When I bought the bike, I was quite pleased that it had ‘Akront’ alloy wheel rims and stainless steel spokes. Once I had the wheels off the bike, I took them to my local branch of Kwikfit, where they very kindly removed the tyres for me. When I examined them though, I found real problems that deserved to be sorted out. The spokes were indeed stainless, but the nipples (the bits that attach the spokes to the rims) were not; at the end of each spoke there was a blob of rusty metal. And, when I looked closely at the rims, the spoke-holes were linked with cracks. I think that the previous owner had been lucky that they hadn’t fallen off. Also, the hubs were filthy. So, I dismantled the wheels and had the hubs bead-blasted. I bought and fitted new wheel bearings. I had measured the offset between the hubs and rims and armed with this information had the wheels rebuilt with new alloy rims and spokes. I took my newly-refurbished wheels to a local specialist, and had new tyres and inner-tubes fitted. Job done, albeit expensively. This picture shows one of the wheel rims. If you look carefully you can see the cracks.
