Broken spoke on new Mavic Ksyrium...

derekwatts

Evening All

Just had my first rear driveside spoke breakage on my Mavic Ksyrium SL's. They have done exactly 840 miles from new, all on smooth roads, so I am not massively impressed. I weigh 80kg's, and whilst I like to sprint, I am quite sure my paltry power output would not have had anything to do with it.

Is this a regular occurence with these wheels? I have just ordered a load of spares at no small cost. Would it be better to throw the wheel back at Mavic via the retailer I bought them from? Or should I just put it down to 'one of those things' and fix it?

Finally, with the tooling that came with the wheels, is replacing the spoke and trueing the wheel a fairly straightforward job? Is it just a matter of tensioning it until the wheel comes back into true? Or should I take it to a good LBS and get them to re-true the whole wheel?

Thanks for any advice you can give...

Derek

Monty Dog

I wouldn't try and true the wheel with the plastic spoke key - better getting a metal one from the likes of Park Tool, that said, if you've no experience of trueing wheels, suggest a £600 pair isn't the best place to start. Generally Ksyriums are solid and reliable wheels - mine have just expired after 5 years and 20000+ miles- the rims are nearly worn through and when a spoke went the other week, it was time to retire them.

Wappygixer

If you look into your warranty you will see that the spokes are not covered by warranty.
Its one of those things that can just go and at any time.
If your not to experienced at wheel truing /i'd take it to you LBS at least you can ride knowing its fine.

rubberjungle

I had a rear spoke go quite early on on my SL's under light load on a smooth road.
I got my LBS to replace and true it as the tension can be quite critical on these wheels, you could end up with more snapping in the future if you try it yourself.
Mine went about 2 years ago and I have had no further problems since then.

derekwatts

Just caught up with this thread...

Well, I couldn't wait 2 weeks for the LBS to true my wheel, so I had a go myself. First thing I notice is that you can't replace a spoke on the drive side of the Ksyrium without loosening off all the opposite spokes first because there is not enough thread on the nipple to screw into the rim without risking stripping the thread, so one ends up with a wheel totally out of true and starting from scratch basically. Secondly, and not sure if this is exclusive to Mavics, but you can't replace a drive side spoke 'roadside' (unless you carry a chain whip, cassette tool and torque wrench in your pouch!) as you have to remove the cassette to insert the spoke. Is this common to most designs?

Also, as you said Monty Dog, the plastic tool is about as much good as a chocolate fireguard. Might be ok for the odd tweak here and there but no good for trueing a hole wheel. It's knackered already. So my progress has come to a grinding halt until I can get a metal tool. Pity as it was almost there...

balthazar

derekwatts wrote:

... Secondly, and not sure if this is exclusive to Mavics, but you can't replace a drive side spoke 'roadside' (unless you carry a chain whip, cassette tool and torque wrench in your pouch!) as you have to remove the cassette to insert the spoke. Is this common to most designs?

This is normal for virtually all wheel designs, including ordinary old-style wheels. The only exceptions are rare straight-pull spoke designs, which have their own problems. There used to be a tool called a hypercracker which undid cassettes by leveraging your pedalling against the chainstay, but apparently the company that made it is no more. Sheldon still lists this product, which looks similar:

http://www.sheldonbrown.com/harris/stei ... index.html

I have had some luck in a pinch by using a rag wrapped around the cassette, and then holding the rag with one hand, whilst undoing the lockring with the other, when I was without a chain whip. You should never need a torque wrench in the field, as the torque setting of the lockring is not critical.

whydoesitalwaysrainonme

It will happen from time to time, apart from in my case when it happened all the time, they are bontrager SSR wheels and are utter crap, four spokes have gone so far and they are not even a year old.

Wappygixer

Are you sure you were fitting the right sized spokes?
Most wheels have different length spokjes for drive and non drive sides.
I cant ever remember having a wheel where I have had to slaken off the opposite spokes to fit a new one.The spokes either side the broken one will hold the rim enough to fit a new one.

derekwatts

Thanks all, yesterday I picked up a metal 'Pedro's Mavic spoke tool' which was perfect and fits in the wedgie bag. Just finished truing the wheel and I can honestly say it is even better than when it came from the factory now. The hardest part was getting the 'out of roundness' out of the wheel, the lateral trueing was easy.

Wappygixer - yes I am sure the spoke is the right size, the 3 types I ordered are different enough in length to not confuse them (drive side being the shortest anyway), but with 1 spoke missing the wheel was out of true by almost 1/2 inch, so it doesn't surprise me that I couldn't get the new one in. The nipples are only 5 threads deep so I couldn't risk trying to put tension on it with only 1 thread in the aluminium rim. I guess it's a side effect of wheels with fewer spokes...

One thing I have noticed though, to get the 'dishing' out of the wheel so it sits equidistant from the chain stays on both sides, needs a differing spoke tension on drive and non drive sides. I suppose this is logical because the 2 sides pull from hub to rim at a different angle. But it's not something which is stressed enough in the online guides. A lot of them talk about ensuring the tension is the same with a spoke tensiometer, but with an assymetric wheel, this will never be the case.

Well, I'll give them a ride this afternoon and see what happens next! Fingers crossed...