Rear wheel creek and spoke tension

[naavt]

Gave my LB rims to my usual LBS and they assembled my wheels, just to discover that they creek a lot.

Since I've built my last pair of wheels on my own and everything went fine, I decided to see what was going on with this build, and after checking all the instructions (rims, spokes, hubs and TM-1 Park Tool spoke tension meter), I've found that my radial side was tensioned at an astonishing low 30 Kgf.

Even if the hub instructions ask for a low Kgf (is an Extralite CyberRear SP), they state a maximum spoke tension of 70 Kgf for the radial side, so I started guessing that the creeking spoke noise was due to low spoke tension.

Adding tension to the radial side was easy, since they were so loose that they winded perfectly fine, but that was not the case for the drive side and I ended up snapping 4 drive side spokes trueing the wheel, with the radial side sitting just around 57 Kgf.

The spokes are steel bladed, and only now I've seen that on the radial side they are double butted but only single butted on the drive side. Besides that, I've noticed that they all snapped where the blade meets the thread, and when removing the internal nipple with the broken spoke tip I've seen the thread all the way in into the nipple.

Going back to the instructions and after carefully measuring LB rims ERD, I came across that the perfect drive side spoke lenght is - on my own math - 2mm shorter that the ones fitted.

Can this be the cause for snapping 4 spokes?

[pdlpsher1]

Did you use a bladed spoke holder when tightening the DS spokes? Also, I personally don't use locking style nipples. I can't get a high spoke tension with locking style nipples without stripping the nipples. I use regular non-locking nipples and apply grease to the spoke threads for easy turning. Once properly tensioned the nipples will not loosen.

[naavt]

Did you use a bladed spoke holder when tightening the DS spokes? Also, I personally don't use locking style nipples. I can't get a high spoke tension with locking style nipples without stripping the nipples. I use regular non-locking nipples and apply grease to the spoke threads for easy turning. Once properly tensioned the nipples will not loosen.

Have done all that! Always use a holder for bladed spokes and these Pillar hex10 nipples come without threadlocker

[kode54]

Did you use a bladed spoke holder when tightening the DS spokes? Also, I personally don't use locking style nipples. I can't get a high spoke tension with locking style nipples without stripping the nipples. I use regular non-locking nipples and apply grease to the spoke threads for easy turning. Once properly tensioned the nipples will not loosen.

Spoke prep or linseed oil.

[naavt]

Spoke prep or linseed oil.

Ok. Not wanting to deal with flammable stuff just bought a can of Stan's Spoke prep powder.

Let's see how this goes!