[mellow_sparky]

I recently had a set of wheels made from a fairly well known wheelbuilder (32 hole rim). I noticed that the spokes (especially the rear) have a couple of very slight bends in them - as an inside spoke crosses another spoke, it has a slight bend. Then it bends back slightly the other direction as it approaches the rim.

Normal? This appears to be uniform and deliberate. It's very slight - in fact you can barely see it - however you can feel it in the spoke.

I've only had cheap wheels in the past, so I'm not sure what is normal.

Thoughts?

 

[Mike B.]

Perfectly normal.

 

[jonKranked]

This is a normal part of any wheel laced with a cross pattern (2 cross, 3 cross, 4 cross, 3 is the most common).


I'm pretty sure the reason for this is that by having spokes cross and bend against each other in this manner, it helps to more evenly distribute the load/force experienced by the wheel.