A customer brought in the front and rear wheels of a Racing Zero Carbon for service.
Let me start with the front wheel.
They wanted me to set up the new shaft to prevent catastrophic failure
(= make sure the left end bolt loosens first)
while also doing an inspection.
...That would've been fine, but...
There were 2 spokes that got twisted from somebody messing with wheel truing,
so they needed replacing.
Since the customer isn't the original owner of this wheel,
I don't know how this happened.
↑I replaced the 2 twisted spokes.
When I mark spokes with tape like this,
I position it to look like a flag relative to the rotation direction.
So this photo is taken from the left side of the wheel.
The twisted spokes were consecutive on both sides,
but on the same side as the spoke behind them,
in the rotation direction, there was another spoke with
impact damage.
You can barely see it in the photo above too.
↑That's the one.
I'm replacing this too.
I didn't have enough spare spokes in stock for these 3 replacements.
We'd had a shipment of Campagnolo and Fulcrum spare spokes recently,
but even then, I'd already used some of them on another repair job
that was left with us earlier,
so we ended up short again.
The Campagnolo and Fulcrum boxes in the photo above each contain
just 1 aluminum spoke,
which is basically shipping a lot of air.
After checking, I found that the full kit of spokes
for Racing Zero's front or rear wheel
(either 16 spokes for the front or 21 for the rear)
can be sourced with a short lead time if it's the rear wheel version.
For this Racing Zero,
the spokes used on the front wheel and the non-freewheel side radial lacing on the rear
are the same length and interchangeable, so
from a rear wheel kit of 14+7 spokes, I could get 7 front wheel spokes.
So I sourced that.
Interestingly, even the full kit comes in the same box as shown above,
but judging by how densely packed it is,
there's definitely no "shipping air" feeling about it.
After replacing the 3 spokes and truing just the radial and lateral runout,
this is my provisional center reading—the first time I checked with the centering gauge.
The rim is pretty far over to the left,
but most of that shift comes from me mucking about with the spoke replacement
and subsequent truing.
After spoke replacement and truing, when I applied an Allen key to both end bolts and turned,
the right side came loose first.
That's a sign of potential catastrophic failure on a new shaft.
I applied high-strength threadlocker to the threads on the right end
and then tightened it.
I wiped away the excess threadlocker afterward.
I loosened the left end, applied grease to the threads,
and then tightened it just enough that it won't come loose by hand
but can still be loosened with tools.
The next time both ends are loosened with an Allen key,
the right end should definitely loosen first.
This time, the hub shaft rotation was smooth with no roughness,
and there was no lateral play, so I didn't disassemble the hub.
If I did disassemble and reassemble it, the wheel center can shift by about a sheet of paper,
so I do this work before final centering after spoke replacement.
I centered the wheel.
It's straight now.
↑Looking from the right side of the wheel,
the 2 short pieces of tape that look like flags relative to rotation direction
mark the twisted spokes,
while the longer tape deliberately placed in the opposite direction
marks the spoke that had impact damage that I found later.
↑The replaced spokes—
from top in the image: 2 twisted spokes and 1 impact-damaged spoke.
↑Like this
The twisted spoke closest to the impact-damaged one
was bent in an odd way once I released it from tension.
I think what happened is that these two spokes
absorbed some kind of impact event,
and then someone tried to fix the lateral runout that resulted
by attempting wheel truing, which led to the 2 twisted spokes.
In other words, the first twisted spoke in rotation order
wouldn't have needed replacing if it hadn't been twisted during the botched truing job.
Now for the rear wheel.
I check by hand whether the right end nut (which has reverse threads)
will come loose—it's become a habit. This time, it did loosen.
The fact that it loosens means the whole sprocket assembly
can move side to side, which is obviously a problem,
but it also affects the dimensions of the surface where the centering gauge seats,
so whether this nut is properly tight is critical.
Also, as the customer had already mentioned,
there was play in the hub bearing adjustment.
The pawl spring showed no deformation.
I adjusted the hub bearing and cleaned around the ratchet.
I didn't take photos of this, but naturally
I re-greased the ratchet area afterward.
After the hub bearing adjustment and tightening the right end nut,
the provisional center reading was spot on.
There was slight lateral runout on both sides, so I fixed that.
The wheel center didn't shift after that correction either,
so the photo would be the same as the two above, and I didn't bother taking it.
Let me start with the front wheel.
They wanted me to set up the new shaft to prevent catastrophic failure
(= make sure the left end bolt loosens first)
while also doing an inspection.
...That would've been fine, but...
There were 2 spokes that got twisted from somebody messing with wheel truing,
so they needed replacing.
Since the customer isn't the original owner of this wheel,
I don't know how this happened.
↑I replaced the 2 twisted spokes.
When I mark spokes with tape like this,
I position it to look like a flag relative to the rotation direction.
So this photo is taken from the left side of the wheel.
The twisted spokes were consecutive on both sides,
but on the same side as the spoke behind them,
in the rotation direction, there was another spoke with
impact damage.
You can barely see it in the photo above too.
↑That's the one.
I'm replacing this too.
I didn't have enough spare spokes in stock for these 3 replacements.
We'd had a shipment of Campagnolo and Fulcrum spare spokes recently,
but even then, I'd already used some of them on another repair job
that was left with us earlier,
so we ended up short again.
The Campagnolo and Fulcrum boxes in the photo above each contain
just 1 aluminum spoke,
which is basically shipping a lot of air.
After checking, I found that the full kit of spokes
for Racing Zero's front or rear wheel
(either 16 spokes for the front or 21 for the rear)
can be sourced with a short lead time if it's the rear wheel version.
For this Racing Zero,
the spokes used on the front wheel and the non-freewheel side radial lacing on the rear
are the same length and interchangeable, so
from a rear wheel kit of 14+7 spokes, I could get 7 front wheel spokes.
So I sourced that.
Interestingly, even the full kit comes in the same box as shown above,
but judging by how densely packed it is,
there's definitely no "shipping air" feeling about it.
After replacing the 3 spokes and truing just the radial and lateral runout,
this is my provisional center reading—the first time I checked with the centering gauge.
The rim is pretty far over to the left,
but most of that shift comes from me mucking about with the spoke replacement
and subsequent truing.
After spoke replacement and truing, when I applied an Allen key to both end bolts and turned,
the right side came loose first.
That's a sign of potential catastrophic failure on a new shaft.
I applied high-strength threadlocker to the threads on the right end
and then tightened it.
I wiped away the excess threadlocker afterward.
I loosened the left end, applied grease to the threads,
and then tightened it just enough that it won't come loose by hand
but can still be loosened with tools.
The next time both ends are loosened with an Allen key,
the right end should definitely loosen first.
This time, the hub shaft rotation was smooth with no roughness,
and there was no lateral play, so I didn't disassemble the hub.
If I did disassemble and reassemble it, the wheel center can shift by about a sheet of paper,
so I do this work before final centering after spoke replacement.
I centered the wheel.
It's straight now.
↑Looking from the right side of the wheel,
the 2 short pieces of tape that look like flags relative to rotation direction
mark the twisted spokes,
while the longer tape deliberately placed in the opposite direction
marks the spoke that had impact damage that I found later.
↑The replaced spokes—
from top in the image: 2 twisted spokes and 1 impact-damaged spoke.
↑Like this
The twisted spoke closest to the impact-damaged one
was bent in an odd way once I released it from tension.
I think what happened is that these two spokes
absorbed some kind of impact event,
and then someone tried to fix the lateral runout that resulted
by attempting wheel truing, which led to the 2 twisted spokes.
In other words, the first twisted spoke in rotation order
wouldn't have needed replacing if it hadn't been twisted during the botched truing job.
Now for the rear wheel.
I check by hand whether the right end nut (which has reverse threads)
will come loose—it's become a habit. This time, it did loosen.
The fact that it loosens means the whole sprocket assembly
can move side to side, which is obviously a problem,
but it also affects the dimensions of the surface where the centering gauge seats,
so whether this nut is properly tight is critical.
Also, as the customer had already mentioned,
there was play in the hub bearing adjustment.
The pawl spring showed no deformation.
I adjusted the hub bearing and cleaned around the ratchet.
I didn't take photos of this, but naturally
I re-greased the ratchet area afterward.
After the hub bearing adjustment and tightening the right end nut,
the provisional center reading was spot on.
There was slight lateral runout on both sides, so I fixed that.
The wheel center didn't shift after that correction either,
so the photo would be the same as the two above, and I didn't bother taking it.