How To Tune Up A Mountain Bike Derailleur

Learn how to properly adjust the rear shifting on your bike for better performance.
How to tune up a mountain bike derailleur. Break your chain with a chain tool or if your chain is joined by a connecting pin by removing the pin use a new pin to rejoin the chain. You need to check the important areas of your bike such as levers handlebars stem shifters seat post seat derailleurs breaks pedals and cranks. The majority of front shifting problems can be solved with basic adjustments to the limit screws and index setting of the front derailleur system. In this video we ll show you how to properly set.
Even if you have not built your bike yourself this is an essential skill to learn to help prolong the life of your bike. Watch a rear derailleur tuning in action. The bike i use for the demonstration is a trek madone equipped with a shimano ultegra derailleur. Get your gears running as smoothly as possible with our guide to indexing and adjusting.
With the bike held off the ground and the chain now on the largest cog at the back test the front derailleur by moving the chain between the smallest and next chainring using the gear lever. Now its time to fine tune the derailleur. You ll need to either lift the bike into a bike stand or flip the bike over so that it rests on the seat and handlebars. Mountain bike tune up checklist notice the bolts and grip the handlebar with the stem.
How to fix the shifting on your bike. In this video. How to adjust your rear derailleur on a mountain bike. Prop the bike up so you can spin the wheels as you work.
The majority of rear shifting problems can be solved with basic adjustments to the limit screws and index setting of the rear derailleur system. To adjust a derailleur you ll need to pedal the bike while working. You can take your mountain bike to specialist bike dealers to have your bike or trick scooter tuned however as you have built it yourself it s worth knowing how to tune it up as part of maintenance yourself as well as save some money. If it shifts up to bigger gears fine but down to smaller gears not so well then you will want to tunr the barrel adjuster in.