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ENVE wheel nipple corrosion.

70K views 294 replies 77 participants last post by  eduluke 
#1 ·
Anyone had any problems with UST ENVE wheels regarding nipple corrosion ?

My wheels are just over 18months old and have never been ridden in water, i live in the driest state on the driest continent on earth :p (actually a fact) so its not even moisture and rain is not an issue either.

So approx at the 12-14 month mark i start hearing this rattling noise inside the "nipple chamber" on both wheels and think to myself its only some dirt thats got in there.

But its taped tubeless so nothing can escape into the wheels or stans escape out. The nipples seal the hole from the inside so no dirt can get in.

So then during a ride (November) i notice my front wheel is way out of true, when i get home i see that a spoke is loose but undamaged, i untape the wheel to see that all the nipples have a dusty white appearance (corroded), and 3 of them are nearly disintegrated but theres so little left of them i cant even get them off without cutting a perfectly good spoke.

The rattling noise was shards of alu from the sides of the nipples and obviously the disintegrated one from the loose spoke that is nowhere to be seen. The shards looked to be stuck together in little balls as if they had picked up some of the sticky glue from the Gorilla tape that is sticky side down on the underside of the spoke access hole.

Has some stans fluid possibly escaped into the "nipple chamber" and done this ?

Gorilla tape IMO is crap so wont be using it again.

Back wheel i stripped tonight has also 4 nipples in advanced state of corrosion. Cant do much about it as i dont have replacement Sapim CX ray spokes to replace the ones i would have to cut. I have replacement nipples but cant get a nipple driver to grab a corroded nipple :confused:

So ive rinsed the chamber out on both wheels and will retape them with Stans tape tomorrow.

Is there any fluid i could put in there to help reduce corrosion that WOULDNT damage the carbon fibre.

I have no idea if this is an ENVE wheel design problem, nipple issue or what.
 

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#204 ·
Same nipples that I have now fitted.

If you read back... I have suspected sealant all along as being part of the issue, it also doesnt help that those Pillar nipples are just sh1t from the start.
 
#207 ·
I just got my new spokes, now I can build up my carbon rims (no rim bed holes, so sealant shouldn't be anywhere near the nipples) with brass nipples. Gonna be ridding them in the winter too.
 
#213 ·
I used Stan's yellow tape - 25mm. Installed a tire and tube after taping for a day to set the tape glue. Been good so far after 1 1/2 years, however the Aluminum Pillar nipples I received were red anodized which appears to be different from Ozzy's and others silver non anodized nipples?
 
#227 ·
Anyway, 006_007 you'll be pleased to learn that I just finished installing all the 32 nipples on the front rim after 1.5 hours. All 12mm brass in electroplated black and gold, with lube on the nipples head.

Dishware Circle Platter


Then later I was up till midnight lacing the wheel. Now I have to do the rear one.

Oh, and that I had pancakes for breakfast.
 
#234 ·
Anyway, 006_007 you'll be pleased to learn that I just finished installing all the 32 nipples on the front rim after 1.5 hours. All 12mm brass in electroplated black and gold, with lube on the nipples head.

View attachment 853038

Then later I was up till midnight lacing the wheel. Now I have to do the rear one.

Oh, and that I had pancakes for breakfast.
Ok, but I was never concerned about how you installed your nipples (nor did I learn anything from it)

Looks good - hope you have the right size spokes this time!
 
#231 ·
Well to be honest it was more like 6 hours total for both wheels to install the nipples, then lace them up.

You can't really take pictures of how-to, but it's easy to explain. Just take a long derailleur cable with both ends cut clean, then solder the tips so they don't fray. Next you need cable crimps that you will cut open so you can slide them onto the cable and crimp them on and off later. Then you insert the cable trough the farthest spoke hole and push it in till you can see it by the valve hole. Proceed to grab the tip of the cable with needle nose pliers and pull it out off the rim by the valve hole. Pull enough cable so you can slide in a nipple and a crimp and pull everything back to seat the nipple in the hole, making sure the cable will be long enough not to be pulled back into the rim. Next tie a rubber-band around the nipple to prevent it from falling back into the rim. Then pull back the cable till the crimp comes out and remove the crimp by pinching it the opposite way you first pinched it. Then pull the cable back out from the nipple and start over again with the following farthest hole, etc. Also I put some lube on the nipple head before pulling it into the rim so it would lube the nipple seat on the rim. Use silicone or teflon lube on the cable if it doesn't slide easily.

It's just painful when you're doing it all over again for the third time because of bad spoke lenghts and other planning issues. But this time it's for good. Tires, rotors and cassette are mounted, nect step is to ride to the bike coop where I'll have the pro Park trying stand and the tension meter so I can bring them up to high tension and perfectly round and straight.

These are hookless, right?
Nope, they are the 30mm wide by 33mm deep 26" DH rims from LB. They are UST compatible and have a nice profile, but aren't hookless. They were originally intended to be hookless, but many people told LB they wanted clincher rims afterward. I wish they would have kept going with the hookless design though.
 
#233 ·
2 main advantages, first is stronger sidewalls and easier/cheaper to manufacture (big deal in carbon tech) and second is the possibility of higher sidewalls to prevent burping even more and easier to seat the tire tubeless.

But stronger rims are the real deal with hookless.
 
#239 ·
That's what mine sounded like with the nipple corrosion issue, however, when I removed the rim strip in addition to corroded nipples I also found little balls / clumps of hardened spoke prep compound rolling around inside which I believe was also causing some of the noise (like ball bearings rolling around inside the rim). Easy enough to check. Pull up the rim strip and look at each nipple with a bright flashlight. It will be quite apparent if you have a nipple corrosion issue.
 
#244 ·
Enve was high on my carbon wheel list. But when I found out about their internal nipple design - the made in USA and "bulletproof" moniker soon became insignificant....having imagined a ride-defeating, trailside wheel straightening session, with tape, tire, tools and sealant all on the side of the trail. No bueno....:nono:
 
#246 · (Edited)
trailside wheel straightening session
How many times have you or anyone you know done this?

It's not unusual to break a spoke in a wheel like an ENVE and not even know it or wrap up the spoke and ride out without issue.

A spoke wrench isn't going to get you what you need on a disc wheel that is so out of true it is unrideable.
 
#247 ·
The issue with the corrosion problem is that all the nipples are damaged badly, the stump of nipple that's left is severely compromised. The nipple giving way is because there is nothing left of it and it pulls through the spoke hole, at this stage there is probably half a dozen others with 10% left holding.

I had a rim fracture when un-sewing one of my wheels, took off the first few nipples and there was too much tension on the next few compromised nipples, they pulled through and fractured the rim.

I have had zero issues since ENVE fixed me up.
 
#249 ·
All well and good when you can actually get the nipples off, mine were so badly corroded that the spokes needed to be cut or the nipples needed to be taken right off to de-tension the other side to allow the nipples to be removed using pointy nosed pliers.

Both wheels were a big mess.
 
#250 ·
I'm rebuilding a wheel set that has carbon rims (Reynolds) and internal alloy nipples (Pillar). The rear wheel nipples were corroded to nearly nothing, and I needed to use needle nose pliers to remove the nipples. The front wheel nipples are in fine condition, with no corrosion evident.
 
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