pat_harris•5d agoProlific Poster

Put $75 into a Park Tool spoke tension meter and it finally stopped my wheel from sounding like a maraca

After 3 months of truing the same rear wheel over and over, that little gauge showed all my spokes were way loose on one side and now I actually trust my own builds, has anyone else had that moment where a tool proves you were just guessing the whole time?

3 comments

3 Comments

kimblack5d ago

A spoke tension meter is nice to have, but $75 seems like a lot just to stop a wheel from rattling. You can get a wheel pretty true just by feel and a decent spoke wrench, that's how most shops did it for years. Unless you're building wheels every week for a living, a simple pluck-and-listen method works fine for most people. Lots of guys chase perfect tension numbers and still end up with wheels that come out of true on the first rough road. Maybe that maraca sound was just a loose nipple or two, not the end of the world.

morganl715d ago

Wait, you're seriously telling me shops used to true wheels by ear and feel?

kim_mason555d ago

Yeah @morganl71 is right that you can get by without one, but for me it stopped that guessing game cold, lol