Bashed a rock really hard on the way down the mountain today. Realized it was bent rim only after I was almost home. I have bent back a couple of other dents, but they weren’t as bad as this one. Is it safe to bend it back? Or is it time to just get a new rim?
by 1pxoff
14 Comments
That rim is done. You can try to bend it back but you risk cracking it and even if you get it straight it that area will be weak and may leak air with a tubeless setup.
You can safely ride it as-is but I wouldn’t risk taking the tire off until you have a new rim ready to build. Good chance you won’t be able to get the bead to seat tubeless again.
Warm it up before you bend it. What’s the worst that could happen….
Oof. That’s a catastrophic hit! You can try to bend that back with an adjustable wrench or similar, but it will most likely crack when you do it. Impressive that it continues to hold air.
I’d bend it back once and see how it goes. I did that with a less severe ding a couple weeks ago and it’s been fine.
I wouldn’t do the same with handlebars, frames, pedals, cranks, etc. but a rim? I wouldn’t feel unsafe riding it as long as it holds air and doesn’t wobble around.
Try bending it back with a crescent wrench very carefully with small incremental bends. It’s a pretty sharp hit so the rim may crack and not have a reliable seal. I would try that before swapping out the rim.
That ding is too extreme, bending it back will cause major metal fatigue that wont last 5 minutes
Can’t hurt to try
That rim is done.
New Bike!
If you were an expert wheel builder or repaired aircraft aluminum well you may have the right skill. Repairing this safely isn’t something I’d risk .
Avoiding pressure points or creasing which will fail catastrophically would be hard but it might actually be possible if you put a lot of time into jigging and carefully tapping it to nearly straight (to totally straighten it you would need to crease the outside of the rim creating a stress point to cut inner tubes or potentially fail catastrophically)
Edit: noticed the specialized tires, I too am a man of fine taste and value
Every decent mechanic will tell you that’s done, I personally bent mine back when it was looking similar and it still holds air tubeless and stays true so
Wish someone would ride me that hard
Bash it with a rubber hammer you got nothing to lose