Spoke tension

[Sparx]

Hi,

I recently bough a new bike, its a flat bar commuter. This morning when I was fitting a cycle computer I noticed that the spokes seemed a bit loose. By this I mean they were not giving a nice 'ping' noise when plucked and if I squeezed two laced spokes there was a fair bit of play and they were rubbing against each other.

Is this normal? I am fairly new to cycling. Should I expect to have to go back to the shop to have the spokes re-tensioned so soon after buying it (approx. 200km of riding).

Incidentally this will be the second time I've had to take the bike back after they failed to tighten the BB properly.

[FuzzyDropbear]

Hey mate,
You mention that the bottom bracket was loose, did they give the bike it's first service (usually provided free of charge after everything 'wears in')? In which case, I would've thought they should check spoke tension, I would ask them about it. But no, spokes shouldn't become loose after 200km of riding. A mate had that issue and it turned out that the bike shop forgot to go over the rim and tension the spokes correctly before sending the bike out the door.

From your description it does sound like they aren't correctly tensioned. I recently had to tighten my front wheel because the spokes were as you described. If you can find another bike (friend or colleague) to compare against, that might help you gauge if they're incorrectly tensioned.

Cheers, good luck and welcome to cycling!

[Sparx]

No bike has not had first service. I had another look and the wheel is ever so slightly out of true - maybe a couple of mm.

BB was loose on first ride and caused crank arm to rub against chain stay.

So it sounds like they've sent the bike out the door with 2 things wrong!