Stans Arch on my back wheel:
[url=https://flic.kr/p/nZPEgb]photo 1[/url] by CoticJon, on Flickr

That’s the worst one but there’s plenty more like this:
[url=https://flic.kr/p/o4Dqn2]photo 2[/url] by CoticJon, on Flickr

Spokes are all tight and the wheel is pretty straight.

You reckon it’ll last? I ride in the Peaks, so in many ways the rims aren’t going to get much more of a thrashing than they already have had.

I do have a spare set of Pro2/Flows lying around, but they are far less round, even if they’re not (as badly!) cracked, and I’ll need to buy an XD driver to make the cassette fit.

There’s going to be a fair amount of climbing, so was planning to use the lighter wheels. I ride in the Peaks, so in many ways the rims aren’t going to get much more of a thrashing than they already have had.

Would rather not do a rebuild at the moment as I’d like to try some of the LB carbon rims, and I go on holiday in 10 days time…

cracked rims at the eyelets in multiple places….I would not ride it down the street personally.

YMMV

Don’t risk it!

Looks like you defiantly need something a bit more substantial!

I would not ride it down the street personally

I first noticed signs of cracking around the eyelets about 6 months ago, and it’s been caned hard since (including tonight). The first pic, to me, is mildly concerning (hence the thread), the second I wouldn’t have bothered mentioning in, and of itself – that’s just what Stans rims seem to do.

I wouldn’t ride it – especially when it could spoil your holiday!

riding that in the alps is madness.

Buy a new Arch rim. Tape it to the old one. Move spokes over. Follow tensioning and truing instructions here. Enjoy the alps and live to tell the tale.

Spokes are all tight

Yep. Overtightened. Stans rims have no eyelets, so you can’t tension them very much. Looks like you’ve tweaked them and they’re over tensioned.

At *some* point the spokes will pull through the rim.

I rode some like this for months and months. YMMV. Truly YMMV.

Not joking, I’ve ridden rims in far worse condition than that before, just not on holiday. I’ve never had a wheel collapse, but then I don’t want this one to be the first.

Spoke tension is spot on the allowable for the rims. I do have a tension meter, and have used it… (I also trust JRA to have built them properly in the first place!)

I replaced a Flow rim that looked like that at the end of last season. Given that I had a pretty manic season and maintenance of my own bike was fairly low down my priority list, it had probably been like that for most of the summer. It’ll probably last the week OK, but I’d keep an eye on it every day. In fact, I’d just ride the Flows. Arch is a bit feeble for out here.

(I’m a full-time guide in the Alps).

I wouldn’t want that to ruin my holiday. I’d be replacing it

Replace.

I’ve ridden rims in far worse condition than that before, just not on holiday

Exactly. for the price of a new rim why would you even consider riding it, spending an entire week’s holiday of intensive riding youve spent good money on stressing your wheel might fail and constantly checking it? False economy is a polite way of putting it.

New rims or join up
PS I think it only works in CH

and I go on holiday in 10 days time…

Cool, my hol starts the day after tomorrow, that means you won’t screw one of my days up too, if you were going to the same place.

Get it sorted before you hurt yourself, ruin a day or more of your holiday and those on the same week as you.

Sort it. Itll only end in disaster, to be blunt. You just have to hit a stone in the wrong place and itll fold. May not just do you alot of damage when it flips over the bars but may cause a hefty bill as prices abroad are a fair bit higher, but Ive ordered stuff from CRC for delivery in Morzine before because it was still cheaper.

A week of riding over there is like a month over here generally.

Spoke tension is spot on the allowable for the rims. I do have a tension meter, and have used it.

I think you may be mistaking the spoke tension meter for an accurate measuring device. The fact that that rim is cracked in many places clearly says that the spoke tension is well above the allowable value.

No it doesn’t, the spoke hole is the weakest point on the rim so simple wear and tear/fatigue could easily account for it too.

stevomcd – Member

maintenance of my own bike was fairly low down my priority list

Don’t worry, it didn’t show 😆

New alps wheels is obviously the answer.

No it doesn’t, the spoke hole is the weakest point on the rim so simple wear and tear/fatigue could easily account for it too.

i.e knocking the wheel out of true a few times has overloaded some of the spokes, initiating cracks which have grown over time? Could be. It shouldn’t be straight up fatigue if the spokes aren’t wildly slack as the load on them shouldn’t be varying too much. The OPs assertion that the tension is bang on the limit makes me wary of over tensioning though, going right too the limit is pushing things a little with the accuracy limitations of a spoke tension meter and there’s no way that all the spokes in a wheel as beat as that are at the same tension.

Either way, if you are planning to ride it hard, a new rim would be cheap insurance for a good holiday.

General rule if you have to ask the question no 😉

robinlaidlaw – Member

i.e knocking the wheel out of true a few times has overloaded some of the spokes, initiating cracks which have grown over time? Could be. It shouldn’t be straight up fatigue if the spokes aren’t wildly slack as the load on them shouldn’t be varying too much.

Nothing so complicated, just a decent amount of hard use wearing out the wheel to the point it cracks. Mine cracked at the valve hole, same thing- failing at a weak spot doesn’t mean the failure is something specific to the weak spot.

And yeah, I would replace that. I rode around on my cracked flow for ages without any real worries but I didn’t take it out to france for the exact same reasons- break at home, it’s annoying, break on holiday and it’s much more of a bummer.

Definitely not. Seems like a receipe for a high speed crash and potentially serious injury.

failing at a weak spot doesn’t mean the failure is something specific to the weak spot.

From an engineering point of view, it does, something has caused that to be the failure point(s)

a decent amount of hard use wearing out the wheel to the point it cracks.

Really, this is what I’m saying in fewer words. This is the sort of cause of failure detective work that I often see at work and at some point, something specific has happened to those spoke holes that hasn’t happened to the others to make the cracks occur on those specific ones.

robinlaidlaw – Member

From an engineering point of view, it does, something has caused that to be the failure point(s)

Yep, the fact that there’s a big ole in the rim! You can’t go from “cracks at the spoke holes” to “clearly it’s the tension”.

LOL – well that all seems fairly conclusive!

I’ll suck up the extra weight for climbing and use the Flows. Buying an XD driver for them was on the to do list anyway.

Personally, I suspect they’ll be fine, but I kind of agree that it’s not really worth the risk.

General rule if you have to ask the question no

Possibly the best answer!

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Clearance-Sale-Stans-NoTubes-ZTR-Arch-EX-Rim-26in-Black-/360948709079?pt=UK_sportsleisure_cycling_bikeparts_SR&hash=item540a3836d7

this may be cheaper than the XD driver, especially if the flows are damaged too.

I might be wrong but I’m pretty sure the flow and arch rims erd is within 2mm so why not swap the flow rim onto this wheel?

Yep, the fact that there’s a big ole in the rim!

Oh, no doubt, it’ll always go at a spoke hole, but why those specific spokes though? 🙂
And I stand by my assertion that the spoke tension is very likely on the high side of acceptable for those rims, albeit it’s not an absolutely direct leap from the cracks to there.

New rim either way.

I might be wrong but I’m pretty sure the flow and arch rims erd is within 2mm so why not swap the flow rim onto this wheel?

a) because there’s plenty more (UK) miles to be had out of that rim. I doubt it will fail catastrophically, It’ll just crack a bit further either until the spoke goes slack, or until it starts leaking air. I’m actually quite interested to see how long it does last, given all the naysaying.

b) the Flow is pretty battered in it’s own right, so it’ll be a pig to build into a nice straight, evenly tensioned wheel, and there’s just no point in stripping an OK wheel down, when it works fine.

c) I don’t want to end up with a Flow on my “trail” hub. I want to end up with an LB carbon on it (in a month or 2’s time)!

robinlaidlaw – Member

Oh, no doubt, it’ll always go at a spoke hole, but why those specific spokes though?

All sorts of possible causes for that- uneven spoke tension will stress the holes differently even if not overtightened, stress on the rim from riding will be uneven, manufacturing variations, corrosion, and random chance (it is those spokes; that doesn’t mean it had to be those spokes). And of course, possibly overtensioned 😉

Those are fatigue cracks, not gross overload cracks!

Alluminium “work hardens” ie every time it flexes it gets harder and losses it’s ductility. This results in cracks forming at these less ductile zones (because the stress then concentrates at these points where the material is too hard to eleastically yield).

If it were a gross overload (too tight spokes / over load from massive huck-to-flat etc) you would see a more localise deformation of the material in a ductile fashion, not a long but small crack propogation over time as these exhibit (imo!)

Chances are, if you have been riding these rims like this for a while, they will be fine BUT, you deffinately have reduced the margin between normal loading and a gross overload failure. The crack can now allow the material to seperate at the spoke hole, so excessive loading here will now much easier “pull out a spoke” than without the cracks.

Now, you might be lucky, you might ride all week, not hit anything, and be fine, or you might just be unlucky a clobber a rock on the morning of day 1 and be cursing soon after!

If you can afford to replace the rims, i’d do that personally.

What’s the worst that could happen?
It breaks, you are in the are in the Alps in a valley miles away from the nearest lifts back to where you are staying.
You take a drop and it crumples beneath you stopping your bike but leaving you flying like superman and eating alpine dirt.
Then you are left having to pay twice the going rate (assuming its France you are going to) for a wheel you wish you had bought in the UK. Also it’s on your mind all the time so you don’t hammer the trails and enjoy them like you should.
For peace of mind I would be getting a new wheel/rim

Those are fatigue cracks, not gross overload cracks!

The bottom one maybe, the top one, I don’t think so, it’s raised around the whole length of that crack, that’s not just been a little by little crack propagation over a lot of load cycles.