04-06-2014, 11:30 PM
Hi,
While fixing a broken chain, the chain came completely off of my rear derailleur. I fed it back through (in a way I thought was right) and fixed the chain. When I tried riding the bike again, it pedaled smoothly at first but gradually became choppier and then became so slack that pedaling was ineffective.
In trying to figure out what went wrong, I noticed that the arrangement of the rear derailleur pulleys had changed. The first two attached photos show what they look like now. They basically do nothing to support the chain. If I hold the lower pulley back, as shown in the third attachment, the chain appears to feed through everything properly, but when I let go, the pulley springs back to the position in the other photos. The upper pulley can also be pushed forward (so that the part in the photo that says "GOLDEN-SUN" would be horizontal), which is how every photo of normal derailleurs I can find looks.
Can anyone tell me what I did wrong? My understanding is that the purpose of those pulleys is to take up slack in the chain. When I fixed my chain, I did end up shortening it, but it still looked like there was plenty of slack. Can a short chain cause this problem?
Any help you can give me would be greatly appreciated.
While fixing a broken chain, the chain came completely off of my rear derailleur. I fed it back through (in a way I thought was right) and fixed the chain. When I tried riding the bike again, it pedaled smoothly at first but gradually became choppier and then became so slack that pedaling was ineffective.
In trying to figure out what went wrong, I noticed that the arrangement of the rear derailleur pulleys had changed. The first two attached photos show what they look like now. They basically do nothing to support the chain. If I hold the lower pulley back, as shown in the third attachment, the chain appears to feed through everything properly, but when I let go, the pulley springs back to the position in the other photos. The upper pulley can also be pushed forward (so that the part in the photo that says "GOLDEN-SUN" would be horizontal), which is how every photo of normal derailleurs I can find looks.
Can anyone tell me what I did wrong? My understanding is that the purpose of those pulleys is to take up slack in the chain. When I fixed my chain, I did end up shortening it, but it still looked like there was plenty of slack. Can a short chain cause this problem?
Any help you can give me would be greatly appreciated.