Wheel Rebuild

Well, I dug into the front wheel today, every thing is good for 40 years sitting. I asked about reusing spokes, and I think that i should be able to there is no rust at all, and the threads are all perfect. The rim, is also not bad, a bit or rust but steel wool has taken everything off so far with a little help from 2000 sand paper. Is it okay to reuse the rim? Theres a few pictures here if you want to alert me about something or just comment...go for it!

The spokes





The rim, is it good to reuse? All that rust has been cleaned off and it looks pretty good already without any polishing.







Thanks

If you polish the spokes with steel wool, or stainless steel wool, they should come up like new. And of course be usable.

Did all the rust specks come off the rim ?
Again, some determined polishing with steel wool or stainless steel wool should remove nearly all of them. An oiling with clean motor oil will then keep all further rust at bay - chrome is porous, and needs something like wax polish or oil to keep the moisture at bay.
Slight rust marks like that will not prevent the rim from being reused.

Try to remove all rust from the inside of the rim, using a wire brush or sandpaper like you say - you don't want spots of future rust forming against the tube. Slight rusty spots inside should be painted over, if necessary, if rust might form again. Wax (sparingly) inside the rim, you don't want oil in contact with tube. Or the tyre lubed enough to lose its grip...

Opethiselps,
Have fun.

Never that good an idea to reuse parts like spokes.............they need to put up with substantial forces in service, and if any of your used spokes break, then the effect of this may be very serious indeed. If you are short of money, it might have been better to leave the wheels alone entirely, and stripped them when you are able to afford new rims, and to rebuild properly.

As long as the threads on the spokes and nipples are in good order, and do up smoothly and cleanly, then all should be well.

Whats the difference between dismantling them, and adjusting the rim runout on a used wheel ? Spokes often need tightening 2 or 3 times on a newly rebuilt wheel anyway. And sometimes subsequently.

But I'd agree, they need to be in good order.
And not overtightened to get the correct runout...

Well I'm not so short on money that I can't buy new spokes, but reusing spokes will help us save $200.

Rohan, the rust seems to come out pretty easy, I haven't done the entire wheel yet though. As far as the wax goes that your talking about using, I have some hockey stick wax that prevents ice from sticking to your stick blade, it works quite well and Ill use it, unless you have any other recommendations?

mattthomas4444 said:

Well I'm not so short on money that I can't buy new spokes, but reusing spokes will help us save $200.

Rohan, the rust seems to come out pretty easy, I haven't done the entire wheel yet though. As far as the wax goes that your talking about using, I have some hockey stick wax that prevents ice from sticking to your stick blade, it works quite well and Ill use it, unless you have any other recommendations?

Click to expand...

Eh?

A car wax might be better.

swooshdave said:

mattthomas4444 said:

Well I'm not so short on money that I can't buy new spokes, but reusing spokes will help us save $200.

Rohan, the rust seems to come out pretty easy, I haven't done the entire wheel yet though. As far as the wax goes that your talking about using, I have some hockey stick wax that prevents ice from sticking to your stick blade, it works quite well and Ill use it, unless you have any other recommendations?

Click to expand...

Eh?

A car wax might be better.

Click to expand...

Haha, maybe it the Canadian in me that made me think of hockey wax before anything else?

mattthomas4444 said:

swooshdave said:

mattthomas4444 said:

Well I'm not so short on money that I can't buy new spokes, but reusing spokes will help us save $200.

Rohan, the rust seems to come out pretty easy, I haven't done the entire wheel yet though. As far as the wax goes that your talking about using, I have some hockey stick wax that prevents ice from sticking to your stick blade, it works quite well and Ill use it, unless you have any other recommendations?

Click to expand...

Eh?

A car wax might be better.

Click to expand...

Haha, maybe it the Canadian in me that made me think of hockey wax before anything else?

Click to expand...

Hockey wax might work on the Canadian women but this a Norton we're talking about!

swooshdave said:

mattthomas4444 said:

swooshdave said:

Eh?

A car wax might be better.

Click to expand...

Haha, maybe it the Canadian in me that made me think of hockey wax before anything else?

Click to expand...

Hockey wax might work on the Canadian women but this a Norton we're talking about!

Click to expand...

Never that good an idea to reuse parts like spokes.............they need to put up with substantial forces in service, and if any of your used spokes break, then the effect of this may be very serious indeed. Just thought I'd re-cycle this from carbonfibre. We're talking 40 year old spokes, wether or not they look, or clean up nicely is kinda not the point, i mean your butts on the line, when your out riding.

I can understand that, but I have yet to hear of a used spoke breaking on anyone. Then again at age 15 I haven't really been around the motorcycle community long enough to know for sure!

Broken spokes are pretty common, and anyone who advises its ok to reuse rusty 40 year old ones, probably doesnt have that much experience of top class wheel building.

Anybody who builds wheels proffesionally would be a fool to use old spokes. Anybody who rides a 40 year old motorcycle has probably already entrusted their lives to old spokes. It is my experience in a lifetime of breaking stuff that most systems do not suffer a catostrophic failure. Don't over torque your spokes, check them often (you should anyway) and I wouldn't be that worried about it. But then I just retuned my original wheels and am running them another season so what would you expect from me?

I cleaned the rust out of my rims and sprayed the inside of the rim with quick dry laquer. The rust spots made it a bee-atch to get the AM26 tire beads to pop into place propperly. It was surprising how little rust it took for the nice sticky rubber to hang up on. So the exercise is worth it.

I think that if you plan to spend a lot of your life messing with motorcycles it makes perfect sense to practice on your old wheels, then save up for some spiffy new ones.

Russ

...and no I am not trying to start an argument...anytime you ride around on a 40 year old bike you gotta be willing to admit that it is on well used parts! You would be crazy to treat it like it was a modern sport bike before you got around to working thru the systems.