Titanium skewers - help?

ROK ON

Anyway I got a set of Ti skewers - I always liked the look of the tiny Ti skewer.

I have been having problems with them however. They will not stay completely locked - as a result both front and rear wheels have moved and hit against the front fork and rear triangle. What is happening is that the skewer comes lose and then the wheel pops loose. It has happened twice yesterday on rear wheel and once today on the front wheel - it happens after the bike is being restarted having stopped at a set of lights.

Getting annoyed now as I have lost confidence in the skewers ability to keep the wheel in place.

Biggest issue is that I feel that I am locking the skewer - but obviously not enough. The caps of the skewers are not getting sufficient purchase on the dropouts (also Ti).

Anyone encounter this issue previously?
If so help.

The tax man

I used PX Ti skewers but never had them come loose. Sounds very strange that they'd come undone. I will say that the odd time I'd have to look closely at them to make sure the lever was closed correctly. The offset pivot on the lever was so slight you could easily tighten it down with the lever in the open position thinking you'd pressed it down in the closed position.
Only issue they caused was the creaking in the drop outs. Since gone back to my Shimano skewers.

Eamonnator

I have Planet X titanium skewers on two bikes. One set is about 3 years old.
I have never had any issues with them

Raam

Might it be the wheels? I had a recent issue where I couldn't get the skewer to tighten. I had to adjust the wheel. I guess you could swap out the skewers with another set to rule them out.

Planet X

Enigma Ti. skewers on my Enigma. Never loosened. They have a flat fitting surface on the engaging side.......nearly sure. No probs anyway.

Dan2912

Get a couple of jagged washers and you're grand

letape

Are you sure they were sufficiently tightened

Planet X

Dan2912 wrote: »

Get a couple of jagged washers and you're grand

Have to be titanium washers though....

doozerie

Are the titanium skewers internal cam or external/exposed cam? With the odd exception I've found that external cam skewers are not nearly as reliable. You might be hitting the same issue.

Usually they are okay initially, mind you, but after being used for a while the cam mechanism gets "contaminated" and when I next open and close them they feel very stiff. It feels like they are too tight so the tendency is to loosen the nut on the far end and it still feels like it is gripping the dropouts quite tightly. In reality, the resistance is friction in the cam mechanism, not pressure against the dropout, so it's not gripping the dropouts very tightly at all. Lubing the cam mechanism usually sorts it out temporarily.

I'm moving to internal cam for all of my wheels. In my case this means choosing Shimano and Mavic skewers, the Mavic composite ones I consider nicer but also a lot more expensive that either XT or Ultegra ones for no obvious (to me) performance gain other than slightly reduced weight. The only external cam skewers that I'll continue to use are my Rolf Prima ones as they are quite good, probably due to the brass surface that the skewer handle bears against, it doesn't seem so prone to friction problems.

Mellon

Hi Rok On,

I had this problem with my ti skewers when I first bought them. The frame (seatstays/drops) where the wheel mounts seemed to be about 0.5mm too thick for the clamping of the skewer nut to the freehub body. If that makes sense.
I ended up removing 0.5mm of material from the inner side of the skewer nut on a lathe...fixed the problem.
Or
You could file the small amount from the hub body
I'd post pictures to help but dont have that option.