Spoke Breaks. What do YOU do?

[GrumpyGregry]

I just don't have the background in road/touring riding to know what the best action to take is...

Planned to do 100km today, but 20km into the ride a spoke went on the rear wheel drive side. Popped spoke on an MTB (my background) is, ime, a short cut to A&E later in the day with an expensive trip to the LBS for dessert.

I bailed the ride, rode slowly, carefully, in a low gear to the nearest railway station and got a train home. Stupid overreaction or sensible least cost option?

Advice please.....

 

[Tim Bennet.]

Buy decent wheels.

They're not that expensive (£200 /pr) and you can then enjoy decades of both on and off-road riding without ever breaking a spoke.

Spoke breakage is just god's way of letting you know you bought rubbish wheels.

 

[andy_wrx]

Depends on your wheels.
Are these the wheels which came with a new sub-£1000 roadbike - probably no-name spokes on Alex rims and manufacturer's own-brand hubs ?
- they will typically be spoked with macaroni and spokes will break, particularly after a few thousand miles : it's how manufacturers get their prices down.
But if your bike has Mavic Aksiums or Fulcrum 7's or Shimano R500 or RS10, etc then they'll be rather better.

I've always ridden home on a broken spoke, including once when it went 50 miles away.
I once rode to work two days with a broken spoke before I got around to fixing it - I loosened the brake adjuster and carried on.

But equally, a spoke broke on my wife's bike and the wheel distorted so much that it wouldn't turn in the frame, let alone the brakes. That was a phonecall-for-lift job.

If the spoke broke when I was out, I'd ride home on it
I'd ride gingerly, avoid potholes, not cane it downhill or round bends.

But if I noticed it was broken as I left the house or it broke just a mile down the road before I got going properly, might be different
- it's that 'is it more sensible to turn back or am I so far out I might just as well carry-on ?' decision !

If I were carrying a lot of weight touring, or pulling a trailer, maybe I'd be more worried.

 

[palinurus]

If your wheels have a fair number of spokes you can normally ride a good way if one goes, sometimes the wheel will barely go out of true. If touring take a couple of spares.

It does depend on what happens to the wheel, sometimes it's instant Pringle.

 

[longers]

I *touches wood* don't get many breakages. A drive side rear went last year eight miles from home at the start of a seventy mile trip loaded up with camping gear.

I went to the nearest LBS, bought a couple of spokes and set off to go home and swap it, got half way home and thought bugger it and turned round. Got to my destination after riding fairly carefully. The wheel had stayed true enough not to need to slacken the brakes off at all so I was reasonably comfortable but I wouldn't recommend it to anyone.

I think you were sensible Greg.

 

[Soltydog]

I've just had my 2nd spoke break in about 150 miles on my tricross Both on drive side of rear wheel. It was a replacement wheel about 400 miles ago
The wheel goes quite a way out of true causing it to catch brakes, so on both occasions I'vehad to discconnect rear brakes & then ridden carefully home or wherever!

 

[Crackle]

Well all mine are 32 spoke wheels. I've had many go over the years, especially on tour (budget wheels in all cases) and if it creates a bad buckle I'll tune it out with the spoke key until I can replace it/take it to LBS. Most I've ever had break on me was 3 on tour but that was because my axle broke and even then I managed to get 17 miles to where I could get it fixed.

 

[PpPete]

Think I'd have been prepared to ride all the way home (20km?) - assuming 32 or 36 spoke wheels - rather than catch train.

 

[addictfreak]

A colleague showed me his wheel today, while asking if I thought the local LBS could sort it out.

He had broken 6 spokes, riding in the lakes (MTB). He had gone along the valley and climbed up to Dale Head then along the ridge and down via Cat Bells.

Surprisingly it was not that badly out of true. He took it to the shop, and hopefully I'll find out what happened when I see hime tomorrow.

 

[ASC1951]

I've had many go over the years, especially on tour (budget wheels in all cases) ..

False economy. Wheels at £200 a pair are more than twice as good as wheels at half the price. I don't see the point in cheap wheels, especially for touring, because as well as giving you a worse ride they actually cost more to use.

I've always used good quality rims and handmade wheels and have only had one spoke break in 50,000 miles or so.

 

[GrumpyGregry]

Buy decent wheels.

They're not that expensive (£200 /pr) and you can then enjoy decades of both on and off-road riding without ever breaking a spoke.

Spoke breakage is just god's way of letting you know you bought rubbish wheels.

The ones that went, yep cheap uns oem on a cheap bike but my off road XC 'trekking' wheels, handbuilt by reputable builder, and my off road XC racing wheels, handbuilt ditto, Mavic rims, high end 36H shimano hubs and DT Swiss spokes. Spokes still broke. ymmv.

 

[psmiffy]

Buy decent wheels.

They're not that expensive (£200 /pr) and you can then enjoy decades of both on and off-road riding without ever breaking a spoke.

Spoke breakage is just god's way of letting you know you bought rubbish wheels.

+1

My early touring was on a mountain bike with what my LBS told me was good quality wheels - in the early years I was plagued with spokes breaking and pulling out through the rim - not experienced enough to go against my LBS advice so replaced with like - same problem - fixed by sourcing a hand built downhill rim - my current tourer has a very robust wheelset and I have not had a spoke break or the rims go out of true when touring for the last 13years - the rims have a tendency to fail first.

It is a matter of having the appropriate wheels for the job - unfortuently it becomes a bit of a lowest common denominator thing unless you can put up with faffing about with seperate wheelsets for different tasks - my commuter is also used for the weekly shop - it was not long before the spokes in the oem rear started to break - fixed now with the application of a good quality robust rear wheel

I have found that breaking spokes is not that big a deal in the short term I have ridden (in my early touring days) hundreds of miles with broken spokes (up to five in one instance - can be a bit psychologically draining) until I could find a bike shop to do the repair

 

[Crackle]

False economy. Wheels at £200 a pair are more than twice as good as wheels at half the price. I don't see the point in cheap wheels, especially for touring, because as well as giving you a worse ride they actually cost more to use.

I've always used good quality rims and handmade wheels and have only had one spoke break in 50,000 miles or so.

At the time, I literally had no money for such things. Prior to me buying my budget wheels I used to take them out of skips and rebuild them.

 

[Hilldodger]

False economy. Wheels at £200 a pair are more than twice as good as wheels at half the price. I don't see the point in cheap wheels, especially for touring, because as well as giving you a worse ride they actually cost more to use.



How can you tell that?

 

[psmiffy]

The ones that went, yep cheap uns oem on a cheap bike but my off road XC 'trekking' wheels, handbuilt by reputable builder, and my off road XC racing wheels, handbuilt ditto, Mavic rims, high end 36H shimano hubs and DT Swiss spokes. Spokes still broke. ymmv.

Those sound like (or identical ) to the wheels that I used on my mtb touring set up in the early days - perfectly good for cross country mtb or long road rides but not for touring loaded - from your post I assume you were unloaded -methinks you might have put a little stress in the wheel from mtb-ing, spoke has been sitting there getting a little longer until it broke