RF: Ascertain whether the cable to the FD is slack or loose when you are on the smallest cog. If so, loosen cinch bolt and pull cable snug.
2011-06-24 02:28:51
10
My front derailleur won't shift up
So I've demonstrated to most people I know that I know basically nothing about bike maintenance.
Today I started having trouble shifting into gears 2/3 up front. I have to go all the way to 3 to get into 2, and I can't get into 3 at all. Is there an easy way to fix this, or will it involve lots of video watching/trial and error? either is fine, so long as I can do it myself.
any advice is appreciated.
2011-06-24 02:16:25
I cant believe I forgot about this, but the housing/cable on my front shifter definitely need to be replaced. could that be the problem?
2011-06-24 02:31:15
That would do it. Swing by gerry's and someone will probably show you how to replace it yourself. It's a pretty easy repair.
2011-06-24 02:34:41
Affirmative. Good diagnosis. Since you're going to replace it anyway, spraying some wd-40 in there won't hurt, and might help in the short term. I like an aerosolized Teflon product for this, and if you happen to have some, it would be preferred.
2011-06-24 02:36:09
My money is on the cable housing. You might be able to compensate with the barrell adjusters alone.
2011-06-24 02:36:29
okay cool. I might even have time to do it tomorrow. I was able to manually place the chain on the third ring this morning, but a few minutes ago on my way home, it wasn't staying. It's weird, as recently as yesterday, I had no trouble shifting at all.
I just need to learn to not let a problem sit for a long time - the cable has been exposed and rusting for a while now because I'm too lazy to fix it. I gotta stop that.
2011-06-24 02:37:34
You don't have enough tension on the cable.
What kind of shifters do you have? What kind of front der are you running?
If this problem is manifesting it's self that quickly, I bet the head of your cable is starting to break off inside of the shifter. Either that or your cable housing split and exploded somewhere (you would see that pretty easily).
2011-06-25 12:39:18
Exactly. Pretty soon you're only going to have one usable ring - the smallest. Fix it!
2011-06-25 14:47:29
Either that or your cable housing split and exploded somewhere
This was the case, and I replaced the housing, messed around with the slack on the cable and the h/l screws in the derailleur. I can shift now, but as it turned out, my bottom bracket is also loose and I have no idea how to fix that. Hopefully I'll have time to make it up there again on Tuesday.
2011-06-26 06:40:22