Should I accept the chain rubbing on the front derailleur?
Posted: 13 Jun 2018, 12:04pm
Hi All,
I've currently got a problem, mainly of my own making, with the front derailleur on my 2016 Kona Roadhouse bike ( http://2016.konaworld.com/roadhouse.cfm ).
The drive train components include the following although I can’t see which specific model codes apply to each part.
Front derailleur: Shimano 105
Rear derailleur: Shimano Ultegra
Rear cassette: Shimano 105 11-32t 11spd
Front Chain Rings: 34/50t
Now up until yesterday I'd never made any adjustments at all to the gears and all was working pretty much fine. However I had noticed that at the extremes of the cassette I would get some noise when say in the small ring and 1st & 2nd gears or the big ring and the 10th & 11th gear cogs on the rear cassette.
In all honesty I don’t really use the extremes at either end of the cassette very often because I live in Norfolk and although there are some lumps to go up & down it’s not as if we have long mountain ascents or descents. However when going downhill I would sometimes get into either 10th or 11th and always notice some noise coming from the drivetrain. Therefore when cleaning the bike I decided to look at this and on inspection I noticed that the chain was rubbing on the derailleur when at the extremes of either the easiest or hardest gears.
Now in hindsight I wished that I’d left things well alone without touching a thing and had just lived with the noise at the extremes of the cassette, given that I hardly ever use them, because other than that in the middle of the cassette everything was working absolutely fine. Unfortunately I didn’t do this and I watched a few videos including the following and decided to have a go at adjusting the front derailleur to try and get 1mm of distance in-between the chain and the derailleur as recommended in these videos.
https://youtu.be/Ea03ChN-7Vg
https://youtu.be/ZNG7g83lI-s
https://youtu.be/sQkvCmg1ckM
Now starting with the chain in the small chain ring and in 1st gear on the cassette I tried to use the limit adjustment screw to move the derailleur but it didn’t go anywhere at all. At first I thought maybe I was using the wrong limit screw and so I tried the other but again nothing moved. On the videos that I’d watched it said that this may happen because the cable tension is too tight and if this was the case I should undo it. Therefore I undid the bolt on the cable clamp to let the cable go completely loose and then I was able to adjust the derailleur to get 1mm of distance in-between the chain and the derailleur when in the small ring and in 1st gear.
However from that point it’s gone wrong because having put the cable back into place and secured it with the bolt the front derailleur will no longer put the chain into the big ring. Now before I undid the cable I made a note of how much cable was showing above the clamp at it was 5.5cm. However even when using a pair of pliers to try and grip the cable to pull it tight the most that I can get above the clamp is about 5.2cm. Therefore I’m wondering it this might be part of the problem. The videos said that I could use a barrel adjuster on the cable to make adjustments. However on my bike where the cable is secured to the frame at the top of down tube the bare cable enters a cable outer at the point where there is a braze on but this doesn’t seem to move/twist/turn at all. Further up the cable and roughly half way in-between the top of the down tube and where the cable goes on into the shifter there is a very small barrel which spins. I tried turning this to see if it would help at all but I couldn’t detect any movement or change in the slightest. Therefore I don’t know whether this is a barrel adjuster or not because if there was any movement I couldn’t detect it but either way it hasn’t helped.
I’m now stuck in the small chain ring only and so I’m probably going to admit to defeat due to my mechanical ineptitude and take it to a LBS for them to take a look at.
Now at worst I’d like them to get it back to how it was before I touched it but ideally to a point of improvement on before whereby there is no longer any rubbing of the chain against the derailleur in the extremes of either the easiest or hardest gear.
However last night when continuing reading on this subject I read this on the Park Tool website ( https://www.parktool.com/blog/repair-help/front-derailleur-adjustment#article-section-9 );
“9. Front Derailleur Performance
The front derailleur should shift the chain between chain rings without throwing the chain off the extreme outer and inner rings. It is possible that the front derailleur will rub the chain slightly even on properly adjusted bikes. This is likely on some bikes when riding in the largest sprocket in front and the smallest cog in back.”
Now I wish that I’d read this before I ever tried to adjust anything at all because should I just have accepted that the chain will rub against the derailleur when in say 1st or 2nd and 10th & 11th gears and so even after my bike has been to the LBS this is the best situation that I can expect to have or should it be possible to get the front derailleur setup without the chain rubbing on it?
Thanks to anyone for any advice!
John
I've currently got a problem, mainly of my own making, with the front derailleur on my 2016 Kona Roadhouse bike ( http://2016.konaworld.com/roadhouse.cfm ).
The drive train components include the following although I can’t see which specific model codes apply to each part.
Front derailleur: Shimano 105
Rear derailleur: Shimano Ultegra
Rear cassette: Shimano 105 11-32t 11spd
Front Chain Rings: 34/50t
Now up until yesterday I'd never made any adjustments at all to the gears and all was working pretty much fine. However I had noticed that at the extremes of the cassette I would get some noise when say in the small ring and 1st & 2nd gears or the big ring and the 10th & 11th gear cogs on the rear cassette.
In all honesty I don’t really use the extremes at either end of the cassette very often because I live in Norfolk and although there are some lumps to go up & down it’s not as if we have long mountain ascents or descents. However when going downhill I would sometimes get into either 10th or 11th and always notice some noise coming from the drivetrain. Therefore when cleaning the bike I decided to look at this and on inspection I noticed that the chain was rubbing on the derailleur when at the extremes of either the easiest or hardest gears.
Now in hindsight I wished that I’d left things well alone without touching a thing and had just lived with the noise at the extremes of the cassette, given that I hardly ever use them, because other than that in the middle of the cassette everything was working absolutely fine. Unfortunately I didn’t do this and I watched a few videos including the following and decided to have a go at adjusting the front derailleur to try and get 1mm of distance in-between the chain and the derailleur as recommended in these videos.
https://youtu.be/Ea03ChN-7Vg
https://youtu.be/ZNG7g83lI-s
https://youtu.be/sQkvCmg1ckM
Now starting with the chain in the small chain ring and in 1st gear on the cassette I tried to use the limit adjustment screw to move the derailleur but it didn’t go anywhere at all. At first I thought maybe I was using the wrong limit screw and so I tried the other but again nothing moved. On the videos that I’d watched it said that this may happen because the cable tension is too tight and if this was the case I should undo it. Therefore I undid the bolt on the cable clamp to let the cable go completely loose and then I was able to adjust the derailleur to get 1mm of distance in-between the chain and the derailleur when in the small ring and in 1st gear.
However from that point it’s gone wrong because having put the cable back into place and secured it with the bolt the front derailleur will no longer put the chain into the big ring. Now before I undid the cable I made a note of how much cable was showing above the clamp at it was 5.5cm. However even when using a pair of pliers to try and grip the cable to pull it tight the most that I can get above the clamp is about 5.2cm. Therefore I’m wondering it this might be part of the problem. The videos said that I could use a barrel adjuster on the cable to make adjustments. However on my bike where the cable is secured to the frame at the top of down tube the bare cable enters a cable outer at the point where there is a braze on but this doesn’t seem to move/twist/turn at all. Further up the cable and roughly half way in-between the top of the down tube and where the cable goes on into the shifter there is a very small barrel which spins. I tried turning this to see if it would help at all but I couldn’t detect any movement or change in the slightest. Therefore I don’t know whether this is a barrel adjuster or not because if there was any movement I couldn’t detect it but either way it hasn’t helped.
I’m now stuck in the small chain ring only and so I’m probably going to admit to defeat due to my mechanical ineptitude and take it to a LBS for them to take a look at.
Now at worst I’d like them to get it back to how it was before I touched it but ideally to a point of improvement on before whereby there is no longer any rubbing of the chain against the derailleur in the extremes of either the easiest or hardest gear.
However last night when continuing reading on this subject I read this on the Park Tool website ( https://www.parktool.com/blog/repair-help/front-derailleur-adjustment#article-section-9 );
“9. Front Derailleur Performance
The front derailleur should shift the chain between chain rings without throwing the chain off the extreme outer and inner rings. It is possible that the front derailleur will rub the chain slightly even on properly adjusted bikes. This is likely on some bikes when riding in the largest sprocket in front and the smallest cog in back.”
Now I wish that I’d read this before I ever tried to adjust anything at all because should I just have accepted that the chain will rub against the derailleur when in say 1st or 2nd and 10th & 11th gears and so even after my bike has been to the LBS this is the best situation that I can expect to have or should it be possible to get the front derailleur setup without the chain rubbing on it?
Thanks to anyone for any advice!
John