Greetings,
During my last couple of muni rides I noticed that my spokes were creaking occasionally. I knew it was the spokes because I could pinch them where they cross and duplicate the sound exactly. A couple of them were fairly loose too. I think some of the noise is caused by the black coating on the spokes wearing off from friction where they cross.
I tightened them yesterday by giving them all a quarter to one half turn with my trusty spoke wrench. I alternated around the wheel in a similar fashion as one does to tune the lugs on a musical drum. The wheel seems to be fairly true so I guess that works.
My qestion is; how tight should they be? I compared the tightness to my old Kovachi built 24" wheel and the tension on those spokes seems tighter. I think both wheels have 14g spokes but the ones on my Kovachi seem thicker and more solid than on my KH24 sig. wheel? As I recall there is a concern about ‘over tightening’ the spokes and causing a nipple to poke through puncturing the tube. Is that correct?
How tight should they be? What should I watch out for?
Jason