Continuing on with our series on The Typical Tune Up, we now move into the adjustment phase. Today, we will take a look at truing you wheels.

A Couple Of Notes First: If you do not own or have access to a truing stand, then leave your wheels in your bike, and use the brake pads as your “indicators”. If you have a disc only rig, you can try clamping on a common clothes pin to the seat stay and use the protruding end as an indicator.

Secondly, this will not get in depth as to the dark art of wheel building. we are simply going to cover the very basic necessities of straightening out a slightly out of true wheel.

If your wheel is a steel rimmed model, a low end model, or beyond servicing, your results may not satisfy you. In these cases, a wheel replacement may be in order. Have a qualified bicycle technician analyse your particular situation before proceding.

If you have a truing stand at your disposal, remove the wheels and place one of them in the stand. (If not, use the brake pads as an indicator.) Place the indicator(s) so that the distance from the rim is about as shown in the image above. (approximately 1mm) Gently turn the wheel. If you strike an indicator, then the wheel is out of true to the side the rim is contacting the indicator. (If you are using a one sided indicator, watch for either contact, or the space between the indicator and rim to become greater.) Note where your wheel is out of true and the area of the rim that is striking the indicator. The spokes that meet the rim in this area will be the ones we focus on for adjustments.

Now, we will stop a moment and grab some chain lubricant, preferably in a bottle with a drip style applicator. Take a drop of lubricant and place it on the side of each spoke nipple we will be adjusting so that the lube runs down the side of the nipple and into the spoke hole of the rim. This will hopefully lubricate the interface of the nipple and the seat it rests in within the rim cavity, making our adjustments easier and more accurate. (If your wheel is new or nearly so, you may not need to do this step) Note: Some wheels have non-traditional spoke nipples, or other non-traditonal means of truing. In these cases, leave it to the experts, or take the necessary steps to learn how to take care of your specific wheels.

Now that we have prepared the nipples we are going to adjust, let’s take a look at my specific example above. Here we see the indicator resting against the rim adjacent to a spoke that is “pulling” to the opposite side from the indicator. The rim is actually contacting the indicator at each adjacent spoke, as well. So, I adjusted the three spokes in that area of the rim. The one the wrench is pictured on, and the two spokes next to where I am shown at above. You will have to determine which spokes you will need adjusted in a similar fashion.

Place your spoke wrench carefully over the nipple, making sure you have it engaged fully on the flats of the nipple. If you fail here, you will round off the nipple and cause your situation to be worse than before. Now, the trick is to remember that you are looking at a bolt, (the spoke) and a nut, (the nipple) from underneath, or you could think of it as looking at it upside down. So, to loosen a spoke nipple, you would turn it clockwise, since you are looking at it in the manner described here. To tighten it, the reverse direction- counter-clockwise- is used. Got that? Good.

Now, in my example above, I want to “pull” the rim away from the indicator using the spoke that I have my wrench on, which “pulls” that rim in the opposite direction from the indicator. Now, I could just turn it counter-clockwise to tighten the nipple, and thus pull the rim off the indicator with just that spoke, but this is not advisable. It can throw off spoke tensions, and cause problems further down the road.

What is preferable here is to turn the spoke nipple my wrench is on only a 16th to a maximum of an 8th of a turn, and then go to each neighboring spoke and turn those a similar amount clockwise (loosening). Those neighboring spokes pull the rim to the side the indicator touches, and so a slight “loosening” needs to be done on the side those spokes are pulling toward. Hopefully making the minor adjustments to this group of three spokes will be successul. (And it was)

It is always preferable to adjust spokes in groups if possible. It will help keep your tensions in balance and keep your wheel running true longer. Also, remember to make incremental adjustments. It is better to have to make several small adjustments than to make sweeping, gross adjustments which tend to confuse the mechanic and cause the job to become more difficult.

After this, continue around the wheel, checking and making proper adjustments where necessary until you have the wheel running “true” within a millimeter on each side. You can futz with it more, and possibly get it even better, but minor adjustments like this will get your wheel serviceable, and keep you from getting in over your head if you are a novice at this.

Next time: Wheel bearing adjustments.