Mechanics and Fixing Any Questions Answered

What’s next? Tear down?

I'd say so. Used to be a bit easier with the external cable ones, as long as the 2mm grub screw holding the lever on wasn't rusted in and you weren't fussed about cutting the Flight Deck wires. These days you're up for a re-tape...

My guess is that some grit must have worked its way between a couple of fairly large faces rotating against each other, probably have to be getting on the size of a coin to hold the lever up against its return spring.

Sounds like worn threads on the steerer.

Probably new fork time.

Headset is fairly new so not much chance it's borked right?

I bought a 105 triple crank and chain set. In the pictures it was built up, when it arrived it was all in very nicely packaged and labelled parts.

I find the correct manual and put it back together and there's no way there's a chain going on smallest ring as it sits too close to middle ring. I have taken it apart 3 times to check that I have the 3 rings in correct alignment and I'm pretty sure I do. Biggest is obvious because of drop pin, middle is less obvious but you point a little arrow whichever way (in this case dead away from the crank) and I think it's facing the right way because there's little collar things that the mating bolts fit inside. and smallest you can see where to line it up with a logo inside.

Any thoughts?

I haven't done it up too tightly or anything like that because it sits too close to the middle ring without even doing it up. It feels like it would need a spacer but nothing showing like that on exploded drawings

This spacer? https://www.sjscycles.co.uk/chainsets/shimano-105-fc5603-chainset-spacer-3mm-1gf-1100/

I've got that spacer, the lack of space seems to be between the actual chain rings. Visibly there's not enough room for a chain and some of the teeth on smallest ring are sitting basically touching the middle ring.

I haven't put a chain on it yet because I don't have one (and currently it's in pieces again or I'd take a photo)

Or am I not understanding where that goes? 🤔

I've just realised what I'm doing

I bought a 105 triple crank

When, from where, and which model? None of the genuine Shimano 105 triples require a spacer between the inner ring and the spider. I've never seen a genuine Shimano chainset shipped in parts, OEMs would hate that because it's making them do work the Shimano factory should do, plus the risk of assembly errors and lost parts.

Picture?

I will try the thread tape thing and see if that helps. Thank you.

@kjlem - Agreed but there are there are limits to my knowledge. I was just looking to tap into the hive mind to help focus on where to start.

I didn't mean to be rude. I just meant that if you take it apart you will quickly see if the thread is damaged or too short.

What does aroogah mean by slipping. Is there a thread issue, with the fork thread or the top race thread.

The lack of clarity in the description suggests closer observation and some diagnostic fiddling is required, huh. @Aroogah - is it that the headset won't keep its adjustment, or, as you seem to be saying, somehow it won't let you adjust it in the first place?

No picture can adequately capture how stupid I was being.

I was building it wrong from the opening move.

@gbj_tester - it's a 10 speed triple, unsure of exact model number, bought from eBay and I guess the seller took it apart to clean it, it is indeed very clean. Anyway all the bits are there and I was just being an idiot

@Philbythesea - I did originally respond to this, but I've found some screengrabs of the Campag catalogue from 2014 on my phone. As the shifting wasn't quite right, they changed the spacers from all being 2.2mm wide, to all 2.2mm except for the one between 6th & 7th largest sprocket (in terms of teeth), and increased it to 2.3mm. Sounds ridiculous, but once I switched that in on my later Centaur cassette which contained 2.2mm spacers throughout, it made all the difference.

I didn't take that as rude! All good.

Taking it apart means I might not be able to put it back together and still have a functioning bike. Which changes school travel logistics in a bad way. Just being a bit cautious.

is it that the headset won't keep its adjustment, or, as you seem to be saying, somehow it won't let you adjust it in the first place?

A little from column A and a little from column B.

It won't keep the adjustment and won't allow me to set it without it being a little loose.

a little loose

As in, the steerer can actually move up and down in the head tube (which would be super weird on an unmolested machine with a threaded steerer), or it's loose because although you can put preload on the bearings, the cup moves horizontally on the steerer even with the locknut tightened?

After advice in the hope I don't end up taking a sledgehammer to the thing. Shifting issues with 11 spd SRAM Rival HRD. Clicking gears to go down the sprockets (as in from big to small, or from inside to out if you know what I mean), the mech will not move. A tug on the outer cable down by the chainstay solves this. I initially thought it was something at the shifter end, but new inner and outer cable plus a thorough clean of the shifter mechanism has made no difference. When riding, if you shift and the mech stays put, and shift again, the inner cable has a tendency to pop out of the spool as it has nowhere to go. I did read this can happen and a blob of superglue can help, but it's only papering over the cracks.
Now, with new cables etc, if there is no wheel in the bike the shifter does move on demand, not super snappy, but it moves. As soon as you put a wheel on (and chain) we are back to it not moving. Is this a mech issue? I've tried cleaning the pivots etc, with no joy.

tl;dr #fuckingsram

Is this a mech issue?

All the gears? If it gets worse as you get to the smaller sprockets, it's usually the parallelogram spring. If it's worse on the biggest sprockets it might be the B-pivot positioning screw needs winding in to give more clearance between the jockey wheel and the sprocket

All gears sadly.

As always, tester is right. The spring has lost strength. That's why the old guys always say to leave the bike in the small sprocket.

A tug on the outer cable down by the chainstay solves this.

This makes it sound more like a cable (or shifter) issue to me.

How exposed your cabling is will determine how easily you can identify the exact location of the issue.

I'd start with getting the chain down ontop the smallest cog however you can and then 'shift' by pulling on the first bit of exposed/available inner, which sounds like it'll be at the chainstay, as you pedal. Does it work as expected? If not then it's either mech related (b tension) or the last bit of outer. If it shifts fine there then move up the cable to the next place you can get to it which might be top of downtube if it's internally cabled, repeat the procedure and see how it works and so on.

This was a great suggestion. I thought I'd gone through every possible option in checking things. It lead me to the tiniest amount of drag on one of the cable ends.

It's now shifting again, not perfect, but functional. So potentially the issue is still there, and could well be the mech, but I'm mobile again.

Thanks for the tip.

but still, #fuckingsram