Ask the experts

[J. Barron DeJong]

Very interesting and I have never heard of this with any other bikes I have had. I guess the dudes at the shop would know how to do this? Is it easy to re-dish a wheel at home? I have spoke wrenches etc. I work on every part of my bike, but never fuck with wheel building.

The actual process should be pretty straightforward: you need to loosen all the spokes on the side you want the rim to move away from and tighten the spokes on the side you’re trying to pull the rim towards. Maybe start with a half turn on each spoke and see how much the rim has moved (loosen every spoke on one side half turn, then tighten every spoke on the other side half turn). Continue as needed, making sure that you always loosen/tighten equal amounts to keep overall tension about the same.

Biggest issue is how you’re going to measure - usually you’d use a dishing gauge, not sure if there are at home hacks other then just eyeballing/measuring off the bike frame.

edit: A tip in case it’s not obvious - though it probably is - start at the valve and work your way around so you know when you’ve finished a complete side.

[jm2e]

You can make a dishing gauge out of cardboard and an old spoke. It's actually pretty easy and a good one is more convenient to use than a clunky Park Tool gauge. Downside? My dog literally chewed mine up.

Since I've built wheels, I'm wary of anyone who suggests purposefully fucking up the dish of a wheel. I'm sure this has been discussed in here previously, so hopefully we won't get to deep into the weeds on it this round. If GG recommends it, it's clearly worked for them. Or at least they're willing to answer for it when you build a taco.

[HAB]

You can make a dishing gauge out of cardboard and an old spoke. It's actually pretty easy and a good one is more convenient to use than a clunky Park Tool gauge. Downside? My dog literally chewed mine up.

Since I've built wheels, I'm wary of anyone who suggests purposefully fucking up the dish of a wheel. I'm sure this has been discussed in here previously, so hopefully we won't get to deep into the weeds on it this round. If GG recommends it, it's clearly worked for them. Or at least they're willing to answer for it when you build a taco.

GG's whole thing is (or was, the new Trail Pistol goes back to "normal") dishing the wheel 3mm towards the NDS to 1) even spoke bracing angles out and 2) make the chainline better, since the rear triangle is offset to compensate. I think those are both worthy goals, but I also get them going away from it since it's got to be a PITA on their end to handle re-dishing wheels for complete bikes, and it probably doesn't make that big a difference.

FWIW, your analogy is wrong because spokes aren't acting in compression. What you're describing is buckling, which is a problem if you've got long, thin structures (like spokes) being compressed. But that's not really how a wheel deals with loads. Maybe, maybe if a rim flexes upwards dramatically the bottom spokes lose tension. But at that point, those spokes are going to start to buckle no matter the dish. You're relying on the hoop strength of the rim, and the tension in the upper spokes to keep everything together at that point.

[rideit]

The actual process should be pretty straightforward: you need to loosen all the spokes on the side you want the rim to move away from and tighten the spokes on the side you’re trying to pull the rim towards. Maybe start with a half turn on each spoke and see how much the rim has moved (loosen every spoke on one side half turn, then tighten every spoke on the other side half turn). Continue as needed, making sure that you always loosen/tighten equal amounts to keep overall tension about the same.

Biggest issue is how you’re going to measure - usually you’d use a dishing gauge, not sure if there are at home hacks other then just eyeballing/measuring off the bike frame.

edit: A tip in case it’s not obvious - though it probably is - start at the valve and work your way around so you know when you’ve finished a complete side.

Good description, but I would start with just a 1/4 turn myself.

[J. Barron DeJong]

You can make a dishing gauge out of cardboard and an old spoke. It's actually pretty easy and a good one is more convenient to use than a clunky Park Tool gauge. Downside? My dog literally chewed mine up.

Since I've built wheels, I'm wary of anyone who suggests purposefully fucking up the dish of a wheel. I'm sure this has been discussed in here previously, so hopefully we won't get to deep into the weeds on it this round. If GG recommends it, it's clearly worked for them. Or at least they're willing to answer for it when you build a taco.

Don’t know which frames specifically, but at least some GG frames are built with the rear intentionally offset from the centerline of the bike. I believe Cannondale does this on some frames as well.

The idea is to get the rim more centered between the hub flanges themselves, which allows for more even spoke tension between the two side and should make for a stronger wheel. Basically the same concept as rims that have the spoke holes offset to one side.

If you didn’t do the offset dish on these frames
then the rear tire is going to end up offset to one side instead of being on the frame centerline.

[J. Barron DeJong]

Good description, but I would start with just a 1/4 turn myself.

yeah, I almost said quarter. It’s been 5 years since I built a wheel, so I’m a little foggy on how much they move when adjusting the dish.

[Whiteroom_Guardian]

Ok so as it is now I can see that the rear wheel is not straight visually with the frame centerline.

I'm willing to try doing the 1/4 turn tighter on NDS spokes and 1/4 turn looser on DS.

I did email my contact at GG to see what their official word is.

Sent from my SM-G973U using Tapatalk

[J. Barron DeJong]

GG's whole thing is (or was, the new Trail Pistol goes back to "normal") dishing the wheel 3mm towards the NDS to 1) even spoke bracing angles out and 2) make the chainline better, since the rear triangle is offset to compensate. I think those are both worthy goals, but I also get them going away from it since it's got to be a PITA on their end to handle re-dishing wheels for complete bikes, and it probably doesn't make that big a difference.

FWIW, your analogy is wrong because spokes aren't acting in compression. What you're describing is buckling, which is a problem if you've got long, thin structures (like spokes) being compressed. But that's not really how a wheel deals with loads. Maybe, maybe if a rim flexes upwards dramatically the bottom spokes lose tension. But at that point, those spokes are going to start to buckle no matter the dish. You're relying on the hoop strength of the rim, and the tension in the upper spokes to keep everything together at that point.

You beat me to it.

I’d add that what you never want to have happen in a wheel is a spoke to become completely unloaded in tension, which can happen with a big impact, lateral load, or combination thereof.

The higher initial tension you have on a spoke, the less likely you are going to be able to completely remove that tension when riding, so you want to build the wheel with as much tension as possible. But the spokes and rim can only take so much tension before they’ll fail - it’s normally the rim spoke holes that’s the limiting factor there.

On a wheel where the rim isn’t centered between the hub flanges, the spokes on one side will get tensioned to the max allowable, and the other side will get tensioned to whatever is needed to achieve the proper rim position, which will be somewhat lower tension - and under load when riding those spokes are more likely to lose their tension and your rim get damaged.

[HAB]

You beat me to it.

I’d add that what you never want to have happen in a wheel is a spoke to become completely unloaded in tension, which can happen with a big impact, lateral load, or combination thereof.

The higher initial tension you have on a spoke, the less likely you are going to be able to completely remove that tension when riding, so you want to build the wheel with as much tension as possible. But the spokes and rim can only take so much tension before they’ll fail - it’s normally the rim spoke holes that’s the limiting factor there.

On a wheel where the rim isn’t centered between the hub flanges, the spokes on one side will get tensioned to the max allowable, and the other side will get tensioned to whatever is needed to achieve the proper rim position, which will be somewhat lower tension - and under load when riding those spokes are more likely to lose their tension and your rim get damaged.

Yup.

Maybe even more to the point, spokes can't and in compression, because at the point that they lose tension, the nipple just starts to float in the rim. It's not taking any load from that point forward because there's nothing stopping the rim from just deflecting upward more.

[Boissal]

Ok so as it is now I can see that the rear wheel is not straight visually with the frame centerline.

I'm willing to try doing the 1/4 turn tighter on NDS spokes and 1/4 turn looser on DS.

I did email my contact at GG to see what their official word is.

It's listed in the manual for all Revved frames with the alu triangle, definitely an official thing. Plenty of online chatter about it too. I only have asymmetric rims and wonder how this is going to work with them, hopefully the offset of the frame is opposite from that of the rim and they cancel out. Otherwise I'm going to end up having to find longer/shorter spokes.
I recently re-dished a front wheel after noticing it looked off center when looking at the fork stanchions. 1/4 turn is the way to go then fine tune as needed. Assuming your wheel isn't all weird to start with it's quick and easy.

[J. Barron DeJong]

It's listed in the manual for all Revved frames with the alu triangle, definitely an official thing. Plenty of online chatter about it too. I only have asymmetric rims and wonder how this is going to work with them, hopefully the offset of the frame is opposite from that of the rim and they cancel out. Otherwise I'm going to end up having to find longer/shorter spokes.

I think you’re going to find that they stack, not cancel. However, it may not mean you need new spokes. Obviously hub dimensions are all somewhat different, but if you throw a DT 350 boost rear hub in their spoke length calculator with a standard type rim, then offset everything 6mm (3 for the rim, 3 for the frame, just guessing to demonstrate) the non drive side spoke only shortens 1mm and the drive side doesn’t change at all. Assuming your spokes were close to ‘optimum’ length on the initial build, they should easily be able to handle that. Bonus is that the spoke bracing angle, and thus tension, end up almost exactly the same side to side.

[g_man80]

Ok so as it is now I can see that the rear wheel is not straight visually with the frame

How does the DUROC rear wheel look on the SB130? Assuming that was built with the 3mm offset by GG.

[Dantheman]

Subscribing to the dishing discussion. I got a set of Reynolds wheels in 2020 that I'm pretty sure are non-dished. I put them on a GG v2 alloy frame and ran them as-is for 1.5 seasons, then moved them straight to a Revved framed last summer and rode them a bunch more as-is. Both bikes rode great. I'm genuinely curious if I'd notice a difference if I rode it "blind" back-to-back with the wheel dished and non-dished.

[Andeh]

I imagine the only "riding" aspect you might notice would be slightly easier to rub on one side vs the other, if you run larger rear tires and low pressures. Running 2.4s with good casings and reasonable pressures, I can't imagine you'd get it to actually rub because the clearance on the GG rear is pretty good.

[J. Barron DeJong]

It'll work, but it'll be better dished appropriately for chainline and chain/cassette wear. I've noticed on my GG with appropriately dished wheel, I have much less wear on the bigger cogs. I imagine the only "riding" aspect you might notice would be slightly easier to rub on one side vs the other, if you run larger rear tires and low pressures. Running 2.4s with good casings and reasonable pressures, I can't imagine you'd get it to actually rub because the clearance on the GG rear is pretty good.

Not sure how changing dish is affecting chain/cog wear? Cog position in the frame isn’t changing when you re-dish the wheel, so chainline isn’t affected at all.

Tire clearance would be my main concern (and even if the tire itself clears, mud might not).

No idea if you’ll actually be able to feel a difference when riding, but I wouldn’t be surprised at all if you can’t

No way my OCD would allow me to knowingly leave the rim off center though, especially since it’s like 15 minutes of work to make right.

[Whiteroom_Guardian]

Ok so I'm super intrigued how dishing actually changes chainline? The hub spacing is a fixed piece of metal and the cassette is attached to the hub. The spokes/hoop can move independently of the cassette. Am I missing something here?

[rideit]

Gonna concur here, dishing doesn’t change chainline.
I remember someone back in the day trying to tell me that dishing affected their disc spacing, it was not correct, to say the least.

[Andeh]

Not sure how changing dish is affecting chain/cog wear? Cog position in the frame isn’t changing when you re-dish the wheel, so chainline isn’t affected at all.

Tire clearance would be my main concern (and even if the tire itself clears, mud might not).

No idea if you’ll actually be able to feel a difference when riding, but I wouldn’t be surprised at all if you can’t

No way my OCD would allow me to knowingly leave the rim off center though, especially since it’s like 15 minutes of work to make right.

You're right, too early, not enough coffee. The reason the rim needs to be redished is because the rear triangle is aligned a bit asymmetrically to push the hub to the DS a few mm. So regardless, the chainline is a bit better on the alloy GG frames, but the tire will be slightly off center until the wheel is redished.

[Whiteroom_Guardian]

I think I'm OCD enough that I will try to dish the wheel even though if it wasn't for this thread I would have happily ridden the bike and never known the tire wasn't aligned with frame center haha.

[Dantheman]

No way my OCD would allow me to knowingly leave the rim off center though, especially since it’s like 15 minutes of work to make right.

OTOH, if it ain't broke....

[Whiteroom_Guardian]

OTOH, if it ain't broke....

As crazy as it sounds it might make a difference when picking lines through crazy chunder/rock gardens? Like in a way even riding dead straight the rear wheel might hit something that the front wheel missed?

That's probably overthinking it.....

[Boissal]

I think you’re going to find that they stack, not cancel. However, it may not mean you need new spokes. Obviously hub dimensions are all somewhat different, but if you throw a DT 350 boost rear hub in their spoke length calculator with a standard type rim, then offset everything 6mm (3 for the rim, 3 for the frame, just guessing to demonstrate) the non drive side spoke only shortens 1mm and the drive side doesn’t change at all. Assuming your spokes were close to ‘optimum’ length on the initial build, they should easily be able to handle that. Bonus is that the spoke bracing angle, and thus tension, end up almost exactly the same side to side.

That's what I read somewhere online (stack as opposed to cancel out) but I have a hard time visualizing it so I'll wait til the bike is built and figure it out at that point. Spoke lengths came from the calculator and were as optimum as I could get, ie 1 mm difference between drive and non drive. Could probably have gone with the same length but I figured why bother calculating things if I'm going to ignore the result. I'll probably re-dish so the wheel is visually centered without actually bothering to measure with a wheel dish though, there's enough flex and squish in the system that I don't think it will matter.

Shock hardware question for the collective. Bought a Gnarvana frame recently, it came with a Cane Creek Kistuma air shock. The hardware is from Cane Creek and the correct size (M8x20 front, M8x35 rear). Yesterday while re-mounting the shock I noticed there's quite a bit of resistance to rotation around the eyelets at both ends when torqued to spec (10 Nm on the torque wrench). The shock moves freely until I about 9ish Nm but the resistance becomes very noticeable above that, so much so that with 10 Nm torque on the front I can let go of the back of the shock and it just floats there instead of dropping down to the frame under its own weight. This seems weird considering that the first time I unbolted the rear half of the shock I have on my Occam it instantly rotated down onto the frame and dinged it (doh!).
I tried removing some of the spacers to see if they were causing the issue but no, there's resistance even with the sleeve by itself.

I was thinking of dropping the torque to 8 Nm to get free rotation and using blue loctite to basically bring things back to the recommended 10. Am I overthinking this? Resistance by hand might not mean shit when my 180 lbs are bouncing about but it still feels off, especially with the CaneCreek hardware seeming a bit janky compared to the Fox stuff I've used (the M8x35 stuff comes with 8 different spacers).

[J. Barron DeJong]

OTOH, if it ain't broke....

I get that sentiment, but I think this is a pretty low risk endeavor. Worst case maybe you end up having to take it into a shop and have them do a final true/tension, which wouldn’t be the end of the world. And I think that’s pretty unlikely.

Odds that you seriously fuck something up here are pretty infinitesimal. But it’s a pretty quick job, so if you’re not comfortable doing it yourself, it’s not like a shop is going to charge you an arm and a leg to do it either.

[Dantheman]

As crazy as it sounds it might make a difference when picking lines through crazy chunder/rock gardens? Like in a way even riding dead straight the rear wheel might hit something that the front wheel missed?

That's probably overthinking it.....

Hypothetically, it's possible, but it's 3 mm. Before carbon rims you probably rode wheels that were more than 3mm out of true all the time. If the DUROC wheel is dished you could try riding them back-to-back. I'm not saying don't dish it, but fixing mine is not high on my priority list and assuming tire clearance isn't an issue there's probably many other factors that have much more influence on the subjective riding experience.

I get that sentiment, but I think this is a pretty low risk endeavor. Worst case maybe you end up having to take it into a shop and have them do a final true/tension, which wouldn’t be the end of the world. And I think that’s pretty unlikely.

Odds that you seriously fuck something up here are pretty infinitesimal. But it’s a pretty quick job, so if you’re not comfortable doing it yourself, it’s not like a shop is going to charge you an arm and a leg to do it either.

I'm really just justifying my own laziness

[XXX-er]

Good description, but I would start with just a 1/4 turn myself.

yeah this ^^ loosen 1/4 turn on one side and tighten 1/4 turn on the other side, check and do it again if you have to, I hit the spokes and listen to the tone they make to tell me how tight a spoke is


As for swapping wheels, shop bro swaps his set of expensive carbon rims from bike to bike, wraps the frame so it looks great, sells the bike after 20 rides with the set of still virgin original wheels and does it again

he has to come up with the money but with his shop discount 10k bikes end up not cost him any money