Shimano Shifter - long travel

[sparkins]

Hi all,

This is my first post and I am delighted to find the site.

I ride a Ridgeback Genesis Day 02 flat barred road bike with a Tiagra triple on the front with shimano rapid fire type shifters. The problem I have is that the shifter for the Front rings i.e. the left hand one has a huge amount of travel before it shifts up. Shifting down is fine, but I have got to the point where I have to take my hand off the bar to push it as my thumb can't push it far enough when I am holding the grips.

Does anyone have any ideas - would it be a strip down and clean, or is there some kind of adjustment I can perform?

Many thanks for any ideas and help you can offer - I imagine this post will be the first of many as i have suddenly decided after years of spending for minor repairs and adjustments that I need to become more self sufficient :-)

[DaveM]

You say "gotten to the point" which leads me to believe that it has gotten worse. There could be slack in the cable. When you click all the way down to the small chainring, does the cable still have a little tension on it, or is it completely loose?

[sparkins]

Thanks for the reply Dave - yep it has certainly deteriorated in the past few months. Certainly when I compare it to my right hand (rear shifter) where the gear changes are short, positive thumb clicks, there is a huge difference. I will check cable tension in the morning and post my findings - it's bed time almost over here.

[sparkins]

Just checked cable tension and in the inner chainring it was really slack, have increased cable tension and will give the bike a spin at lunch after I have fixed my puncture...

Thanks for the help

Stephen

[sparkins]

Good evening - I increased the tension for the chainring shifter cable and while it definitely improved shifting up from the smallest ring to the middle one and the large ring, when I came to shift down from the large ring it always missed the middle ring and went directly to the small ring. Have fiddled around with it for a couple of hours this evening but to no avail. I have slackened it off again and I can now shift in both directions but when I shift up I have the same problem that I started with and when I shift down I have to click the shifter twice.

[trevgbb]

Disconnect the cable and check that is free to move in the outer casing, replace if in doubt, set the inner and outer stop to the correct position by manually moving the changer, also check the height and alignment at the same time.

If the shifter has adjustment, return this to the fully in position and reconnect the cable, make sure that it is taut and that the shifter is in the proper gear. You may need to use the adjuster to tauten the cable a little more if not shifting smoothly, but if the stops have been set properly and the cable is not rusted, you should have proper shifting.

see also http://bikeride.com/adjust-front-derailer/