Spoke Cleaning

My original idea was to have the wheels stripped & powder coated, but after speaking to a couple of companies about it, I was kinda put off the idea.  If anyone has had theirs done & I'm wrong on this, please correct me, but apparantly it's not just a case of taking the tyre off, cleaning them up & re-fitting the tyre.  From what I'm being told, to do the job properly, you need to strip the spokes out & powder the rim separately, or the movement of the rim against the spokes will cause the powder coating to fracture & allow water in, eventually causing rust.  So I'm being quoted about 150 a wheel - does this sound right, or is someone having my pants down ??

So in the meantime, I've decided to start cleaning up the spokes as they were looking decidedly tatty - I don't think they've ever been cleaned !

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And I thought cleaning the fins & barrels was tedious.  I'm using a combination of 400 grit emery cloth on a roll & these things to finish them off Luster Lace Strips.  

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Results are good - but it's a long term project, not just an evening with a coffee & the radio.  If anyone has any other ideas, please toss them out whilst I still have finger ends left !!



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No other tested idea's from me Dave Sorry, Just a thought though? Plumbers use a little strip of flexible fibreglass mesh bonded with something or other? that gets a nice bright finish on copper and seems to last ages, this stuff, not sure what grades it comes in though?
http://www.toolstation.com/shop/Hand+Tools/d10/Plumbers+Tools/sd210/Abrasive+Clean+Up+Strip/p85391

The complete stripping down of the wheel seems the right and correct way to do the job, as for price I'm not sure, have a shop around.

Hiya Sim.  I'd looked at something similar, but I'd already tried some of my own 180 emery & it left marks which I had to wet & dry off.  The 400 grit is enough to take the surface crap off without damaging the surface.  25 metres on a roll cost me just over a fiver.

The other costs as well as the powder coating, are the tyre removal (can't do it myself) & I would imagine I'd be putting new bearings in.  As the whole idea of this bike is not to go over the top on how much I'm spending on it (unlike the Katana) I'm gonna clean the spokes up, then make sure they get a good coat of a liquid wax which, hopefully, will mean they only need a good going over every few months - that's the theory.  And to be honest, now they're coming up sparkly, I'm quite liking it.

Hi Dave if you are getting your wheels powder coated then you will have to take the bearings out anyway,the heat will melt them.Have you thought on the lines of going to a wheel builder and getting a quote for stainless spokes?.

Originally I was just going to have the rims & spokes done which would mean that the bearings wouldn't need doing. Thought about have stainless spokes - I'd been in this catch 22 situation swaying between ease of maintenance against cost.  So it starts off - the easiest way to keep the wheels clean would be to have them powder coated, but you can't really just have the wheels & spokes coated, you need to have the hub, drum casing, etc, etc  done or it will look a bit crap.  And to have the wheels done properly, you need to have them completely stripped.  Ah, what about if I have the rims & hubs coated, but have the wheels rebuilt using stainless spokes - then they'll need cleaning every so often - which is the situation I'm trying to evade !!! 

So at the moment, I may as well devote a few a hours cleaning up what I have & if it pisses me off trying to keep them clean, then they can be powdered later in the year.  Thing is, I love the look of spokes against cast

if you wanted them re spoked Hagon do that google em there not bad near where I live actually although they can take a long time to finish the job (past when they said it would be done) if you do go down the the rout of getting new spokes you can have larger diameter ones fitted (chunkier ones) how wider they can go they would be able to let you know once they see ya wheel. I think you can send them the whole wheel and they will strip it and have bits powder coated before they put it back together not sure though bin quite a while since I last used them

Thanks for the write up, cleaning my now getting old spokes is something I will have to attempt.

fat intruder wrote:

if you wanted them re spoked Hagon do that google em there not bad near where I live actually although they can take a long time to finish the job (past when they said it would be done) if you do go down the the rout of getting new spokes you can have larger diameter ones fitted (chunkier ones) how wider they can go they would be able to let you know once they see ya wheel. I think you can send them the whole wheel and they will strip it and have bits powder coated before they put it back together not sure though bin quite a while since I last used them

Yeh - I'd been looking at the fat spokes - they look the dogs.  If I decide to go down that route, I'll give you a shout Morgan.

Have to say, now I've found a method, I find it quite therapeutic.  I'm doing it in 30 minutes segments, which is enough in one go.  Reckon on about 90 minutes a side for the rear, the front a bit longer as I have to raise the bike to spin the wheel to get to the next one, then lower it so the wheel stays straight when you pull sideways.  Just finished the first half of the back wheel - yehaaaa !!!

So a quick update on how things are progressing - BLOODY SLOWLY !!! This really is a tediuos, time consuming task - but the efforts are well worth it - as you can see.

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Back wheel is at stage 3 of a 4 stage process.  Front wheel - only half way through stage 1 !!  

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I'm hoping that once I'm on top of this deep clean, it'll only need minimum maintenance to keep it looking as good as it does now.  I'm going to do a full write-up when I've finished, so that if anyone else fancies tackling it, I can put them off !!

Looking bloody great Dave, good job done. I would just keep them lightly covered with WD when done, that should stop deterioration.

Yeah - my plan is to apply a hard wax, then when that's been buffed off, to give them a light covering of either WD40 or silicone

Massive improvement Dave 

You're doing a good job there Dave.

bloody ell them come up well good job that man

You have done an excellent job, very inspiring.