Wood wheel wall hanger

[us56456712]

I have this old wood wheel that was cracked through. Dismantling it caused it to fall apart at the break and at the finger joints. I want to spruce it up for a wall hanger.

You can never have too many clamps or bicycles.

What workmanship on the tapered finger joints, they fit so tight. It must have been time consuming and expensive. Each spoke nipple has a very precise counter sunk place for a washer on the back side of the nipple so it won't sink into the wood when it is tensioned.

 

[LukeTheJoker]

They don't put that amount of effort in these days unfortunately.

Luke.

 

[us56456712]

I sanded and I sanded, can't get out the iron stains. I tried Iron Out 3 times with minimal results. Unfortunately non of the wood bleach products available locally contain Oxalic Acid. I had a kilo of it but I gave it away to the local rock club as I didn't like the results for rust removal on bike parts. Now I wish I had a few teaspoons of the stuff. It might just get stained and varnished the way it is.

 

[horsefarmer]

Patina! Are you gonna varnish the wood?

 

[us56456712]

Patina! Are you gonna varnish the wood?

Varnish was the original plan. My 92 year old neighbor though I should use a little light stain and some spar varnish. He feels that the iron stain adds character and will show the age. He is from Norway (the country, not the UP town) and did some beautiful ornately carved traditional Norwegian shelves when he was younger so I guess he knows what he is talking about.

 

[us56456712]

I went to the grocery store and spent about a half hour reading ingredient labels in the cleaning product isle. I got some ZUD cleanser (like Comet on steroids). All it contains is calcium carbonate grit and Oxalic acid. It was cheap. I should have brought my magnifying glass as they don't print those labels so 70 year old eyes can see them; tiny brown print on a black background. When I get back from camp next week I will submerge the wood rim in a bath of water and the whole container of ZUD. That otta do er, if not the heck with it. It would be interesting to see how ZUD works with fine wet emory paper on a rusty bike frame?

 

[us56456712]

The wood wheel has been laced and has come apart at the original break 3 times. I tried wood glue, Gorilla Glue and epoxy. They didn't hold. The only thing I can think of is to take it apart, again, and then glue it and put small screws in it. This may split it worse once it is laced. Mild tightening causes it to split. I am using a New Departure Model A as the hub. Any other ideas to keep it together? I have some old tricycle wheels in my scrap trailer and I thought it would be cool to take a trike wheel and attach a cable to the hub. Then take 3 cables attached to the rim of the trike wheel and attache them to the wood rim. Then take 4 old bike headlights and put them on the wood rim facing down. Wire it up and hang it from the single cable attached to the trike wheel. You would have a unique chandelier.

 

[horsefarmer]

Maybe after glue, you can wrap some wire around the rim and wrap it together, twist it till its tight. Then tighten spokes? Or try to tie the spokes together where the wood is glued with metal sheet drilled to accept the spokes and inside the rim...

 

[A.S.BOLTNUT]

Is it just me or are the letters on labels getting smaller ? I can admire the effort
You put in to save the wheel but in the end it is yours to do what you please with it , I say try your idea with it ,you may just come up with a work of art . I myself would hang it some where as you have it now .

~ Rafael ~

 

[RustySprockets]

I'd suggest you skip screws or other mechanical fasteners and try an old woodworker's trick--wooden pegs! I've done this type of joinery before and find it far superior. It also has the added benefit of being easily concealed.

Remove the spokes, re-glue, and clamp the break. Once dried, drill a series of small holes, at various angles, across the split. Glue in some wooden pegs. These pegs can be as simple as toothpicks, bamboo kitchen skewers, almost any small wooden dowel-shaped item. (Make sure the size of the holes and size of the pins match.) I'll try to draw up a diagram to explain this better.

After everything has dried, cut the pins flush and sand them smooth--the repair will be stronger than you imagine and nearly invisible.

 

[RustySprockets]

Anyway, here's the basic idea using four pins--two left side, two right. The criss-cross pattern adds strength and is less likely to pull apart than drilling perpendicular to the split. By drilling carefully and stopping short, as the arrows indicate, the repair would be completely concealed.

 

[us56456712]

Anyway, here's the basic idea using four pins--two left side, two right. The criss-cross pattern adds strength and is less likely to pull apart than drilling perpendicular to the split. By drilling carefully and stopping short, as the arrows indicate, the repair would be completely concealed.

Yahoo. I think I will try maple pins made from the firewood I split for this winter's heating. I have plenty of splinters of all sizes.

 

[us56456712]

Is it just me or are the letters on labels getting smaller ? I can admire the effort
You put in to save the wheel but in the end it is yours to do what you please with it , I say try your idea with it ,you may just come up with a work of art . I myself would hang it some where as you have it now .

~ Rafael ~

I would like to get it together and leave it as a wheel. I was just kind of thinking out loud as far as the chandelier goes.

 

[RustySprockets]

Yahoo. I think I will try maple pins made from the firewood I split for this winter's heating. I have plenty of splinters of all sizes.

Rustic, but would no doubt do the job. Whittle those splinters straight and true and match them to the hole size as best you can. The pins ought to fit snugly, but not so tight that they risk further splitting. The strength comes from the opposing grain direction and added gluing surface, which is hundreds of times the diameter of the hole you make.

 

[us56456712]

Done. Used the splinter technique to hold it together.

I used some Schwinn spokes that were close enough in length. Too bad you can't find the very thin double butted kind like it originally had. The original spokes were almost rusted through because the gauge was so thin and everything was painted red.

 

[A.S.BOLTNUT]

OH boy what a cool old wheel . Defintly worth the effort.

~ Rafael ~