's now been running it for nearly 6
months without any further problems. you go ahead and figure out the
connection. meanwhile, /i/ get the blame for him wasting money on the
new replacement he didn't need to buy. there's no pleasing some people.

K2 wrote:
Yesterday I noticed that the rear wheel (Bontrager Race Lite) on my 16
month old Trek 52k had a worsening wobble. Taking it into the LBS I
purchased it from for (another) consultation they found that the rim had
failed at a spoke eyelet... i.e., trashed.
Mechanic says that this isn't a to uncommon occurrence given the higher
spoke tension coupled with lighter alloys that go into such a wheel and
if I'm riding on it "a lot" then it increases such chances. Okay, so I
actually ride my bike... sue me!
Historically this wheel had problems early on. It had to be redished
within the first week and has been in at least twice for a truing to
which never seemed to get it completely straight claiming that this was
virtually impossible given the reduced number of spokes. I suspect that
this had failed even earlier but went undetected and was made worse with
their attempts at truing it but of course I can't prove this. This bike
has not been abused, as I use it for road riding mainly on normal
blacktop averaging maybe 90-150 miles per week, mostly to and from work.
Should this really be considered a "Not too uncommon" event? Should such
a wheel not be used for daily use as it's too brittle for such an
application? It doesn't appear to be marketed this way.
And, now that I'm apparently in the market for a new set of wheels (they
can build up the same rear wheel for me for ~$110 which I'm thinking of
avoiding) any recommendations?


Bontrager rims are pretty soft to begin with, I wore through the
sidewall of one in a summer. Road wheels should last a long time (I've
heard of rims lasting over 10,000 miles). Find a better LBS, one that
knows how to work on wheels, and get better rims. Peter @ Vecchio's
might be a good person to call.

My 0.02, some may not agree - but I really don't care.

-Nate

All nonsense. The history of this wheel suggests that spoke tension was
improper and it pulled through. Rims last tens of thousands of road
miles (less with sidewall wear if you ride in rain/crud often). If
you're not racing and don't need the absolute lightest disposable
wheels, get a good set of handbuilts. Last forever, easy to maintain.

Lou D'Amelio

K2 wrote:

Historically this wheel had problems early on. It had to be redished
within the first week and has been in at least twice for a truing to
which never seemed to get it completely straight claiming that this was
virtually impossible given the reduced number of spokes.

This is true only if the rim is not straight. If the rim itself isn't
true, then trying to true it by varying the spoke tension is a very bad
idea. What exactly do you mean be "redished"?

I suspect that
this had failed even earlier but went undetected and was made worse with
their attempts at truing it but of course I can't prove this.

It is possible that they overtensioned the wheel to compensate for a
bad rim.

This bike
has not been abused, as I use it for road riding mainly on normal
blacktop averaging maybe 90-150 miles per week, mostly to and from work.
Should this really be considered a "Not too uncommon" event?

With less than 10k miles I certainly wouldn't be satisfied, but I don't
know what others have experienced with these wheels.

Should such
a wheel not be used for daily use as it's too brittle for such an
application? It doesn't appear to be marketed this way.

The name "Race Lite" wouldn't lead me to think of it as a commuter
wheel, but they also make several lighter versions that the real racers
use... so I wouldn't expect this model to be unsuitable for daily use.
For commuting I think you'd be much better served by regular
inexpensive... and durable wheels. It is also good to learn how to tune
wheels yourself... then if something goes wrong, you know who to
blame...

....the manufacturer!

Dan who? writes:

I bought my current bike some years ago. I had endless trouble
keeping the rear rim straight. I fiddled with it about once a
month. I finally bought a new rim and installed it on the old hub
with the old spokes. It was the first wheel I ever laced and it has
was trouble free until I trashed it in a crash. It turned out that
the old rim had a slight kink (picture an "S" wave in the plane of
the rim). Apparently, it was too much for the spokes to keep
straight. I don't know how the rim became crooked but I suspect it
happened before I got it since I had trouble with it from day one.

That's too bad, because your first rim could probably have served you
as well. Had you plucked spokes with your fingernail, the disparity
in tension caused by such a deformation, would have been acoustically
apparent and you could have straightened it so the spokes had equal
tension. You didn't say what brand and weight the rim was, but I
suspect it was reasonably usable.

Typically, several months ago I noticed the brakes had worn my front
MA-2 thin (0.5mm) so I looked in my stack of rims that people had
discarded for various reasons, and found a near new MA-40 that was
warped in a smooth "S". I transferred my spokes from the worn out
MA-2 to this rim and straightened it before bringing it to full
tension. It has been working as well as a new rim for a few thousand
miles.

I would opine that the most probable cause of your rim trouble was a
damaged rim, a defective rim and/or a poor mechanic.

If it hasn't got a kink, it can easily be straightened and made "as
good as new." I've done it often.

Jobst Brandt

K2 wrote:
Yesterday I noticed that the rear wheel (Bontrager Race Lite) on my 16
month old Trek 52k had a worsening wobble. Taking it into the LBS I
purchased it from for (another) consultation they found that the rim
had failed at a spoke eyelet... i.e., trashed.
Mechanic says that this isn't a to uncommon occurrence given the
higher spoke tension coupled with lighter alloys that go into such a
wheel and if I'm riding on it "a lot" then it increases such chances.
Okay, so I actually ride my bike... sue me!
Historically this wheel had problems early on. It had to be redished
within the first week and has been in at least twice for a truing to
which never seemed to get it completely straight claiming that this
was virtually impossible given the reduced number of spokes. I
suspect that this had failed even earlier but went undetected and was
made worse with their attempts at truing it but of course I can't
prove this. This bike has not been abused, as I use it for road
riding mainly on normal blacktop averaging maybe 90-150 miles per
week, mostly to and from work. Should this really be considered a
"Not too uncommon" event? Should such a wheel not be used for daily
use as it's too brittle for such an application? It doesn't appear to
be marketed this way. And, now that I'm apparently in the market for a new set
of wheels
(they can build up the same rear wheel for me for ~$110 which I'm
thinking of avoiding) any recommendations?

thanks for listenting!

--
If replying directly, please remove the
cleverly decorated addition to my return address.


Unfortunately I have a set of these rims too. They have about 4000 miles on
them and I have had to retrue the back three times and the front five times. I
don't know what your weight is but I'm around 195 lbs. and I don't think these
wheels can handle that much weight. I used to build wheels and I'm fairly good
at getting the tension equal and the rim running true but these wheels seem to
constantly lose spoke tension. I came back from a ride once and saw the front
rim out of true and found one of the spokes was so loose that I could move it
back and forth over 1/4". I only paid $250 for the set but I don't think they
are even worth that. I would definately look at some other wheel sets with a
minimum of 32 spokes.

Neal

Lou D'Amelio wrote:
All nonsense. The history of this wheel suggests that spoke tension was
improper and it pulled through. Rims last tens of thousands of road
miles (less with sidewall wear if you ride in rain/crud often). If
you're not racing and don't need the absolute lightest disposable
wheels, get a good set of handbuilts. Last forever, easy to maintain.

Lou D'Amelio

handbuilts are only good if the person that builds them is good. and in
my experience, there's *very* few people out there who are prepared to
spend the time, or even /have the skill/ to build a good long-term
reliable wheel. otherwise, the o.p. is back in the same position they
were before - constantly having to get the wheel re-trued.

imo, there are two good reasons to buy pre-built "brand" wheels:

1. much better chance of it being right first time, and if not messed
with by the lbs, stay right.

2. [and this is not a big deal but something i appreciate commuting
across the golden gate bridge] lower spoke count is better in cross winds.

Hi,

I also have Bontrager race lite rims, 20 spokes front and 24 spokes rear,
on my Trek 2300. I have close to 2000 miles on them and they're almost as
true as when they were new. I'm real pleased with them. I weigh 140 which
may make a difference.

Bob P.


"Neal" wrote in message
...
K2 wrote:
Yesterday I noticed that the rear wheel (Bontrager Race Lite) on my 16
month old Trek 52k had a worsening wobble. Taking it into the LBS I
purchased it from for (another) consultation they found that the rim
had failed at a spoke eyelet... i.e., trashed.
Mechanic says that this isn't a to uncommon occurrence given the
higher spoke tension coupled with lighter alloys that go into such a
wheel and if I'm riding on it "a lot" then it increases such chances.
Okay, so I actually ride my bike... sue me!
Historically this wheel had problems early on. It had to be redished
within the first week and has been in at least twice for a truing to
which never seemed to get it completely straight claiming that this
was virtually impossible given the reduced number of spokes. I
suspect that this had failed even earlier but went undetected and was
made worse with their attempts at truing it but of course I can't
prove this. This bike has not been abused, as I use it for road
riding mainly on normal blacktop averaging maybe 90-150 miles per
week, mostly to and from work. Should this really be considered a
"Not too uncommon" event? Should such a wheel not be used for daily
use as it's too brittle for such an application? It doesn't appear to
be marketed this way. And, now that I'm apparently in the market for a
new set of wheels
(they can build up the same rear wheel for me for ~$110 which I'm
thinking of avoiding) any recommendations?

thanks for listenting!

--
If replying directly, please remove the
cleverly decorated addition to my return address.


Unfortunately I have a set of these rims too. They have about 4000 miles
on them and I have had to retrue the back three times and the front five
times. I don't know what your weight is but I'm around 195 lbs. and I
don't think these wheels can handle that much weight. I used to build
wheels and I'm fairly good at getting the tension equal and the rim
running true but these wheels seem to constantly lose spoke tension. I
came back from a ride once and saw the front rim out of true and found one
of the spokes was so loose that I could move it back and forth over 1/4".
I only paid $250 for the set but I don't think they are even worth that.
I would definately look at some other wheel sets with a minimum of 32
spokes.

Neal