In this previous article on truing your bicycle wheel we looked into how to spot an untrue wonky wheel. These indicators included loose spokes, if they are squeezed and feel less taught than the others or even very wobbly there stands an untrue wheel. This can in addition be confirmed by a visual inspection, you can see whilst your bicycle is upside down and as the wheel spins round, the wheel “bobs” or moves around by looking sideways on at your bike and through the area of your bikes brakes.
Making your bicycle circular, or true again is a relatively simple procedure in itself; all you need to do is tighten up the spokes again to bringing the wheel back into shape. To do this you need a spoke wrench (inexpensive item) that fits the nipple (the larger point where the spoke goes into the rim) of the wheel for truing. However the difficulty is that it takes time and patience and an observant eye to make the adjustments.
How to True a Bicycle Wheel
Checking Alignment
The most cost effective way to true your own wheel is to leave the wheel on your bike, turn it upside down and use the brake blocks as your guide to checking the alignment. But you can also purchase special equipment to more professionally assist you, a truing jig gives you the flexibility of properly assessing and managing the alignment of the wheel more accurately as well as being in a better position to work in.
But whatever you have to watch your wheel spin, be it on a jig or on your bike, you’ll want to be watching the rim of your wheel as is passes through the brakes. With the tyre of your wheel removed, you’ll be watching for when your rim sways over to one side (lateral) or up and down (vertical), and it’s at that point that your wheel needs tightening. Work on the worst misalignments first, starting with lateral (sideways) misalignment and then vertical (up and down) misalignment. In the next article I'll take you through what to do when you spot a point of misalignment to true the wheel back up again!
Further Reading
Truing a Bicycle Wheel
An introduction to truing your bicycle wheel, spotting the signs of an untrue wheel and more information about the tools required for the job can be found here.
