Rear wheel not sitting centrally

temitchell1987

Any help appreciated, even if reassurance!

Out today with a group when someone commented that my rear wheel was not central in my dropouts. It is over to the non drive side a few cms.

I'm riding an orbea orca silver 2012 model. I recently put Mavic Ksyrium elites on the bike. I crashed a few weeks ago in Majorca, bike store said everything looked OK. There doesn't seem to be any 'play' in the wheel, no wobble nothing untoward at all.

I find it hard to believe that I've damaged the frame so much that the wheel is no longer central and I have no other issues.

Is this anything to worry about.

Ben6899

A few cms? As in 20 or 30mm?

Yeh that doesn't sound right. Can you post a photo?

temitchell1987

Yeah as in 20-30mm not lots of cms, Yeah I'll try to get a photo up later but about to clean it, so will do it after that.

ugo.santalucia

temitchell1987 wrote:

Yeah as in 20-30mm not lots of cms, Yeah I'll try to get a photo up later but about to clean it, so will do it after that.

I suggest you take a look at a ruler and reassess your statement. If the wheel was 2 cm out of dish, you won't be able to fit it in the frame, so it has to be a lot less.
Given a wheel cannot go out of dish all of a sudden, it's either a bent frame or the wheel doesn't sit correctly in the dropouts, on balance the latter seems a lot more likely. That can be due to a number of reasons

ride_whenever

Doesn't it have assymetric chainstays?

There is no way you could bend a carbon frame a couple of cm plastically without it failing, it's very unlikely you've perfectly redished a wheel by crashing.

temitchell1987

ugo.santalucia wrote:

temitchell1987 wrote:

Yeah as in 20-30mm not lots of cms, Yeah I'll try to get a photo up later but about to clean it, so will do it after that.

I suggest you take a look at a ruler and reassess your statement. If the wheel was 2 cm out of dish, you won't be able to fit it in the frame, so it has to be a lot less.
Given a wheel cannot go out of dish all of a sudden, it's either a bent frame or the wheel doesn't sit correctly in the dropouts, on balance the latter seems a lot more likely. That can be due to a number of reasons

Yes I appreciate the latter is more likely, could you explain to me what those reasons are so that I can try to address them. On closer inspection (unfortunately without a ruler) it is about 1-2cm out of dish, I have a couple of photos that I am about to try to get from my phone onto here, which from what I remember isn't the easiest process.

temitchell1987

ride_whenever wrote:

Doesn't it have assymetric chainstays?

There is no way you could bend a carbon frame a couple of cm plastically without it failing, it's very unlikely you've perfectly redished a wheel by crashing.

My thoughts exactly, there is no obvious cracks or bends etc

Just looking into assymetric chainstays on the old google.

ugo.santalucia

Your dropouts might be damaged... your hub caps might be damaged, your hanger might be bent preventing the QR to sit properly... any of these results in the wheel not sitting correctly. Have you tried tweaking with the wheel trying to make it sit properly?

temitchell1987

Yeah I have tried tweaking the wheel, it moves slightly but not a huge amount and then settles back to the non-drive chainstay. I was thinking about the hanger as that was bent back into shape post crash. Will get hold of a new one and see if that helps. The dropouts themselves seem fairly intact.

ugo.santalucia

temitchell1987 wrote:

Yeah I have tried tweaking the wheel, it moves slightly but not a huge amount and then settles back to the non-drive chainstay. I was thinking about the hanger as that was bent back into shape post crash. Will get hold of a new one and see if that helps. The dropouts themselves seem fairly intact.

Take it off and see if the wheel sits correctly without it

temitchell1987

Thanks gents, I've a fair bit of fiddling to do to see if that helps. If not I'll be back!

jimothy78

The easiest way to check if it's the wheel or something else is to measure the distance between the frame and the rim (on both sides), then turn the wheel over and repeat. If the wheel is out of dish, the measurements will change, if it's because the frame is assymetrical (either intentionally or not) then the measurements will not change.