broken spokes, cassette/drive train compatability

Llatikcuf wrote:
wrote:
Your bicycle shop ought to have "the Bicycle Wheel" in their shop or
on the book shelf. How to stress relieve is described in that book.
Do it!

Jobst! You never pass up a chance to plug your book or post old
pictures of you at the top of some huge hill in the Alps. I bought the
book years ago before I knew you posted here. If I would have known how
grouchy you get sometimes I would have thought twice about buying the
book.

Seriously though, it's a good book. I bought both Jobst's book and Gerd
Schraner's book and have built many a successful wheelset. Good advice
in both books. I've never seen it in a bike shop though. Amazon has it
sometimes:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/096...oks&v=glanc e

-Nate

Well when you stop to think about it selling Jobst's book might
negatively impact the repair business There might well be a copy
stashed in the back for the mechanics to use but not at the front.
John Kane, Kingston ON Canada

Sandy Leurre writes:

Many (most) machine-built wheels are not properly tensioned
straight out of the box.

I would really like it if you would identify the /many/ and the
/most/. I am amazed that companies which dedicate full production
lines, with trained and supervised technicians, are unable to
perform this simple task.

I think the reason machine built wheels have this problem has been
adequately discussed in this forum. With the decreased number of
spokes in wheels these days, the problem has gotten worse, spoke
tension needing to be yet higher than previously. High tension causes
spokes to twist from thread friction which is proportional to tension.

When spokes twist, a machine does not know about it and doesn't know
what to do about it even if it knew. When spokes cease to turn in
their nipples, machine adjustments to tension cease as well, and the
machine goes into infinite loops of measurement and spoke twisting.
To avoid this time consuming and wasteful effort, spoke tension on
machines is set low and there you have it, not properly tensioned.

To make up for the low tension, most wheels are assembled with some
manner of glue in the threads so that while riding such loose wheels,
even when repeated slackening occurred, spoke nipples will not unscrew
to go out of true. It was Wheelsmith using a Holland Mechanics wheel
building machine who came up with the idea of SpokePrep thread glue.


Also, please tell us how untrained, inexperienced, unsupervised and
untested individuals, having only a book in front of them, can do a
better job.

I think we have seen adequate proof of that here, from riders who
report success in their first set of home built wheels. Following
instructions on "how to", humans are able to sense spoke twist and to
correct for it so they are not limited as current machines are. They
can make wheels as tight as they need be.

Really, I would like to know. I bet Campagnolo, Mavic, Fulcrum,
Lightweight, MODE, and a bunch of other manufacturers would like to
know. Can you please be nice and specific?

I discussed the solution to this problem with Holland Mechanics and
BMD wheel building machine manufacturers at InterBike. They are
working on adding a high tension feature to their machines that will
get rid of the problem. I hope to see this improvement next year at
the trade show.

Jobst Brandt

Dans le message de ,
Jasper Janssen a réfléchi, et puis a déclaré :
On Sat, 5 Nov 2005 12:51:49 +0100, "Sandy" wrote:

I would really like it if you would identify the /many/ and the
/most/. I am amazed that companies which dedicate full production
lines, with trained and supervised technicians, are unable to
perform this simple task. Also,

That's mostly because the people operating the machines

Error already ...

are intern
monkeys instead of highly trained professionals, the machines mostly
can't do proper tensioning,

Machines ??

and there is no touch-up truing after the machine phase.

You have not had the opportunity to see what actually goes on in the
factories, clearly. Not that it would change your inane bias. Since you
are categorically wrong, feel free to take the guided tours and see for
yourself. But that would be learning, not spouting the party line, so I
guess you'll pass on practical education.

Also, there is no incentive for manufacturers to do it right, since
even a badly undertensioned wheel will usually last out the warranty
period and doing it right ups costs by a large factor.

Of course - bad big business. When you have an original thought, or can
bring forth your actual observations of reality, post again, OK ? Yeah,
elves .......
--
Sandy
Verneuil-sur-Seine
*******

La vie, c'est comme une bicyclette,
il faut avancer pour ne pas perdre l'équilibre.
-- Einstein, A.

Dans le message de news David L. Johnson a réfléchi, et puis a déclaré :
On Sat, 05 Nov 2005 12:51:49 +0100, Sandy wrote:

Dans le message de
oups.com,
JeffWills a réfléchi, et puis a déclaré :
Many (most) machine-built wheels are not properly
tensioned straight out of the box.

I would really like it if you would identify the /many/ and the
/most/. I am amazed that companies which dedicate full production
lines, with trained and supervised technicians, are unable to
perform this simple task. Also, please tell us how untrained,
inexperienced, unsupervised and untested individuals, having only a
book in front of them, can do a better job.

For the first question, even "dedicated" production lines are geared
to speedy production rather than careful wheel-building. "Trained
technicians"? What good wheel-building takes is a little time, and
reasonable technique.

A machine-built standard wheel will be true at first, but the spokes
are far too loose, and are not stress-relieved, and so will fail
quickly. This is not prejudice, but observation.

As for which ones do better, one would hope that the fancy "boutique"
wheels costing over $1000 per pair would do better. For me, though,
that is an untestable hypothesis, since I can build my own wheels for
a small fraction of the price, and they last a very long time.

Since you know all this, would you be so kind as to answer my question :
which are those despicable companies that fall into the "many" or "most"
category ? Be specific - don't be afraid. The truth will set up all free.
--
Bonne route !

Sandy
Verneuil-sur-Seine FR

jim beam wrote:
David L. Johnson wrote:

On Sat, 05 Nov 2005 12:51:49 +0100, Sandy wrote:


Dans le message de
oups.com,
JeffWills a réfléchi, et puis a déclaré :

Many (most) machine-built wheels are not properly
tensioned straight out of the box.


I would really like it if you would identify the /many/ and the
/most/. I am amazed that companies which dedicate full production
lines, with trained and supervised technicians, are unable to perform
this simple task. Also, please tell us how untrained, inexperienced,
unsupervised and untested individuals, having only a book in front of
them, can do a better job.



For the first question, even "dedicated" production lines are geared to
speedy production rather than careful wheel-building. "Trained
technicians"? What good wheel-building takes is a little time, and
reasonable technique.
A machine-built standard wheel will be true at first, but the spokes are
far too loose, and are not stress-relieved, and so will fail quickly.
This is not prejudice, but observation.
As for which ones do better, one would hope that the fancy "boutique"
wheels costing over $1000 per pair would do better. For me, though, that
is an untestable hypothesis, since I can build my own wheels for a small
fraction of the price, and they last a very long time.


wow, by that rationale, every car, washing machine, every computer,
every elevator motor, every air conditioning compressor, [insert any
number of mass production processes here] would be utter garbage. but
they're not.

don't believe all the fud. that's the i.q. vacuum into which ill
researched books get sold.


I think the real issue isn't machine built wheels, but how far a robotic
wheel building machine can get a wheel to what it should be, for
installation.

Cars, washing machines and computers, (I don't consider an electric
motor or a compressor complex enough mechanically for a valid
comparison), all need a person to make the final adjustments, before it
is ready for use. Same goes for a bicycle wheel, the machine might be
able to get it 90% there, but a mechanic taking that wheel and making
sure all the spokes are tensioned properly, and stress relieved
properly, and making sure all the components are working 100% will take
even a cheap wheel from being crap to perfect.

There are dealers where the wrenches make sure every bicycle sold is
properly adjusted 100%, and that includes making sure the wheels are
trued and spokes tensioned and stress relieved properly, and in that
case the wheel should be pretty much as good as a hand built wheel.

W

Dans le message de ,
a
réfléchi, et puis a déclaré :
Sandy Leurre writes:

Many (most) machine-built wheels are not properly tensioned
straight out of the box.

I would really like it if you would identify the /many/ and the
/most/. I am amazed that companies which dedicate full production
lines, with trained and supervised technicians, are unable to
perform this simple task.

I think the reason machine built wheels have this problem has been
adequately discussed in this forum. With the decreased number of
spokes in wheels these days, the problem has gotten worse, spoke
tension needing to be yet higher than previously. High tension causes
spokes to twist from thread friction which is proportional to tension.

I am *so* glad you wrote. Can you please identify the specific companies
that fall into the "most and "many" categories ?? After all, you must have
observed all that first hand.

When spokes twist, a machine does not know about it and doesn't know
what to do about it even if it knew. When spokes cease to turn in
their nipples, machine adjustments to tension cease as well, and the
machine goes into infinite loops of measurement and spoke twisting.
To avoid this time consuming and wasteful effort, spoke tension on
machines is set low and there you have it, not properly tensioned.

Machines ... Interesting. Now again, have you the spunk to answer the
asked question, from first hand knowledge, about these companies. We should
all be aware of what choices we may unwittingly make.

To make up for the low ......

You are so specific here, it blows my mind. You just forgot to mention
names.

Also, please tell us how untrained, inexperienced, unsupervised and
untested individuals, having only a book in front of them, can do a
better job.

I think we have seen adequate .....

Again, warn us against specific offenders, as a public service, please .....

Really, I would like to know. I bet Campagnolo, Mavic, Fulcrum,
Lightweight, MODE, and a bunch of other manufacturers would like to
know. Can you please be nice and specific?

I discussed the solution to this problem with Holland Mechanics and
BMD wheel building machine manufacturers at InterBike. They are
working on adding a high tension feature to their machines that will
get rid of the problem. I hope to see this improvement next year at
the trade show.

So, Holland. A machine maker. The devil incarnate, with regard to wheels.
Now, I seem to have forgotten, from all the re-published opinions, what
facts do you bring to the table today ? What brands of wheels fail to
observe proper building techniques, and which ones are coldly put together
by inanimates objects.

Name them - from personal knowledge. Go ahead, as this will make NEWS !!
--
Sandy
Verneuil-sur-Seine
*******

La vie, c'est comme une bicyclette,
il faut avancer pour ne pas perdre l'équilibre.
-- Einstein, A.

Sandy Leurre writes:

Many (most) machine-built wheels are not properly tensioned
straight out of the box.

I would really like it if you would identify the /many/ and the
/most/. I am amazed that companies which dedicate full production
lines, with trained and supervised technicians, are unable to
perform this simple task.

I think the reason machine built wheels have this problem has been
adequately discussed in this forum. With the decreased number of
spokes in wheels these days, the problem has gotten worse, spoke
tension needing to be yet higher than previously. High tension
causes spokes to twist from thread friction which is proportional
to tension.

I am *so* glad you wrote. Can you please identify the specific
companies that fall into the "most and "many" categories? After
all, you must have observed all that first hand.

That there are undertensioned wheels being shipped with many bicycles
is apparent from the many complaints we read here and from the bicycle
shops I have asked about their wheels. The better shops around here,
manually tighten and true wheels of bicycles they sell.

I haven't bought any bicycles recently and haven't tested any, so I
can't tell you which brands have loose wheels. On the other hand, I
am aware that most machine built wheels are built on the two Dutch
machines, Holland Mechanics and BMD.

http://www.hollandmechanics.com/
http://www.bmd.nl/index_products.htm

You seem to change the subject from whether machine built wheels are
failure prone to which bicycle brands have machine built wheels.

Just to remind you:

Many (most) machine-built wheels are not properly tensioned
straight out of the box.

I am writing about that subject and do not claim to have made a survey
of bicycles that have such wheels. However, most of them have such
wheels if they are not exotic wheels with few and unconventionally
shaped spokes. Such wheels are by their nature difficult to build by
machine and their high cost easily absorbs the extra attention of a
manual wheel builder.

When spokes twist, a machine does not know about it and doesn't
know what to do about it even if it knew. When spokes cease to
turn in their nipples, machine adjustments to tension cease as
well, and the machine goes into infinite loops of measurement and
spoke twisting. To avoid this time consuming and wasteful effort,
spoke tension on machines is set low and there you have it, not
properly tensioned.

Machines... Interesting. Now again, have you the spunk to answer
the asked question, from first hand knowledge, about these
companies. We should all be aware of what choices we may
unwittingly make.

Are you saying that machine built wheels are not the problem the OP
claimed they were or what are you getting at?

To make up for the low...

You are so specific here, it blows my mind. You just forgot to
mention names.

Why do you think names of bicycle companies have anything to do with
the problems of Holland Mechanics and BMD? I take it you think unless
I give a list of bicycle companies that use them, such machine built
wheels do not exist. The machines of the two companies I name are in
use in most wheel assembly plants and these are not necessarily the
integraters of the bicycles who put their brand name on the bicycle.

Also, please tell us how untrained, inexperienced, unsupervised
and untested individuals, having only a book in front of them, can
do a better job.

I think we have seen adequate...

Again, warn us against specific offenders, as a public service,
please...

You sound like the neocons who defend GWB, always sniping past the
real target and raising decoys.

Really, I would like to know. I bet Campagnolo, Mavic, Fulcrum,
Lightweight, MODE, and a bunch of other manufacturers would like
to know. Can you please be nice and specific?

I discussed the solution to this problem with Holland Mechanics and
BMD wheel building machine manufacturers at InterBike. They are
working on adding a high tension feature to their machines that
will get rid of the problem. I hope to see this improvement next
year at the trade show.

So, Holland. A machine maker. The devil incarnate, with regard to
wheels. Now, I seem to have forgotten, from all the re-published
opinions, what facts do you bring to the table today? What brands
of wheels fail to observe proper building techniques, and which ones
are coldly put together by inanimates objects.

These machines are the savior of wheel building in that they can do
this at a far lower cost than manual assembly. Wheel building is a
tedious low speed operation in the hands of humans for production, so
the advance to machine building is a positive step. Right now, all
these wheels need is a final manual tweak and stress relief. Both of
these operations can be added to existing machines.

Name them - from personal knowledge. Go ahead, as this will make
NEWS!!

Calm down. Please explain why you believe there are no tension
problems with today's machine built wheels. That will be big news.

Jobst Brandt

wrote:
snip the usual herrings, bon mots & avoidance

Calm down. Please explain why you believe there are no tension
problems with today's machine built wheels. That will be big news.

well, since you're fighting shy of citing specific examples, let's
approach this from the other end of the spectrum and *rule out* a couple
of instances for you instead:

1. shimano r540. perfectly true - as they have been from the day i
bought them. straight out of the box. about 3k miles.

2. mavic cosmos. perfectly true, as they have been straight from the
box. commute wheels. bought them last april. about 2.5k miles.

now, of most of the "expert" hand built wheels i've also owned over the
years, only one pair have been anywhere near this good - the pair i got
from the bike nook in san francisco. everything else has required
attention almost immediately and regular touch-ups thereafter. i've
also seen these pre-built wheels go to heck, but only after the local
wheel monkey has wrought their usual havoc. that's why i made sure both
mine were still in their box & untouched before purchase.

conclusions:
1. people that know how to build wheels well are /mighty/ thin on the
ground.

2. pre-built wheels are much more trouble free. and for a consumer that
wants trouble free riding and doesn't have access to a proven wheel
guru, frankly, name brand pre-built is the way to go.

wrote:
... humans are able to sense spoke twist ...

A mark on one side of the spoke from a sharpie (or other marking pen)
will make it visually obvious....

D'ohBoy

On Sat, 05 Nov 2005 10:30:41 -0800, jim beam wrote:

A machine-built standard wheel will be true at first, but the spokes are
far too loose, and are not stress-relieved, and so will fail quickly.
This is not prejudice, but observation.

As for which ones do better, one would hope that the fancy "boutique"
wheels costing over $1000 per pair would do better. For me, though, that
is an untestable hypothesis, since I can build my own wheels for a small
fraction of the price, and they last a very long time.


wow, by that rationale, every car, washing machine, every computer,
every elevator motor, every air conditioning compressor, [insert any
number of mass production processes here] would be utter garbage. but
they're not.

don't believe all the fud. that's the i.q. vacuum into which ill
researched books get sold.

IÂ*don't know how you got that "rationale", or what comparison you are
drawing between wheels and washing machines. My claim was not that
mass-production always produces "utter garbage", but that low-end market
wheel-building machines build wheels that are not durable.

You have to look at the market for low-end bicycles. Most are not ridden
very far, or often, and mostly by kids. Manufacturers think that what
they produce is good enough, and probably the complaint level is low
enough to justify that belief.

You can buy whatever wheels you want. But too many people here, and on
rides, have trouble with cheapo machine-built wheels for me to think that
is my "research" which is ill in this case.

--

David L. Johnson

__o | "Business!" cried the Ghost. "Mankind was my business. The
_`\(,_ | common welfare was my business; charity, mercy, forbearance,
(_)/ (_) | and benevolence, were, all, my business. The dealings of my
trade were but a drop of water in the comprehensive ocean of my
business!" --Dickens, "A Christmas Carol"