Setting spoke tension

[Hank Scorpio]

I have a set of wheels where the spokes are making am aggravating pinging noise. It seems to have gotten worse since the last time I trued them. I am guessing that the spoke tension is off and that is what is causing the noise. My question is how do you determine spoke tension and do you set all spokes the same? I know that there are different settings for front and rear as well as drive and non drive side. Is there an online calculator similar to the DT spoke lenght calc? My build is as follows:

Record hubs 32 hole
I am not sure of the gauge or butting of the spoke but I am guessing it is a 14 maybe a 15, double butted, and laced 3 cross.
Mavic CXP 33

Any help would be appreciated.
James

[dtandy]

James,

There are a couple of different techniques for determining spoke tension.

Some people ping a spoke and listen to the pitch of the resonance to determine if a spoke is tensioned properly. If same-side spokes have differing pitches, their tensions are different (which is a bad thing). Others go by feel and squeeze pairs of spokes together. Some probably use resistance to turning a spoke nipple as a guide. I like to use a spoke tensiometer since I don't trust my ear or my ability to measure resistance using my hand. A tensiometer measures the tension in the spoke, and if it is calibrated properly, gives an indication of the tension in the spoke in absolute terms. You can pick up a tensiometer such as the Park model for around $80 or so. It's a good investment for a home shop. While the tool may not be laboratory accurate in an absolute sense, it does allow you to achieve balanced spoke tension across all of the spokes which really helps when it comes to building a good wheel.

All of the spokes on the front wheel should have the same tension reading (or within 15% realistically). The spokes on the drive side of the rear wheel should have the same tension as a group while the spokes on the non-drive side should have identical tension between themselves the value of which will be lower than the drive side.

It has been a year or so since I laced up a wheelset but I seem to recall that I run about 95 to 100 kgf of tension or so in the front spokes and rear drive side spokes. The tension in the rear non-drive side spokes falls out to be whatever it is based on the geometry of the rear hub/rim/spoke pattern.

Try to find a similar wheelset (round and true, of course) built by a reputable builder and you can compare how the spokes sound and feel relative to yours. It is inexact, but it at least provides you with a reference.

Dave

[xlbs]

are nifty tools...If you do a search through the threads on this forum, you'll find that there are some excellent discussions around your concern.

Hands are really good tensiometers too, but finding someone with the experience in the fingers may not be as much fun as sourcing a new toy.

You could simply tighten each spoke, carefully, by a quarter turn to see if this alleviates your clicking noises, but you should inspect your rims very carefully to make sure that there is no damage to them before you begin winding up those spokes.

[Hank Scorpio]

I have the park tool in the shop and a comparable set of wheels to compare the tension. I will try that method and see how it goes. I could wait for the boss to come back from vaca, he uses the hand method, but the noise is maddening and he wont be back until the fourth.

Thanks for the suggestions.

James