Jiggling spokes

[wiemue]

Good morning all together,

as a newbee and owner of a 25 Model T Touring i got some jiggling spokes in a wheel. Its about 0,5mm in the rim so that you can hear a klick - klack.
What do you mean, what should i do for repair? Do you have some tips for me?

best regards and a wonderful time
Willi

[Allan]

Willie, if you can hear the spokes talking to you, they are saying it is time for a rebuild with new spokes. Once they have begun to chatter, they have been loose for a while, and there is no safe way to go with a patch up.
Others may differ.
Allan from down under.

[Loftfield]

Loose spokes create one of the most dangerous conditions, a wood spoked car driving down the road with loose spokes. Pictures of cars with collapsed wheels are never pretty, and the outcome for folks in those cars is rarely pretty, either. First, examine the wheels and wood rims (felloes) to see if the wood is soft or punky. Try to stick a pen knife into the wood. If the wood is soft, if the pen knife goes in easily, then the wheels need to have new wood. If the wood seems solid, I always advise letting your wheels go for a swim before entering panic mode and sending the wheels off to be repaired by a reliable Amish or other buggy or wheel shop. You can do the job yourself, but without some good guidance the first time around the outcome can be disappointing. One thing that can cause spoke looseness is excessive drying, and then shrinkage, of the wood. I have more than once solved the problem by letting the wheels sit over night in water. I use a $10 kiddies plastic swimming pool. After an overnight swimming around, if shrinkage from drying is the problem, the spokes and fellows should be tight again, no problems. If there is still chatter, then the wheels need a serious rebuild. Drying of the wood, and attendant shrinkage, can be caused by any number of factors. Keeping the car in a heated garage all winter will do nicely. Heated air is dry air. My cars remain in an unheated winter environment. Living in the desert can cause the problem, especially if your car used to live in a damp area but now lives in an arid place. Just having a long, dry, spell in summer can lead to wood shrinkage. In summer I usually try to either drive through a stream or two, or use a lot of water washing the car and wheels from time to time. Avoid soaking in linseed oil or other supposed substitutes. Once these oily replacements get in, it makes it difficult for water to do its natural job. Once again, give it a try, but if you don't get a truly tight wheel from a soaking you will then need to get the wood replaced.

[CudaMan]

With a 1925, your wheels will have metal felloes, so you can tackle the spoke replacement yourself if you wish. The vendors sell new hickory spokes. If you have balloon tires with split rims, you'll need 48 (I order 50 so that I have 2 spares) spokes for a 21 inch rim. If you have 30 inch tires with non-split rims, you need to determine which brand felloes you have so that you can order the correct length spokes. Post some pictures of your wheels and we can identify the brand of rims here.

You'll need to borrow or build a fixture to press the new spokes. Here is a link to the plans, along with a link to plans for a hub hole drilling jig:

http://www.funprojects.com/pdf/WheelpressA2.pdf

http://www.funprojects.com/pdf/Wheel%20 ... %20Jig.pdf

Here is a link to an earlier thread showing my buildup of a set of Kelsey rims for 30 x 3.5 inch tires. This was my first attempt and it went fine.
The spokes have a large chamfer on one side of the base, be sure to put the chamfer next to the fillet of the hub.

http://www.mtfca.com/discus/messages/41 ... 1404960383

Here is a link to one of Steve Jelf's videos showing him building up a set of wheels for his car.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UKZ7WrfHdf8

Good luck!

[FundyTides]

Just a tip. Make sure you know where your wheels, or your car, were manufactured. My car is Canadian built with Canadian Kelsey wheels, and spokes for US wheels will not fit. Your best route may be to find a wheelwright in your area who can rebuild your wheels using your old spokes for a pattern. I had mine rebuilt by Bill Calimer in Pennsylvania a couple of years ago and am very pleased with the result. http://www.calimerswheelshop.com/ Good luck

[Allan]

The "soak them in water" trick is at best a very temporary trick which may lead to a false sense of security. Timber shrinks as it dries, so the spokes get loose. Swelling them up again by soaking them will tighten them somewhat, but keeping them in that swollen state is the problem. Repeated drying out leads to even greater shrinkage. And in that dry state, loose spokes working in the felloes will make for wear in the tenons and even greater looseness.

Allan from down under.

[wiemue]

Hello all together,

thank youfor your help. I decided to go to a workshop here in germany for repair.

Thank

Willi