[Healeys] New Post on my Blog...tire truing

[sentenac.rw at gmail.com]

Replacing wheels or possibly a few spokes and nipples are good
solutions for most Healey owners.  However if you have an early BN1
like Michael and like me, and you want the car to remain original you
have to find a way to work with the 'flat' hubs that those cars come
with.  As Michael's original posting showed, the spokes are different,
different lengths and different angles of the spoke base to the spoke
direction.

So, someone who wanted to modify the later spokes to fit the early
wheels would need to get long spokes, shorten and rethread them, and
bend them at the base end, all without seriously weakening the spokes.

I don't know of anyone who can produce these modified spokes for BN1s.
And if someone did, they ought to charge about $25 per spoke or
something over $1000 per wheel just for 48 spokes.

Hence, even pretty good original early BN1 wheels approach hens' teeth
in scarcity.  If Michael can make pretty good wheels work with a few
cuts on the tires with his table saw I say good on him.  I hope that I
will be able to make the early wheels that I have work as well, one
way or another.

-Roland
BN1 #724

On Wed, 30 Sep 2015 08:39:02 -0700, you wrote:

>True enough. Trying to true a wheel that is even mildly flattened or more often potato chipped seldom succeeds, leaves an unstable wheel because some spokes are loose and that is unsafe because some spokes are overstressed. I think MWS will shorten pre-existing high quality butted spokes as needed. So, if the rim is reasonably circular, perhaps the long-term solution is to relace the wheel with new spokes.
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>From: Healeys [mailto:healeys-bounces at autox.team.net] On Behalf Of Michael Salter
>Sent: Wednesday, September 30, 2015 7:34 AM
>Cc: healeys <healeys at autox.team.net>
>Subject: Re: [Healeys] New Post on my Blog...tire truing
>
> 
>
>The problem with trying to true the old 48 spoke wheels is that the nipples seize on the spokes after 60 odd years and it is virtually impossible to free up the threads to save the spokes which are just not available for these really early wheels .... also the actual rim itself is often a little distorted and straightening that is very difficult and cannot be achieved by simply adjusting the spokes. 
>
>I had heard of people deflating the tire and rotating it 90 degrees on the rim then checking again so I gave that a try... There was no measurable change although I tried it in all 4 quadrants on the worst wheel ... I suspect that modern tires are made pretty accurately. 
>
>Regarding the "scalloping" I actually made 4 cuts on each tire and managed to position the blade to cut the tread fairly much like the original profile.. After a 10 mile run the tires look just like they did when  before the treatment.
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>Michael S
>
>BN1 #174
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>On Wed, Sep 30, 2015 at 10:18 AM, Bob Spidell <bspidell at comcast.net <mailto:bspidell at comcast.net> > wrote:
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>Ingenious, and very not PC, but, wouldn't it have been easier to true the wheels?  
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>You probably want to run a little under-inflated as well, to compensate for the width-wise scalloping of the tread.
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>  _____  
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>From: "Michael Salter" <michaelsalter at gmail.com <mailto:michaelsalter at gmail.com> >
>To: "healeys" <healeys at autox.team.net <mailto:healeys at autox.team.net> >
>Sent: Tuesday, September 29, 2015 12:54:33 PM
>Subject: [Healeys] New Post on my Blog...tire truing
>
> 
>
>Not recommended for the home mechanic but very effective...
>http://www.netbug.net/blogmichael/
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>Michael S
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>-- 
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>If you can't fix it with a hammer, you've got an electrical problem.
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