Speedwobble

[bazzapage]

My Turbo gets a bit of a speedwobble on the front wheel at about 40km/h (25mph) if I am riding no hands or holding the bars close to the stem (aero!). It corrects quickly if I hold the bars on the grips or push forward on both hands. But it's annoying.
Anyone else get this? Any remedies?

 

[reoutput]

You can make the headset tighter which would enable you to go hands free easier but may increase bearing wear with the tighter set up. Other than that not much else you can do about that.

Check your tire pressure and quick release as well.

 

[bazzapage]

Thanks @reoutput, I have tried those things. My current theory is that it might be the fenders and a certain wind angle that causes some turbulence and oscillation. Will see if I can change anything on the aerodynamic front.

 

[reoutput]

Ahhh, interesting. The profile of the tire is quite large so cross winds can be a major factor...I have noticed. So the fender theory could be something to consider as well.

As a side note, I don't run fenders so I cannot comment on any effect this might have. Hope you figure it out!

 

[bazzapage]

I have adjusted the fender to be closer to the tyre. If you look at this picture taken earlier today you can see it is set quite far out. I'll see how it goes on Monday's commute.

 

[Nutella]

Lots of bikes will get a speed wobble once you get up @50mph, 25mph would be unexpected and unacceptable IMO. I'm curious to see if your fender adjustment will help. Is your bike heavily rear weighted? A light front end will also do this at speed.

 

[opimax]

+1 on rear weight. makes a difference on my wife's step thru. My st2 was harder especially at first when I added the suspension fork to replace the rigid, slowly getting used to it

 

[reoutput]

That would make sense especially if you running a rack with panniers filled with stuff.

 

[Richard Spensley]

I can notice a slight front wheel wobble tendency even whilst holding the bars because I have the rack and panniers loaded and I feel like the whole bike is weighted much more at the back.

 

[Robie]

After adding rear panniers on my St2 has greatly eleaveated my wobble up front. Cane Creek has special washers or shims you add to headset, that swell up when wobble starts and is suppost to solve issue.

 

[bazzapage]

Good news is that tweaking the front fender to be closer to the tyre helped a lot. It still has a slight tendency to shimmy, but far far less than before. @Robie I am keen to hear more about those headset gizmoids.

 

[Robie]

Bazzapage your going to need to contact Cane Creek. Unless another forum member knows previously posted info.

 

[bazzapage]

I was in the local bike shop and he said: "Well that will be the reflector you have on the wheel". Obviously...

The reflector is a requirement of New Zealand law for all new bikes. Normally the first thing 'real' cyclists do is to take them off. This time I thought "What the heck, I'll leave it on. It's a commuter." But alas, the safety measure was itself unsafe.

[Stupid Amazon ads showing me all "Hobbit" paraphernalia along the bottom of the screen. Are you getting that too?]

 

[Nutella]

Yeah, take it off, they are useless anyway. If you want reflectors that work for commuting, use high intensity reflective tape. I have bits of it on my frame and a few small pieces interspersed on my rims. As well as lights.

 

[bazzapage]

Pesky speedwobble is still there despite everything I thought was helping. Today I was getting it around 38+km/h. Perhaps I should take the wheel into an auto shop and get the balancing and alignment done

 

[Nutella]

You can do it yourself if you want, but that would just help eliminate a hop. Can you swap out a wheel from another bike? Pull the fender off and see what happens? You could at least start to narrow it down.

 

[bazzapage]

All my fixes turned out to be fantasy. Today I had a bit more weight on the rear rack and I got the wobbles from hell. So it must just be the weighting of the bike. When I got my weight over the front wheel, all was good. When I had light hands on the bars i got the wobbles.

 

[Nutella]

I run flat bars on my road bike which puts my weight just a little farther back than it would be if I was in the drops on a normal bar, it's fine until I get over 40-45 mph and then I have to focus on staying forward to avoid the wobbles.

If its annoying enough, you could always look into front racks and switching some load up front.

 

[Robie]

That's my plan Nutella. I've got an Arkel small front handlebar bag on the way , to try to disperse some of the weight off the rear tire. Mounts for bag will be tight to clear St2 headlight though, we'll see what needs adjusted when it gets here.

 

[reoutput]

Now that you know it's the weight in the rear, maybe trying different tire pressures can help with the problem? Free to try and may help some. I'm not sure which one should be higher or lower though...maybe someone will chime in. Good luck!