Bicycle gear shift faulty or normal?
Good day everybody,
My girlfriend recently got a new bike from Decathlon. In the store, she was only able to test ride it briefly without shifting through all the gears. At home, she noticed that she had to shift three to four times to change gears in the higher gears (1, 2, and 3). The left "shift lever mechanism" has 12 shifts/"clicks."
This is very unusual for us. We've only ever had bikes where a major gear change can be accomplished with just one shift.
The lower gears work perfectly, requiring only one shift each. (Exactly as many shifts/clicks on the shift lever as the number of gears)
Is this normal, or is it a problem? If you shift less than three or four times during a major gear change, the chain will rattle and drag.
Here is the link to the inexpensive bike:
Thank you very much!
Greetings
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I don't really understand what the problem is… Please describe it in more detail.
Very strange. There should be six, because that's how the seven sprockets on the rear wheel are shifted. They shift through once with six shifts.
The principle is actually quite simple: one shift lever is used for coarse adjustment, the other for fine adjustment.
What you need to make sure is that the chain isn't too skewed. If you're on the small chainring at the front, you shouldn't use the two smallest rear sprockets, and if you're on the large chainring at the front, you shouldn't use the two largest rear sprockets (I don't know what the numbers are on the shift indicator). So, you should use the "coarse adjustment" and not, for example, try to find a gear for the descent on the small chainring, which is used for steep climbs.
The gear system may be able to shift three or four sprockets at once under favorable conditions (when pedaling with light force). But it's not really designed for that. One sprocket at a time, or two if necessary.
Generally, you shouldn't shift gears while pedaling at full throttle. The chain needs to be moving for the shifting process, but you should ease off the pedal pressure significantly for one or two pedal strokes and only accelerate again once the gear is engaged.
If the gear doesn't engage smoothly even with light pressure on the pedal and a small shift, or if the chain rattles and clatters while engaged, the gears are not adjusted correctly or are slightly bent. Especially on a new bike, it's not uncommon for the shift cable to stretch a bit and need to be re-tightened to adjust the gears correctly.
"I don't really understand what the problem is… Please describe it in more detail."
Okay, I'll try:
The bike has three "major" gears: one, two, and three (pinions near the pedals, controlled by the shift lever on the left handlebar)…
…and seven "small/fine" gears (pinion on the rear wheel, controllable by means of the shift lever on the right side of the handlebar).
To move from 1st to 2nd gear (or from 2nd to 3rd, or from 3rd to 2nd, etc.) in the "big" gears, it's not enough to just shift once. A single gear change requires four shifts. This means that if you want to move from pinion 1 to pinion 2, four shifts are required.
The "small" gears work with just one shift, so no problem.
Thank you
The one at the front of the pedals is called crank the toothing on the chain runs on the chainring and not on the pinion a pinion sits more on the freewheel on the rear wheel, the thing which is responsible for switching to another chainring, front derailleur and on. I suspect this is due to too little tension, ergo the gearshift is set modestly as with the
Most Chibabikes are factory-made. So, I'll take it back to the dealer so they can fix it, but if I'm being completely honest? I probably wouldn't have taken the bike from the link even if it were a gift. It's got really bad components, etc.
By the way, the front sprockets are called "chainrings"
Ah, I didn't see that you meant the left switch. It's a twist-grip switch, right?
They sometimes have a detent between gears so the twist grip doesn't snap back if you accidentally turn it a bit too far to the next gear. It's almost like a ratchet. However, you're still not at the next gear, which should also be indicated by the gear indicator. It's just so you can grab hold of the knob and turn it further to the desired gear.
It's quite simple: The left side of the pedals, where the shifting is, doesn't have any fixed gears in the shifter. You should do it with feeling. The advantage: You can also adjust it slightly if the derailleur rattles somewhere. It's a stepless twist-grip shifter (or shift lever, I can't see where it's coming from). It's really quite practical.
3 x 7 = 21, but only in mathematics. With this gearshift, you have 21 gear combinations, but only 9 gears. With the front (left) gear on 1 or 3, you get two more gears. All other combinations result in the same gear ratios.
If you shift on the left, it's as if you shift on the right twice, so two gears at once.
The chain shouldn't run at an angle. That is, it shouldn't run small-to-small or large-to-large.
If you can explain all this to your girlfriend, you're a genius!
…no, that's not normal! I assume "big gear shift" means shifting at the front of the bottom bracket and not at the rear wheel…here, too, just pulling the shift lever once should be enough. And since it's a Shimano system, I'm sure that's actually the case (without exception) (it works on my current bike, but also on my over 30-year-old mountain bike with Shimano gears). So something is defective or misadjusted…but that shouldn't happen even on inexpensive bikes. Off to the dealer and have them repaired!