My attempts at repairing broken spokes haven’t met with much success.

So advice please, why would a new spoke which appears not to be bent or have any impact damage shear at the thread inside a nipple – too much tension?

Are your threads dry? Are you backing off after turns to let the spoke relax?

That would be my guess – but i’m certainly not a wheel builder! 😀

I didn’t know the threads had to be lubed 😳

And I didn’t know they had to be backed off – I just followed the “ping” test and advice on here to tighten them as evenly and as much possible 😳

I don’t have a clever tensioner btw, just a spoke key…

I’ve snapped a spoke before due to a bit of dry tweaking, the chap in the LBS explained I would have been riding it twisted which sounds obvious once someone explains it.

The ping test is fine for a new build, but once things are out of alignment the spokes need to be specifically adjusted to maintain the trueness (truth?). Each should be adjusted in small increments and the effect of a quarter turn here leads to an affect which can span 4 spokes, so the others may need to be adjusted to compensate. A ding will need tighter spokes to re-align, but added tension elsewhere will exaggerate any other wonkiness.

Once the nipples all get a drop of lube (wipe away excess) the adjustments can be done in a half turn forward, quarter back which is gradual and will let you see the change of alignment in little steps. After you’ve adjusted spokes grab parralel pairs and give them a squeeze so they ‘settle’ into a comfortable position. I mark the wonky bits with tape so I keep track of the bit I’m working on.

I can adjust left to right wobbliness, but in and out egginess is somewhat harder!