Last month we discussed the theory of BMX wheels; this month we
will focus on wheel maintenance and the purchase, should it prove
necessary, of replacement wheels. We will begin with the assumption
that you have a reasonably new and true wheel. The life of a dirt
biking hero being what it is, however, chances are it won't stay
that way for long. In fact, the very next day you case the back
wheel on a big set of doubles and hear that awful CRUNCH when
you land. Now the wheel wiggles back and forth when you spin it.
This is no time for panic. It's actually time to go out and buy
a spoke wrench.
Your search for a spoke wrench will require discrimination. A
great many of the spoke wrenches currently available are "multi-wrenches"
featuring a variety of gaps designed to adjust a variety of spokes.
Since you don't have a variety of spokes on your wheel, or at
least it is to be hoped that you don't, you will instead purchase
a single-size spoke wrench designed to fit the size of nipple
you have on your wheel. There are a couple of really good spoke
wrenches out there. The easiest ones to find are made by Park
Tools and will cost anywhere from eight to twelve bucks each.
Take your wheel to the bike shop and make sure that you are buying
the proper wrench. Start with the red wrench, since most BMX wheels
use Japanese spoke nipples and the red wrench is designed for
the Japanese size. Try the green wrench if the red one doesn't
fit. If the shop will not let you try the wrench to make sure
it fits, take your business elsewhere.
Now that we have our spoke wrench, we need a spoke tuning stand
to properly adjust the wheel. But, since we are broke, we can't
afford a spoke tuning stand. Luckily, our BMX bike has its very
own spoke tuning stand built in. Put the wheel back in the dropouts
and tighten it up. Spin the wheel to get an idea of where the
ding is, then stop the wheel at a true spot and push one of your
brake shoes lightly against it. Unless you have a Pitbull or cantilevers,
the brake shoe will stay where you push it to. If you have a Pitbull,
loosen the center mount and rotate the brake around until one
of the shoes barely touches the rim. If you have cantilevers,
you will have to eyeball it or duct-tape a ruler to your dropout
so the end of the ruler barely brushes the rim.
Now, turn the wheel slowly until the rim moves away from the brake
shoe or pushes against it. When that happens, stop. Find the spoke
nearest to that spot that "pulls" away from where the
rim is bent. Let's make that a little clearer. As you know, each
spoke starts at the rim and goes to one side of the hub. If the
rim is bent to the left side from your perspective. look for the
spoke that attaches to the right side of the hub. If the rim is
bent exactly between two "pulling" spokes, keep an eye
on both of them.
Now, put your spoke wrench on the nipple of that spoke and turn
it counter-clockwise one-quarter turn. This will move the rim
back a little bit. If the ding is exactly between two spokes,
give them each a one-quarter turn. Remember, the rim becomes uneven
because the spoke tension is uneven. When we re-tension the spokes,
the rim will return to true.
If your first turn does not solve the problem entirely, make another
one. Every other turn, make a small loosening (clockwise) turn
to the spoke that "pulls" away from the ding. This will
be on the immediate left or right of the spoke you are tightening.
The purpose of this is to permit the rim to move more freely in
the direction you want it to go. You will also be keeping the
total tension on that part of the rim as even as possible.
After a couple of turns, you will have fixed all but the most
deadly of rim dings. Even those can usually be calmed down a bit
by careful spoke tuning. When the rim is true, grab the spoke
you have been tuning where it crosses its neighbor and forms an
"X", and squeeze the pair together. This will keep the
newly tensioned spoke from building tension up against the spokes
it crosses. You're done.
Any master wheelbuilders who have been reading this column are
no doubt about ready to faint from the raw and unsophisticated
wheel-truing method just described. There are a couple more steps
involved in perfectly truing a wheel, but they probably don't
belong in BMX. Heck, you're just going to bend the thing again
anyway. You're just performing field surgery. A wheel consistently
trued in this manner will, however, considerably outlast a wheel
that is not trued at all, or one that is trued once a year by
the local shop.
Now's let talk about the real, raw, rugged, wheel repair secret.
I developed this method all by myself to fix wheels that a bike
shop would probably have to rebuild. I'm talking about abused
wheels, old wheels, you name it. Keep this one between you and
me.
Start by leaving the wheel on the bike. Grab the pair of spokes
nearest to the air nozzle. How easy are they to squeeze? Chances
are that, if the wheel is old, they will be very easy to squeeze,
indeed. Go around the wheel, squeezing each pair of spokes. Get
a feel for what the loosest pairs are. Then tighten the loosest
spokes each one-quarter turn. Go around the wheel and squeeze
again, tightening the loosest spokes again. Continue doing this
until all the spokes are fairly tight. Then fine-tune the wheel,
as described a couple of paragraphs up, until it is relatively
true. Every month, go around the wheel and tighten where necessary.
If you follow the above method faithfully, you will get entire
seasons out of wheels other people have to throw away. The key
is keeping the spokes tight. When spokes are loose, it doesn't
matter how good of a rim you have. That wheel will bend like Silly
Putty the next time you case a jump. Keep the spokes tight at
all costs.
I have been using the same set of wheels for six years now, and
the rear wheel remains true thanks to my homebrewed wheel maintenance.
I am not a great jumper, but I am a heavy one, so my wheels take
a lot of punishment. Nevertheless, they continue to hold up because
I take care of them. By contrast, in my teens I was seventy pounds
lighter than I am today, and a better jumper to boot, but I went
through two pairs of wheels a year because I couldn't be bothered
to take care of them. Learn from my mistakes.
If you expect to really case a jump someday, you may wish to zip-tie
your rear wheel. Put a small zip-tie where the spokes cross, pull
it tight, and cut off the end. This will not, repeat, will not
keep your wheel true, but it can protect against bent spokes when
you have a really bad landing. It does mean you have to be careful
when you are truing your wheel, because a zip-tied pair of spokes
can be hard to properly re-tighten.
There are a couple of things that a pro-sized BMX racer should
avoid like the plague when it comes to wheels. Radial lacing and
wrapped spokes will significantly weaken the wheel and provide
no real benefit to you. Thin spokes will also render the wheel
susceptible to damage while providing almost no weight savings.
When shopping for a new wheel, here is what to look for: A name-brand
hub with sealed bearings. Most of the hubs out there are fine.
Do not buy a loose-ball bearing hub unless you are comfortable
with the idea of rebuilding it twice a year. Stainless-steel spokes
are best, and the thicker the better. "Double-butted"
spokes are thinner in the middle, and might be worth considering
if saving an ounce or two is really important to you. Should you
choose straight-gauge, or regular, spokes, you shouldn't worry
that you're missing out.
The weight savings obtained through the use of double-butted
spokes is nominal at best.
You can save yourself a lot of heartbreak in this world if you
buy chrome rims instead of polished or anodized ones. Not only
will chrome rims increase your braking effectiveness, they are
easier to clean and, believe it or not, appear to be slightly
stronger. There is no rational reason why this would be so, but
there it is.
I am always a little unsettled by the idea of really breaking
the bank to buy a set of wheels. Not only are they the most likely
part on your bike to be irreparably damaged, there also doesn't
seem to be much, if any, speed benefit in it. I conducted a series
of extremely informal tests a few years back to determine which
hub spins longest. The winner was a Japanese-brand unsealed hub
(It's my opinion that anything more than a set of Suzue or
Redline hubs is a waste of money--JB). The major-brand sealed
hubs were all about the same in terms of rolling resistance. Buy
whatever you like, but don't expect to put yourself in the winner's
circle by the use of super-hubs.
You can make your wheels last forever in the following fashion:
Continually true and re-tension the rims, particularly the back
one. When the back rim finally goes south, have new spokes laced
up on a new rim. Don't buy a new pair of wheels because your rear
rim is tweaked. As common-sense as this sounds, most people buy
wheelsets because their rear rim is trashed. A new rim and spokes,
properly laced, might cost you sixty bucks. A new wheelset will
cost more.
Don't forget to buy a couple sets of spare bearings and maybe
one spare axle. Replace those parts when they bend or break. Most
riders should get five years out of a set of wheel bearings. By
careful repair and replacement, there is no reason why you should
not get an entire decade out of a pair of hubshells.
It would appear that plastic wheels are returning to fashion in
BMX again, after about a decade of being uncool. Although composite
or graphite wheels offer quite a few advantages, I have yet to
see one that could be brought back to true. Back when I was a
pup, the old racers said that putting Tuff Wheels in the refrigerator
would retrue them. This may well be true, but since no mother
(or wife) in the history of civilization has permitted her kids
(or husband) to put BMX wheels in with the frozen steaks, I doubt
we'll discover the validity of that story any time soon. I will
continue to use spoked wheels until everyone else has stopped
using them, and then I'll go the whole nine yards and put a pair
of ACS's excellent Z-Mags on.
That should about do it for wheels. When we next meet, we'll plot
your strategy for the winter months. So, until then, may you,
and your wheels, stay true to BMX.