polymorphself 

Update: I just dropped the wheel off at the shop. The person who looked at it told me that he wasn’t sure if it was incorrect or not but that they would figure it out and call me back tomorrow

Hobbiano 

+1 on everything above. You paid a lot for spokes & labor. Hopefully they'll make it right. They should end at the bottom of the screwdriver slot when fully tensioned.

Russ Roth

That sounds worrisome, not certain I would want to hear it put that way. A few threads sticking out is fine but the number of threads I'd start to worry if the nipples will bottom out of the spoke and I'm guessing its getting close. A wheel like this should have been easy to grab a single length and build to within spec, not like its a hugely offset hub design. Also the number of spokes has zero effect on how a wheel is built until you get to a ridiculously low number of spokes. from my experience 20-40 spoke wheels all build the same, they're all measured the same and the only thing that makes a 40h wheel harder is just the extra time to turn all the spokes. 48 is where it really gets hard but that's only due to having fat fingers. I think when I got it back I would have the spoke tension checked elsewhere. Good luck with this one.

niliraga 

Implies there's at least 2 folks working there who aren't qualified to charge you $200 for a wheel build. Methinks 'tis time for a new LBS...

Jeff Wills

It's how I learned to build wheels in a shop... nearly 40 yeas ago. Back then we didn't have elaborate spoke inventories so it was SOP to build a rear wheel with one length of spoke, dish the wheel, then grind off the excess. It wasn't for another 10 years that I started seeing spoke lengths fine-grained enough that you could choose different lengths for drive-side and non-drive-side.

I agree that you should take the wheel back and have it redone.

polymorphself 

Hm, two days later and still no call. Now they’re closed for the weekend. I normally wouldn’t mind but they did say they’d call me the next day.

SurferRosa

Here's another good lesson to do the work yourself. Wheel building might sound hard, but it's not. Just use your upside down bicycle frame and follow Sheldon's wheel building page to a "t."

You can build a pretty nice set for $200 and have the skills to maintain it for the dur.

miamijim

The wheel was laced correctly but with spokes that are too long for 2021. I say 'for 2021' because back in the day before spoke cutters and internet calculators and the expectation that life is perfect shops had nifty tools to fix problems like that.

Grind them down. Don't think I ever did this
Use a nipper. Did this often. I used a VAR but as someone above mentioned Hozan makes one
Wack 'em. Line up a screwdriver and wack with a hammer to knock the ends off. I preferred this method as it was much faster

bark_eater 

I've done that plenty of times with larger fastenings that are meant to be permanently installed. Seems like for wheel building it would prevent that spoke from ever loosening, and you would have to go back and grind the burr off if you every had to tighten the spokes. What I'm wondering is if "back in the old days" the ends of spokes where peened down on intently to keep them from unwinding?

miamijim

Surprisingly, 'wacking' them left a nice clean edge and they could still be easily tightened/loosened. Too often, using a nipper, a spoke end would bend versus nipping clean. That sucked. Too do it right you needed the slot to be perpendicular to the nipping direction.

We didn't peen anything....but we did 'crimp' the nipples. What really sucked was over crimping crap nipples to the point they cracked/broke. We didn't do much with 'spoke prep' thread lockers either. And we never used tension gauges. What's the point? If the wheels properly spec'd n built and the gauge says too high/low what are going to do?

The two greatest innovations in the history of wheel building were the welded seam/machined sidewall Mavic rims and 'Mr. Spokey' spoke wrenches.

dombey19

When I was building a lot of wheels (in a previous century), I used the spoke nipper several people have described. I can't imagine that a qualified professional wheel builder would not have one. Yes, you can grind them down, and they should have been ground down, but there are only a handful of tools necessary to build wheels. A spoke nipper is one of them.

tiger1964 

Agreed, but if on my bike, I'd be paranoid about ever turning any spoke in the future to true up, lest the protrusion causing woes. I guess demounting tire, tube and rim tape every time I turned a spoke key is the obvious solution, but...

I'm looking at a set of wheels right now, nice and straight but ONE spoke a wee bit loose -- if I tighten it up, everything must come off as I didn't take a photo to record how much leeway I have.

seedsbelize 

This thread has been educational. I have a wheel here where all the spokes are loose, and none protruding. Instead of giving up on it forthwith, I'll see if it can be saved.

oldspokes

Looking at the picture of how much spoke is protruding, my guess is that there's more than a 1mm error in length.
Back in the day it was very common for OEM wheels to be built with one size spoke, and quite often one size front and back too.
There were various tools to grind or nip excess threads.
What concerns me about that pic is that it looks like more than 1mm protruding. As if they had two spoke sizes but used the wrong spoke on the wrong side of the wheel.
So long as the left side spokes have enough thread engagement to be safe, I'd simply grind or file off the excess threads.

Most spokes are threaded 56tpi, that translates to roughly 2.2 threads per mm. When I look at the pic above I see roughly 4 threads protruding.
If the wheel was built with the proper but equal spoke sizes, with proper dishing, there theoretically should only be roughly 2 spoke threads showing.

A pic showing how much thread is not used in the left side spoke nipples may tell the real story.
Possibly they were built either with the long/short spokes on the wrong side, or there was more than 1mm difference between the two size spokes.

bikingshearer 

Problem #1 is the shop letting that wheel go out the door in that condition. Use the right length of spokes or grind 'em down, but get those spokes flush with, or a thread or two shorter than, the nipple.

Problem #2 is the person taking the wheel back not recognizing instantly that the wheel was "incorrect" as if there is some sort of debate. The wheel is not usable in that condition unless you like getting flats more or less constantly. This is not a close call.

Problem #3 is not getting a call back when promised. The call should have been timely and should been a discussion about how to remedy the problem, for which I see two viable options: fix it or refund your money. Full stop.

I don't like to bash an LBS, but unless you get a call Monday morning and the result is them fixing the problem by the end of Monday, you should not let them wrench on your bike(s) ever again. They may be okay to buy stuff from, but if they don't back up their work, they can't be trusted to work on your bike.

At least that's how I see it.

bikingshearer 

To be clear, "the person taking the wheel back" refers to the shop employee the OP talked to when he brought the wheel back to the shop. I did not mean that the OP was in any way at fault. I wasn't as clear on that as I might have been. My apologies.

polymorphself 

For those echoing the sentiment of learning to build them myself, I hear ya! In the years since joining this forum I've learned to handle most of my own bicycle needs and I'm very grateful for it. I will likely dive into wheel building, but my hopes for this wheel set was a quick turn-around with no room for error as I want to get the bike loaded up for a few camping trips as soon as possible. I assumed tackling the build myself would take lots of time and practice and possible result in failure on a trip. But alas...

Hobbiano 

I've used a Bicycling magazine article by Eric Hjertberg ( Feb. & Mar. 1986) on lacing and truing wheels to build all the wheels I've built so far. As I don't build them often enough to remember from one pair of wheels to the next how to do it I just kept these two issues to guide me through each time and my wheels have always turned out good and have lasted a long time. I recently purchased "Professional Guide to Wheel Building by Roger Musson" which seems really good with more in-depth information and is available as an immediate downloadable pdf. Also, Jim Langley has a YouTube video on lacing & trueing wheels that is very good: I realize this probably won't help your current problem, especially with the time restraints but you may find it useful in the future if you decide to build or true your own wheels.

polymorphself 

Will definitely bookmark this, thanks!

Just got a voicemail that the wheel is done. Will be picking up later today. Going to ask if they grinded or re-laced.

daverup 

If they used a grinder you may see evidence on the nipple tops. If so, make sure to check for damage to the rim from their grinder slipping.

oneclick 

It's also pretty easy to take half (or more) the nipple head off with a slip.

Bill Kapaun

I'd venture to guess they got the indexing off one hole when they started the 2nd set.
That will result in alternating spokes being too long.

Velo Mule

That is a good point. When they completed spoking the one flange, and started on the other flange, it is critical that the starting hole on the second flange is correct. If you are off, this will be the result. It is likely that they picked the wrong spoke hole on the second flange.

This is an indication that the wheelbuilder is not that experienced. Of course, the other telling factor that they were not experienced is that they somehow competed the job with the spokes sticking way out of the nipples.

If this is the case, let's hope that they don't just cut or grind the spokes down and find the root cause of this issue and correct that second side flange spoking.

desconhecido 

In response to another wheel lacing thread, just checked to see how far past the nipple top a DT spoke would go. Looks like with a DT spoke and DT nipple fully threaded that the spoke might extend about .5 to 1mm. I think the person who laced that wheel might have been a spoke wrench gorilla. Don't think I could cut that much thread with a wimpy spoke wrench.

polymorphself 

I picked up the wheel. They grinded the spokes down and they seem to be an OK length now. That being said, almost the entire length of the rim is scratched now and I assume it’s from the grinder. This is annoying but purely cosmetic and of course not somethin to that can be seen so I’m over it. Likely won’t be going back for anything other than item purchases though, if even.

Any worrisome last minute things I should check for before mounting these?