spoked wheels obsoletion

given that spokes are alive and well on bicycles I have to ask
why they are gone from the car wheels.

motorcycles held a little longer than cars it seems,
but spokes are long gone in standard, touring and sport
triangle (not sure if harley and wannabes have them or not)

so, was it the looks alone the killed them or stamped steel rims have
some
inherent advantages over them aside from being possibly cheaper
to produce and require much less if any maintenance, esp
when potholes come into the picture
?

AD > wrote in news:8e72d479-bc97-4c06-aa97-
:

> given that spokes are alive and well on bicycles I have to ask
> why they are gone from the car wheels.
>
> motorcycles held a little longer than cars it seems,
> but spokes are long gone in standard, touring and sport
> triangle (not sure if harley and wannabes have them or not)
>
> so, was it the looks alone the killed them or stamped steel rims have
> some
> inherent advantages over them aside from being possibly cheaper
> to produce and require much less if any maintenance, esp
> when potholes come into the picture
> ?
>


Solid disc wheels are
1) stronger
2) cheaper
3) simpler
than spoke wheels.

But spoked wheels are lighter than solid wheels, which is to the advantage
of bicycles. Bicycles do not generate the sorts of cornering side-forces on
their wheels that cars do; spoked wheels cannot handle side-forces as well
as solid disc wheels do, but that's not important for bicycles.


--
Tegger

On May 23, 3:00*pm, Tegger > wrote:
> AD > wrote in news:8e72d479-bc97-4c06-aa97-
> :
>
> > given that spokes are alive and well on bicycles I have to ask
> > why they are gone from the car wheels.
>
> > motorcycles held a little longer than cars it seems,
> > but spokes are long gone in standard, touring and sport
> > triangle (not sure if harley and wannabes have them or not)
>
> > so, was it the looks alone the killed them or stamped steel rims have
> > some
> > inherent advantages over them aside from being possibly cheaper
> > to produce and require much less if any maintenance, esp
> > when potholes come into the picture
> > ?
>
> Solid disc wheels are
> 1) stronger
> 2) cheaper
> 3) simpler
> than spoke wheels.
>
> But spoked wheels are lighter than solid wheels, which is to the advantage
> of bicycles. Bicycles do not generate the sorts of cornering side-forces on
> their wheels that cars do; spoked wheels cannot handle side-forces as well
> as solid disc wheels do, but that's not important for bicycles.
>
and as for motorcycles that generate that have the wheels leaned into
the turn
along with the bike?

AD > wrote:
>given that spokes are alive and well on bicycles I have to ask
>why they are gone from the car wheels.

Have you ever had to true the wheels on a bicycle? That's why.

And the higher the speed, the more carefully they have to be set.
--scott


--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

AD wrote:
> given that spokes are alive and well on bicycles I have to ask
> why they are gone from the car wheels.
>
> motorcycles held a little longer than cars it seems,
> but spokes are long gone in standard, touring and sport
> triangle (not sure if harley and wannabes have them or not)
>
> so, was it the looks alone the killed them or stamped steel rims have
> some
> inherent advantages over them aside from being possibly cheaper
> to produce and require much less if any maintenance, esp
> when potholes come into the picture
> ?

Mag spoke wheels are a modern wire spoke replacement. They don't
need periodic truing, can handle side forces, and are lighter.
Stamped steel wheels are rare and mainly found on inexpensive
cars (like my Kia).
Wire spokes were ok back in the 1930's but are not suited to
todays needs. Bicycles rarely go over 60 mph for extended
distances.

Tegger > wrote:
> AD > wrote in news:8e72d479-bc97-4c06-aa97-
> :

> > given that spokes are alive and well on bicycles I have to ask
> > why they are gone from the car wheels.
> >

> ... Bicycles do not generate the sorts of cornering side-forces on
> their wheels that cars do; spoked wheels cannot handle side-forces as well
> as solid disc wheels do, but that's not important for bicycles.

So there's an oportunity to design a car with spoked wheels that tilts
its wheels when turning, just like a bicycle.


--
Jack Myers / Westminster, California, USA

Our policy is, when in doubt, do the right thing.
-- Roy L. Ash, ex-president, Litton Industries

On 05/23/2013 06:48 AM, AD wrote:
> On May 23, 3:00�pm, Tegger > wrote:
>> AD > wrote in news:8e72d479-bc97-4c06-aa97-
>> :
>>
>>> given that spokes are alive and well on bicycles I have to ask
>>> why they are gone from the car wheels.
>>
>>> motorcycles held a little longer than cars it seems,
>>> but spokes are long gone in standard, touring and sport
>>> triangle (not sure if harley and wannabes have them or not)
>>
>>> so, was it the looks alone the killed them or stamped steel rims have
>>> some
>>> inherent advantages over them aside from being possibly cheaper
>>> to produce and require much less if any maintenance, esp
>>> when potholes come into the picture
>>> ?
>>
>> Solid disc wheels are
>> 1) stronger
>> 2) cheaper
>> 3) simpler
>> than spoke wheels.
>>
>> But spoked wheels are lighter than solid wheels, which is to the advantage
>> of bicycles. Bicycles do not generate the sorts of cornering side-forces on
>> their wheels that cars do; spoked wheels cannot handle side-forces as well
>> as solid disc wheels do, but that's not important for bicycles.
>>
> and as for motorcycles that generate that have the wheels leaned into
> the turn
> along with the bike?
>

tegger's thinking right, but not saying it right. cornering force on a
car wheel are normal to the wheel plane. those forces on a bike are in
the wheel plane. [and the vector sum of gravity and the lateral force
gives the angle of lean.]

to your original question, the reason is twofold:

1. initial cost.

2. maintenance.

re #1, it takes time to build a spoked wheel. they can be assembled and
largely tensioned and trued by machine, but they need to be finished by
hand. stamped steel or cast aluminum wheels need no manual
intervention. in addition, spoked wheels can be vary unreliable unless
spoke material quality is high. this again is a prohibitive cost for
most car manufacturers.

re #2, training someone to build a spoked wheel isn't that hard.
getting them to true it [kinda] isn't that hard either. but getting
them to true it in a way where it'll /stay/ true in use is much much
harder, and if it needs re-truing, it's nigh-on impossible.

based on my experience of bicycle wheels, i'd say fewer than 1% of wheel
builders have the skill to true a wheel so that it stays true from new,
and maybe 10% of that 1% know how to correct a wheel that has become
untrue so that it doesn't happen again.

bottom line, spoked wheels are fabulous mechanical structures - few
others can support 100x their own weight - but they're a pita for
someone making an appliance that just needs to work. and that is the
car or modern motorcycle. the high end bicycle crowd pay through the
nose for their wheel service, and most car owners wouldn't put up with that.


--
fact check required

On 05/23/2013 07:32 AM, Jack Myers wrote:
> Tegger > wrote:
>> AD > wrote in news:8e72d479-bc97-4c06-aa97-
>> :
>
>>> given that spokes are alive and well on bicycles I have to ask
>>> why they are gone from the car wheels.
>>>
>
>> ... Bicycles do not generate the sorts of cornering side-forces on
>> their wheels that cars do; spoked wheels cannot handle side-forces as well
>> as solid disc wheels do, but that's not important for bicycles.
>
> So there's an oportunity to design a car with spoked wheels that tilts
> its wheels when turning, just like a bicycle.
>
>

but bike wheels don't tilt relative to the vehicle - why should a car's?


--
fact check required

On May 23, 10:36*am, jim beam > wrote:
>
> based on my experience of bicycle wheels, i'd say fewer than 1% of wheel
> builders have the skill to true a wheel so that it stays true from new,
> and maybe 10% of that 1% know how to correct a wheel that has become
> untrue so that it doesn't happen again.

Those figures are in reality exactly 0%.
-----

- gpsman

On 5/23/2013 3:11 AM, AD wrote:
> given that spokes are alive and well on bicycles I have to ask
> why they are gone from the car wheels.
>
> motorcycles held a little longer than cars it seems,
> but spokes are long gone in standard, touring and sport
> triangle (not sure if harley and wannabes have them or not)
>
> so, was it the looks alone the killed them or stamped steel rims have
> some
> inherent advantages over them aside from being possibly cheaper
> to produce and require much less if any maintenance, esp
> when potholes come into the picture
> ?
>

Having driven both, car wheels in pressed steel are stiffer,
lighter and much less trouble overall than spoked wheels.
Not to mention tubeless!

Bicycle wheels have proportional diameter/width differences
and severe weight constraints which are not relevant to
motor vehicles.

Splined 'spinner' hubs are cool but one gets past that.

Aluminum wheels in modern alloys are just clearly superior
in almost every case[1] but the principle was established
well in steel many years ago.

[1] Yeah, everybody can cite one failure or another,
especially if we go back to the brittle products of the
1960s, but run a set of wire wheels for a few years and the
concept will be clear.

--
Andrew Muzi
<www.yellowjersey.org/>
Open every day since 1 April, 1971