I checked cranks and pedals and they are all fine. It seems it is the spokes, as the noise is similar to the sound when I squeeze the spokes to release tension. Anyway I tighten all the spokes on the right side by a quarter turn. I test ride it and the noise is less but not completely gone. I sprayed some WD40 to some of the spoke crosses (right side spokes only) and the noise is gone.
If the noise come back again (WD40 evaporates?) I will probably tighten the spokes even more and see. Thanks all for the help.
Cautious at first, I’m so glad I bit the bullet and bought a Park Tool one.
Keeps the guesswork out of it and I haven’t had a broken or noisy spoke since.
This is good to know, overtime the wd40 or any lube will dissipate and breakdown due to the elements you ride in. If you want a longer lasting lube I suggest a dry lube like Squirt or T-9 Bosheild, they do not attract dirt as easily as wd40.
The increment between spacers is 1 (or 2?) mm if i remember it right. If you use Shim Rings DIN 988 22x30x0.X that are available in thickness of 0.1, 0.2, 0.3 and 0.5 mm.
See also these two posts of me in the past:
Yes, thank you for adding this. We do offer spacers in a kit of 4, 5, 6, and 8. These have seemed to be the best combination for reintroducing the pressfit for the bulk of unicycles. Please note this does not include the Schlumpf hub, I know even thinner spacers are need for it at times before the crank is unusable.
I recall buying some spacers < 4mm from UDC. They were very useful.
I have combined spacers to get the right thickness, and this seemed to work without issue. Is there a problem with this approach?
I had a pair of QuAx cranks that bottomed out on the spindle. I was able to make them work by using spacers (to keep the connection between the crank/spacer/hub flush) and then tightening the living crap out of the crank bolts. Not a perfect solution; I had to recheck the tightness in the crank bolts, due to the tiny amount of wiggling in the crank while riding. But, at least this kept the crank from being “unusable”. Thoughts?
Finally, I am concerned that closing a larger gap will shorten the life of the interface part of the crank. I shoot for 2.5 - 3mm of gap when choosing spacers (which is at the lower end), and I haven’t had any interface issues. I have no engineering knowledge to back this up, but I imagine that closing a big gap could deform the ISIS splines in the cranks. Our goal is just to eliminate slop in the interface along the axis of forward/backward pedal-pressure, right? Maybe someone with a better understanding can comment.
Stacking spacers is fine, we do this quite a bit.
What you did with the Qu-ax cranks is the only option if you want to get more life out of them. Technically cranks are spent once the axial is level with the inside bolt stop.
Technically speaking the cranks should only need to be adjusted once from initial install, some harder riding styles and how many times you remove the cranks can shorten the life. Honestly there are too many variables to list but everything has a cycle life.
In general unicycling is harder on cranks and hubs over a bicycle. The ISIS design works well for us unicyclist but it is not totally perfect when it comes to installation, if done wrong you can possibly shorten your cranks life, when done right with a traditional fixed unicycle hub they can last quite a long time. I hope this helps.
Which further justifies multi-hole cranks as the way to go, if you are planning to ride different styles with the same machine because it avoids the need to take them on and off, if you would like a different crank length.
(Well that and the fact that it is also a hell of a lot faster to move pedals than change cranks to a different size and move pedals)