Broken spokes

[cl_miata]

My passenger front tire has about 3 or 4 spokes that are broke/missing, is there any way of repairing these at home, or can a shop even repair them? I am affraid that when I go to get tires the shop will consider it a liability and not use my wheels.

 

[tony barnhill]

You can repair them at home...Moss sells a spoke wrench for the spoke area closest to the hub & all you need at the outer diameter is a big screwdriver....problem is usually rust at the outer ent....but lots of PB Blaster works there.....& you can buy individual spokes from Moss also

Theoretically, its the same as when we replaced spokes on our bikes (motorized or not) & if you get a tuning fork, you can get them all the same tichtness so the tire shop can balance them when the tires are installed.

 

[bill_young]

You're going to have to remove the tire and tube to replace the spokes, but that's not difficult for tube type rims. If you've never done that before you'll need at couple of "tire irons" to work the tire up over the rim with, being careful not to pinch the tube between the tire and the rim or the iron. Mark the location of the valve stem on the sidewall of the tire with a grease pencil or such and you'll be able to reinstall it back in balance when you're done. You can probably buy a good tire iron at you local auto parts store, but the ones sold by JC Whitney are of good quality and work great. I recommend one dropped center and one straight spoon type irons for most work. https://www.jcwhitney.com/autoparts.../s-10101/Ntk-AllTextSearchGroup?Ntt=tire+iron

 

[cl_miata]

Ive only taken a tire off a rim using a tire changing machine at school, but alright thanks, I feel alot better now

 

[bill_young]

For tubeless type rims it really takes some type of machine usually to at least break the beads, for a tube style rim the tire beads should compress easily once the air in the tube is released. Then the process is about the same, get one side of the bead to drop into the center well and the other side will lever out using the tire irons, hold it with one iron and use the other to start working aroung the wheel. Shouldn't take much and it will be free. Remove the tube and then the other bead is a snap.

 

[tony barnhill]

Harbor Freight has tire irons.

 

[cl_miata]

Thanks a million guys... as soon as my paintjob is done, this will be the next project... hopefully will be 100% done by August 15th