In the words of Mark Knopfler:

Well it’s a strange old game – you learn it slow 
One step forward and it’s back to go 
You’re standing on the throttle 
You’re standing on the brakes 
In the groove ’til you make a mistake 

Broken Spokes

Working on my latest wheel healing project.  I had replaced a missing spoke and was tensioning and truing.  Just about had it and then ping!  A spoke shoots out and hits me in the chest.  It had snapped at the elbow.  Ok…replace it.  Rework the tensions and then ping!  Another spoke tries to stab me.

I see where this is going.  Time to replace all the spokes.  Oh boy a complete rebuild.  A third spoke broke while I was disassembling the wheel.  Typical fatigue failure of straight gauged spokes.

Real Men Don’t Need Instructions

I picked a bad day to work on a wheel.  The force was not with me this day.  My first mistake was lacing the new spokes from memory.  One, I’m aging and my memory is getting a little tired.  Two, it’s been some time since I laced a wheel.

Two tries later I relented and got out my copy of Jobst.  Aha!  Laced it a third time only to discover that the spokes were sized for four cross and not three.  That would be “over, over, over, under” not “over, over, under.”

Laced it a fourth time and put initial tension on the spokes.  That’s when I decided to call it a day.  With Dire Straits “The Bug” continuing to play in my head.

Sometime you’re the windshield 
Sometime you’re the bug 
Sometime it all comes together baby 
Sometime you’re a fool in love 
Sometime you’re the louisville slugger 
Sometime you’re the ball