A customer brought in a Ksyrium SLS (Mavic wheel) for repair.
A truck swerved into them (unclear if intentional),
and to avoid the collision, they hit the curb and crashed,
resulting in both wheels getting bent out of true.
Apparently in cases of non-contact accidents like this (induced accidents)
you can sometimes claim damages,
but when you don't know who the other party is, there's nothing you can do.
The other day, my mentor in the competitive cycling world
(the one who built the rear wheel with the Dura-Ace 25th anniversary hub)
got swerved at by a car on the Wakayama side of Nabeya Pass and fell into a drainage ditch.
The driver of the car following behind even testified
that there was a causal relationship between the swerve and the fall into the ditch,
but in that case too, they never identified the other driver.
The image above is the front wheel, but let me start with the rear wheel first (no image).
It only needed truing,
but there was a faint dent on the bead hook.
The customer hadn't noticed it,
and I only found it after pushing the truing pretty hard,
so I think it's fine to use as-is.
For the front wheel (Mavic front wheels have a fixed relationship between
the hub body sticker orientation and the position of the side with the bearing adjustment function,
so I'll call the side with six holes for bearing adjustment the "left side"),
two spokes on the right side and one spoke on the left side were bent.
So I put a tool on the nipple of one of the bent spokes on the right side
and loosened it on the first try (I swear I didn't tighten it),
and for some reason the adjacent spoke on the right side (the second bent one)
suddenly went crack and broke. I was shocked.
I hadn't even put a tool on this spoke's nipple.
The tension must have fluctuated and a pre-existing crack
propagated all at once.
I've experienced spokes breaking while turning the nipple,
but this is the first time something like this has happened.
I removed the two bent spokes on the right side and
one spoke on the left side.
The customer also brought in another front wheel from a Ksyrium SLS of the same era,
but the bead hook on the rim is pretty messed up, so
they said I could use the spokes as spare parts.
This is something I've been wanting to write about for a while now
and I already had images prepared, but since this Ksyrium showed the same issue,
I'll cover it. Mavic's Zicral spokes can become completely seized
depending on usage and duration.
In that case, you can't turn them either way,
and if you force it, the flat section of the spoke can twist,
or at worst, break.
There's nothing you can do about this.
Or sometimes the nipple turns, but
the spoke twists in sync with it, so
when you try to restore the spoke's flat orientation,
the nipple's thread engagement also reverts,
making truing impossible.
In this case too, forcing it will twist the spoke.
With Campagnolo Fulcrum aluminum spokes, there are
countermeasures available, but
with Mavic aluminum spokes, there aren't.
Obviously I can't true a wheel where the nipples won't turn.
Mavic wheels usually have center offset,
so if a Mavic wheel with no centering history
is even slightly off,
you need to adjust all the nipples on one side,
and if even one nipple is seized, the repair can't be done.
The spokes in the image above are starting to rust,
but they were only at the early stages of the pre-seize stage, so I was able to loosen them.
Whether the seizing occurs between the nipple and spoke,
or between the nipple and rim, it's probably a combination
of both factors, but
between the spoke and nipple,
rust or dirt gets packed in as shown in the image above.
When you clean this out, the sliding resistance of the nipple
decreases significantly, and the problem
where the nipple rotation and spoke twist are in perfect sync
occurs here.
↑The rim hole from the SLS where I removed the bent spokes
It was stiff to turn so I loosened it carefully.
↑The rim hole from the SLS where I sourced spare spokes
The nipple turned smoothly here.
Seizing between the rim hole and nipple
varies depending on how much rust forms here.
With Campagnolo Fulcrum, the rim holes aren't threaded,
so serious seizing doesn't occur there.
So with Mavic aluminum spokes, it's sometimes impossible
to true the wheel at all, so please understand.
All
fixed.
↑Replaced spokes
The top two are from the right side, the bottom one is from the left side.
A truck swerved into them (unclear if intentional),
and to avoid the collision, they hit the curb and crashed,
resulting in both wheels getting bent out of true.
Apparently in cases of non-contact accidents like this (induced accidents)
you can sometimes claim damages,
but when you don't know who the other party is, there's nothing you can do.
The other day, my mentor in the competitive cycling world
(the one who built the rear wheel with the Dura-Ace 25th anniversary hub)
got swerved at by a car on the Wakayama side of Nabeya Pass and fell into a drainage ditch.
The driver of the car following behind even testified
that there was a causal relationship between the swerve and the fall into the ditch,
but in that case too, they never identified the other driver.
The image above is the front wheel, but let me start with the rear wheel first (no image).
It only needed truing,
but there was a faint dent on the bead hook.
The customer hadn't noticed it,
and I only found it after pushing the truing pretty hard,
so I think it's fine to use as-is.
For the front wheel (Mavic front wheels have a fixed relationship between
the hub body sticker orientation and the position of the side with the bearing adjustment function,
so I'll call the side with six holes for bearing adjustment the "left side"),
two spokes on the right side and one spoke on the left side were bent.
So I put a tool on the nipple of one of the bent spokes on the right side
and loosened it on the first try (I swear I didn't tighten it),
and for some reason the adjacent spoke on the right side (the second bent one)
suddenly went crack and broke. I was shocked.
I hadn't even put a tool on this spoke's nipple.
The tension must have fluctuated and a pre-existing crack
propagated all at once.
I've experienced spokes breaking while turning the nipple,
but this is the first time something like this has happened.
I removed the two bent spokes on the right side and
one spoke on the left side.
The customer also brought in another front wheel from a Ksyrium SLS of the same era,
but the bead hook on the rim is pretty messed up, so
they said I could use the spokes as spare parts.
This is something I've been wanting to write about for a while now
and I already had images prepared, but since this Ksyrium showed the same issue,
I'll cover it. Mavic's Zicral spokes can become completely seized
depending on usage and duration.
In that case, you can't turn them either way,
and if you force it, the flat section of the spoke can twist,
or at worst, break.
There's nothing you can do about this.
Or sometimes the nipple turns, but
the spoke twists in sync with it, so
when you try to restore the spoke's flat orientation,
the nipple's thread engagement also reverts,
making truing impossible.
In this case too, forcing it will twist the spoke.
With Campagnolo Fulcrum aluminum spokes, there are
countermeasures available, but
with Mavic aluminum spokes, there aren't.
Obviously I can't true a wheel where the nipples won't turn.
Mavic wheels usually have center offset,
so if a Mavic wheel with no centering history
is even slightly off,
you need to adjust all the nipples on one side,
and if even one nipple is seized, the repair can't be done.
The spokes in the image above are starting to rust,
but they were only at the early stages of the pre-seize stage, so I was able to loosen them.
Whether the seizing occurs between the nipple and spoke,
or between the nipple and rim, it's probably a combination
of both factors, but
between the spoke and nipple,
rust or dirt gets packed in as shown in the image above.
When you clean this out, the sliding resistance of the nipple
decreases significantly, and the problem
where the nipple rotation and spoke twist are in perfect sync
occurs here.
↑The rim hole from the SLS where I removed the bent spokes
It was stiff to turn so I loosened it carefully.
↑The rim hole from the SLS where I sourced spare spokes
The nipple turned smoothly here.
Seizing between the rim hole and nipple
varies depending on how much rust forms here.
With Campagnolo Fulcrum, the rim holes aren't threaded,
so serious seizing doesn't occur there.
So with Mavic aluminum spokes, it's sometimes impossible
to true the wheel at all, so please understand.
All
fixed.
↑Replaced spokes
The top two are from the right side, the bottom one is from the left side.