Checking Spoke Tension – How often?

I must admit to not really doing it at all.  Is it something that should be done regularly – like once a month?

DH bike after every 2 runs

trail bike, hardly ever.

i just give em a squeeze occasionally – if any are loose its a 5min job to tension it up.

i dont measure the tension though. if i do spenmd time ‘truing’ i just try and get them as even as feasible depending on flat spots/dents/wobbles hamfistedness etc.

i find they come loose more in winter – i guess the cold/warm temp changes makes a difference.

If I’ve got the bike(s) on the workstand, I’ll spin the wheels and run my finger along the spokes to do a quick, audible test.

If it sounds like a spoke is ‘out of tune’ I’ll get the spoke key and give it tighten.

Building your own wheels helps, as you know what they should sound and feel like.

Obviously if the wheel is out of true then I’ll check spokes asap.

Properly = only if the wheel starts to play up – feeling ‘baggy’ or going out of true with no/little impacts. Potentially after a decent whack – whilst checking the rim for cracks too.

Ad hoc – whenever I’m doing anything near the rear wheel – just pinging with a fingernail and tightening up any really lose ones.

+1 for building your own wheel – it gives you a really good appreciation of how much margin for error there truly is.

Depends on what you mean by checking.  Every time I clean the wheels, I run a rag over each spoke so if they are baggy or there’s any really nasty dings on them, I’ll pick it up.

Actually measuring the tension?  Only if I spot an issue with the wheel.

DH bike after every 2 runs

I know you (or rather the boy) are at a very high level and the loads on that bike on a standard run must be more than most of us will ever put our bikes through even in a crash…

but is that really necessary, are you actually frequently finding problems and needing to make adjustments after 5-10 minutes of riding time?

I have a flick whenever i take the wheels off to do something, or if i get a big impact (pinch puncture or rim dent).

If they are buckled i obviously check, but i can’t recall last time i had a decent sized buckle. I’ve seen a few ebike and DH wheels that need a bit of preventative maintenance. a look over once every couple of months, rarely find anything wrong once they’ve been looked at once or twice. Until they fail completely.

I also build most of my own wheels and have been for 25+ years. So thoughts on many factory or custom built wheels are not repeatable.

I have a few Probikegarage reminders based on moving time, one of these is to pinch check the spokes every 20 hours. Never found an issue but as it’s in the stand anyway might as well.

Yeah, I’ll do a “pinch check” with adjacent spokes every once in a while on my own bikes.

When I was maintaining a hire fleet, every bike got checked as part of the wash/service cycle between every hire.

Just run a finger or hand round when washing and for any big wobbles.  Despite being relatively weighty I don’t seem to damage wheels with any regularity (look out for that “What non boost wheelset” thread any day now…).

Would love to be able to build / true wheels properly but a stand etc. is uncomfortably pricy and there’s no way I’d do an in frame build again (once was plenty).

I bought my first proper mountain bike in 1994. In that time, they number of wives I’ve had is far, far greater than the number of times I’ve checked spoke tension.

And I’ve had two wives.