Ask the experts

[D(C)]

Loosely related, but how many of you keep an extra shock in rotation to avoid service downtime and protect your endless summer? Same shock or different (eg air vs coil)? And now I’m curious if any shops have considered offering a rotation of common shocks to improve turnaround time. Assuming I could get the right tune (maybe too many variables here?) and reliable quality, I probably wouldn’t care if I wasn’t riding _my_ shock so long as I never needed to wait more than a day for service. Seems like something Fox service dept could pretty easily manage. (they wouldn’t do this nefariously, but… do you always check your serial numbers after return?)


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I have two bikes, partly to avoid downtime.

[funkendrenchman]

Loosely related, but how many of you keep an extra shock in rotation to avoid service downtime and protect your endless summer? Same shock or different (eg air vs coil)? And now I’m curious if any shops have considered offering a rotation of common shocks to improve turnaround time. Assuming I could get the right tune (maybe too many variables here?) and reliable quality, I probably wouldn’t care if I wasn’t riding _my_ shock so long as I never needed to wait more than a day for service. Seems like something Fox service dept could pretty easily manage. (they wouldn’t do this nefariously, but… do you always check your serial numbers after return?)


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I have an extra fork because they all start creaking.

...and two bikes which I really don't need.

[chicken feathers]

Best way to get a seized rear thru axle out?
...It's a new Trek with the ABP pivot & UDH, both are new to me...With the axle in place the threads aren't obvious as they are on other bikes in the quiver, but I think that the 6mm hex head I see inside of the axle drive side (and inside the 8mm udh) is just the other side of the axle?

I think I'll need another helper to hold the UDH bolt (counter clockwise) to keep it from spinning with the axle?

If all else fails a trip to the LBS.

Thanks.

Took it to the shop. They found that the UDH had loosened up causing it to bind with the axle while riding. They were able to get it apart after messing with it for a few days.

Bike is a 23' Trek Fuel EX 8. Shop also said one other person had just brought one in with the same problem.

[altacoup]

How on gods earth do I get my sram brakes to be quite? Second pair of sram brakes, first were guides and sold bike before I could solve the issue and now have some codes that are driving me crazy. I went through the bed in process on both bikes and can’t get them to not be super loud. I’ve cleaned them with alcohol and re bed them, they start the ride fine and then halfway through the ride they’re super loud. They are actually quieter when braking hard, but light tap of brakes is ridiculously loud. Buy new pads and rotors (galfer) or does someone have a solution that doesn’t require me spending a bunch of money?


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[rideit]

Alcohol, sandpaper, heat. But not exactly in that order.
At least try some of those first.
Basically, remove pads and rotors. Scuff the pads (quite hard, until they look new again)on top of the sandpaper on the floor. Hit them with a propane torch, but not too long, or you can break down the adhesive that holds the actual pad to the backing plate.
Sand the rotor as well as you can, and try to clean thoroughly with alcohol. Hit everything with compressed air.
Reassemble, and reevaluate.
If that doesn’t work, start shopping!

[Andeh]

OK, so I recently cleaned then checked the stock NX chain on my ebike because it was starting to make a lot of noise even when visually cleaned and shortly after being lubed. Turns out that it was quite worn (easily failed the 0.5 test on chain checker) despite only having 600 miles on it. I put a degreased and freshly lubed X01 chain, cut to the same length. (Old chain had over 1/2 a link worth of elongation to it from the clapped out rollers, so it was definitely smoked.) I didn't touch the derailleur settings, as it was shifting fine before, although there were more instances of bangs when shifting under load. On first ride with the new chain, it shifts and pedals under load fine for gears 1-6 (largest cogs). When I start going into 7-10 and pedal with the motor (high load on it), it will frequently bang/jump until I either back off the torque or shift to lighter gear. My buddy says he had the same thing, and the solution was a new cassette. On normal bikes, I usually get 2000-3000 miles out of a cassette. Is it really possible that I thrashed this cassette in 600 miles along with the chain? I rode it a lot in truly shitty conditions this winter doing trail work, lots of wet sandy grit. I tend to pedal in gears 5-8, descend in gear 10. So the spots where it's banging are definitely in the range of high torque/load.

I've got an old (~2000 mile, wear is mostly on gears 1-2 and 9-10) X01 cassette from my last pedal bike I can put on and see if it does this on. Or I guess I could pull the cassette off my pedal bike and try it also. I'm just a little bit shocked that I went through a drivetrain that fast on the moped.

[toast2266]

The NX chains are shit, and the moped basically doubles the force that a normal person would be putting into the drivetrain. Not too surprising the chain didn't last long. And if the chain was super worn and was used in the same gears a lot on the cassette, it's also not too surprising that it killed the cassette.

The better quality sram chains last much, much longer.

[Whiteroom_Guardian]

How on gods earth do I get my sram brakes to be quite? Second pair of sram brakes, first were guides and sold bike before I could solve the issue and now have some codes that are driving me crazy. I went through the bed in process on both bikes and can’t get them to not be super loud. I’ve cleaned them with alcohol and re bed them, they start the ride fine and then halfway through the ride they’re super loud. They are actually quieter when braking hard, but light tap of brakes is ridiculously loud. Buy new pads and rotors (galfer) or does someone have a solution that doesn’t require me spending a bunch of money?


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How thick are those Galfers? Last year I switched to the 2.0mm HS2 rotors and MTX pads. Not sure what it is about those pads, but they last a REALLY long time and paired with the thicker rotors have tons of power. Super super quiet too.

[MegaStoke]

How thick are those Galfers? Last year I switched to the 2.0mm HS2 rotors and MTX pads. Not sure what it is about those pads, but they last a REALLY long time and paired with the thicker rotors have tons of power. Super super quiet too.

This. HS2s and MTX pads (either red or gold) are the shit.

[jm2e]

I am plagued by noisy brakes. The HS2 are my current go to for quiet making.
I’ve had some luck with Galfers, but with several different cut out designs, I can’t make any sweeping statements about them.


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[Andeh]

The NX chains are shit, and the moped basically doubles the force that a normal person would be putting into the drivetrain. Not too surprising the chain didn't last long. And if the chain was super worn and was used in the same gears a lot on the cassette, it's also not too surprising that it killed the cassette.

The better quality sram chains last much, much longer.

That's kind of what I figured. I should have thrown the NX chain straight to the trash can when I got the ebike, but I figured I'd use it until it wore out then quickly replace it. Unfortunately I didn't realize it would wear out THAT fast, and take out the cassette along with it.

[Eluder]

That's kind of what I figured. I should have thrown the NX chain straight to the trash can when I got the ebike, but I figured I'd use it until it wore out then quickly replace it. Unfortunately I didn't realize it would wear out THAT fast, and take out the cassette along with it.

GX Chains are not much better, just pony up for an X0.

[natebob]

didn't make sense

[Andeh]

GX Chains are not much better, just pony up for an X0.

Yeah, rather than sink money into another GX (or even X01) cassette for this thing, I was going to use this as an excuse to get the XO Transmission setup. The 1-ride X01 chain I'll save for my enduro bike, which currently has a relatively fresh X01 cassette & XX1 chain. I should probably rotate chains on that one to avoid repeating this mistake.

[XXX-er]

I ran about 1100kms on the NX chain riding in boost 99% of the time and didnt think it wore particularly badly, after a season I upgraded to GX just cuz I thot it might be time and kept the old one for spare

I haven't had any trouble at all with any of the NX, it doesn't seem any better or worse than the XT I had on the last bike, back in the days I used a lot of sach pc-61 and then 971 not many shimano but I'm pretty sure someone hates them as well, in general buy the higher quality but not necessarily the most expensve and all will be fine

I was ok with the ZEB too

I guess its one of those ymmv things

[Whiteroom_Guardian]

Anyone actually running Transmission yet and have 50+ miles on theirs?

[carlh]

My cargo bike cracker at the seat tube gusset weld and they want $500 for a replacement frame. Feels a bit steep but otherwise the pile of parts including a Bosch motor are not really useable.
Any ideas other than pony up the cash?
They also won’t share any technical docs for the build swap which is bullshit.

[XXX-er]

How on gods earth do I get my sram brakes to be quite? Second pair of sram brakes, first were guides and sold bike before I could solve the issue and now have some codes that are driving me crazy. I went through the bed in process on both bikes and can’t get them to not be super loud. I’ve cleaned them with alcohol and re bed them, they start the ride fine and then halfway through the ride they’re super loud. They are actually quieter when braking hard, but light tap of brakes is ridiculously loud. Buy new pads and rotors (galfer) or does someone have a solution that doesn’t require me spending a bunch of money?


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I had a lower end hydralic brake on a fat bike that made a lot of noise pretty much from new

I cleaned/ scuffed the padz, took the bike up a very long steep hill and did repeated panic stops all the way down

seemed to cure the noise

[toast2266]

My cargo bike cracker at the seat tube gusset weld and they want $500 for a replacement frame. Feels a bit steep but otherwise the pile of parts including a Bosch motor are not really useable.
Any ideas other than pony up the cash?
They also won’t share any technical docs for the build swap which is bullshit.

Is it steel or aluminum?

If it's steel, I'd get a local welding shop to fix it up.

[joetron]

Anyone actually running Transmission yet and have 50+ miles on theirs?

I’ve got it on my Rail29. It’s ok. The shifting is slow. Kinda hard for me to recommend, honestly. The durability is sweet and the shifts are solid - no matter what, but they are slow, especially when trying to grab a few and my cadence is a little slow.

We just put a Linkglide set up on my service mgr’s Levo, and that is stuff is pretty sick so far. If Shimano was able to make a lighter Linkglide cassette, it would be all time.


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[Dee Hubbs]

Anyone actually running Transmission yet and have 50+ miles on theirs?

Not my bike but 2 athletes that I look after, one has close to 1000k, the other I would assume 500+k on it.
The 1000k one is in my garage now for a brake bleed. No shifting issues, no adjustments needed or wear noticed so far.

[Whiteroom_Guardian]

I wonder if the slow shifting was intentionally engineered for initial release and some kind of firmware upgrades will speed it up in the future?

[Jtlange]

Anyone actually running Transmission yet and have 50+ miles on theirs?

No issues. I think SRAM made a good product to compete with Shimano's shifting and actually fully wireless. Just make sure you tighten down the derailleur enough before your first ride. They also mostly fixed their terrible cassette spacing. If you want it, I wouldn't steer you away from it. If you like cable stuff, hard to compete with Shimano right now.

[Boissal]

Anyone chewing through grips, and not because of crashing? I've been running ESI foam grips and switched to ODI grips last year, on both I tend to burn a hole really quickly at the spot where the outside of my hand/based on my pinky contacts the grip. I don't think I'm overgripping or moving my hands too much. Indication that my bar roll is wrong and I put much more pressure on the outside of my hands?

[carlh]

It’s aluminum so welding isn’t really an option