Bicycle Mechanics - Skewer is too long

Bought some cheapy skewers @ Performance and the rear one is too long and it goes thru the "nut" on the cassette side by about .25". Bugs the hell out of me. Should I; 1) live with it, 2) buy better ones or 3) cut the excess off using my dremel tool? If I do #3 won't the thread get messed up? And then it won't have that "rounded finish".

If the threads stop inside the nut, the rounded look won't matter much. Before you cut it off, thread a nut onto the skewer. Then after you cut it, when you take the nut back off, it will clean up the threads.

Dirtgrinder's advice is what I would have said. I suppose the skewer adjusting nut itself is a, well, nut. Just mark the properly adjusted skewer, remove the wheel, screw the nut down a few more turns, zip it off with an emery wheel in the old Dremel then put in a grinding stone and clean it up a bit. You can probably get close to that nice smooth finish. THEN back the nut off to clean up the threads. If you have or can find a plain nut that will fit, as DG suggested, that would protect the skewer nut from any mishaps. Most hardware store carry metrics, and most of the threads on bikes are standard metric size and pitch combinations.

Alright. I'll go ahead and give that a try.:beer:

Road skewers are 130mm, mtn are 135mm. You bought the wrong size, but then again, cutting the extra off won't hurt anything!

L8R

Well, just to clarify a bit for future readers of this thread, the current standard dropout widths are 130 mm for road, 135 mm mtb and some hybrids. The skewers are actually quite a bit longer.

Originally posted by RainmanP
Well, just to clarify a bit for future readers of this thread, the current standard dropout widths are 130 mm for road, 135 mm mtb and some hybrids. The skewers are actually quite a bit longer. Skewers are sold acording to OVER LOCKNUT dimension, and will be linger than that dimension by the appropriate amount

The skewer that came stock in the original Ultegra hub is just a tad short of protruding out of the "locknut". That is what I'm used to. I'll measure that Ultegra skewer and hack the new one to that same length.

Originally posted by Bobsled
And then it won't have that "rounded finish".
Just take a file and gently round off the end a little. It'd be a good idea in any case, just to get rid of sharp edges and burrs.

Done! Came out nice.