This is my very first post to these boards…
First, a little bit of history. I bought a Fisher Marlin about 4? years ago and rode it very hard for at least two seasons. Being a middle of the road kind of bike, the components weren’t that great and they took a pretty good beating. I rode in some pretty harsh conditions. By the end of the second season some real maintenance was definitely in order. The biggest problem was that, as I rotated the pedals with a bit of force, every few revolutions would cause some sort of skip on the rear cassette. I’m not sure if it was shifting half way through gears or what.
So this year I took every moving part off the bike except for the crank case, and cleaned it. I put everything back together along with a new chain, cables, and housings. My first ride was a 40 mile trip on a rails-to-trails and the bike performed flawlessly. It shifted well and everything was very smooth and clean. A couple days after that ride I decided to get out and hit some singletrack and everything went to pieces. The problem began again where every few revolutions of the pedals results in a skipping on the rear cassette. It’s incredibly annoying and makes the bike pretty much impossible to ride. I took it home and went to work adjusting the rear derailleur. I’m certainly not a bike mechanic, I just kind of figured things out as I went. I also downloaded the manual for the rear derailleur so I could figure out what each screw did. I thought I had it fixed so last night I brought it out to another local rails-to-trails to test it and it was still skipping every few revolutions of the pedals.
It’s almost like the chain advances one slot on the cassette or if it’s trying to shift but doesn’t. It’s not every single revolution of the pedals, just like every fourth or fifth time around.
Anyone have any advice? Should I just bring it to the LBS for a tune-up or is there a trick to adjusting the rear derailleur? It seems like if I go too far with the cable, the derailleur doesn’t want to shift right, and if I don’t go far enough with the cable, the derailleur is in the spokes.
Any help or advice would certainly be appreciated. Thanks in advance…