Forward/backward play in a wheel?

toasty

Simple one here I'm sure. I understand wheels effectively use forward spokes to tension one way, and trailing spokes for forces the other direction, but should there literally be a chunk of play in between these 2 tensions?

I've got a set of wheels, when locking out the front brake and gently rocking the wheel it'll roll about an inch forward and backward, the rotor/hub is solid, the play is solely the spokes. Curiously my other wheels don't seem to do this, it's a fairly new wheelset though, hand built Merlin 32 spoke jobbies so it seems a bit bizarre if they've loosened from a bit of commuting already.

Should I just go through and tension the play out?

Cheers

nicklouse

this is normally the pads rocking in the caliper.

or combined play in the fork/headset.

there should be no movement between the hub and the rim.

toasty

nicklouse wrote:

this is normally the pads rocking in the caliper.

Ahh, possibly, I hadn't considered that one. It would explain why both ends acted the same, even though they're using wheels built at slightly different times.

It's definitely not headset/fork, a very slight movement will cause it and you can see the wheel rotating in relation to the fork lowers.

Cheers!

anjs

Have seen Hope floating rotors do this at the rivet

toasty

These are centerlocks, come to think of it, they're my only wheels with centerlocks. I'll have a look.

Cheers

stu8975

If they are all tightened correctly on the hub and it still moves, you made need an extra uber thin washer in there, my mate had the same prob with his xtr cl's and crossmax sl hubs.