td.tony

i have an 08' jamis aurora elite and it has shimano 105 shifters. I put about 1000 miles since i got it and noticed that the rear derailleur wasnt shifting as fast as it used to, certain gears wouldn't even shift until i started mashing down on the pedals. So, i figured it was time for an adjustment and i thought i would try to do it myself using a youtube video. if i messed up i could take it to rei and have them adjust it anyways.

So, i take off the tension on the cable, and i pedal to see if the chain rests on the bottom cog. it does, so i didnt adjust the hi lo limit at all. Then i just retensioned the cable, then tried to adjust the barrel.

BUT, when i pressed the shifter, nothing happened. when trying to shift to a bigger cog, it would click without any resitance at all, and then it wouldnt move at all. Then i pressed the smaller black lever and again, a click but no resistance at all, and also no movement of the cable or derailleur.

I took it to rei because i thought it was a problem with the derailleur or barrel screw, but he showed me that if he pulled on the cable, it shifted just fine, its just that the shifter wasnt doing anything.

So, was i not supposed to take off the tension of the cable before i did something with the shifters first??? is my shifter broken or does something just need to be adjusted in the shifter?? the guy at rei tonight said he didnt know what was wrong or how to fix it, and i had to wait until sunday when the master mechanic comes. I decided to leave my bike there.
i was actually planning to attempt my first century tomorrow, which is why i wanted to adjust it in the first place, but now i cant even bike until who knows when...

krems81 

Hard to believe a working shifter suddenly stopped working. Shift all the way down (up) before tightening cable. Maybe you tightened while deraileur was in a low gear (i.e., already pulling), and when you shifted down it naturally didn't do anything.

Next guess, improper seating of housing/cable in shifter is creating some kind of slack that is not getting taken up. Try tightening cable better.

td.tony

i just remembered that after i first loosened the cable, i pushed the lever to shift to a bigger gear, and then the lever was stuck there, then i pulled lever back in place. Maybe that is when something got misaligned in the shifter? or is that normal? but after the lever got stuck in that position and i just pulled it back in place, it never got stuck like that again.

tellyho

I'd give it the WD40 flush.

ehilge

hmmm, curious problem. I will say that its not unheard of for shimano shifters to break though, I had a front 105 shifter with less than a 1000 miles on it go out on me a couple months ago. It sounds like a similar situation. At one point my chain got jammed between the derailleur and a chainring and it threw off the shifting. In the process of readjusting my derailleur, the shifter stopped working. It would pull the derailleur into high gear but wouldn't stick and consequently fall back when you let go of the lever. I think I had the same situation where if you just pulled on the cable it worked fine. Luckly, the shifter was still under warranty (Shimano has a 1 year warranty on all parts I believe) and I got a new one free of charge. Anyway, my recomendation is to wait until Sunday when the master mechanic can look at it. No reason to take off on century ride if your bike is broken.

San Rensho 

Agree. Its probably the grease in the shifter that has hardened. Spray a bunch of WD40 into the shifter mechanism, run through the gears and it should start working again.

To rule out the rear der, put the chain on the smallest cog and as you turn the pedals, grab the shift cable and pull it. If it moves through all the cogs, the der is ok.

johnny0

something like this happened to me on my left shimano 105 shifter last year. the problem was it had settings for three chainrings and i only have two. i shifted to the big ring, forgot about it, shifted again and the level got stuck. i pulled it back and something inside the shifter broke and there's no noise when i shift nor does the RD stay in position. easiest way to check would be to loosen the cable and test that the shifter still works normal without tension. since the bike's in the shop, might as well wait till monday and find out.

dont pay too much for the left shifter, $150 at nashbar.com gets you a pair of triple ultegras that work fine with double/compact.

bbruce0

Where do you see this, I was looking at their website and did not see this. Maybe you could point me in the right direction. Thanks

Al1943

When this happened to my 9-speed D-A shifter I flushed it out with WD40 and it's work perfectly since then. My symptoms were the same as yours.
New shift cables and cable housings can also significantly improve shifter performance. STI shifters are susceptible to dirt and corrosion which cause increased friction in the housings.

Al

Not the Slowest

https://bike.shimano.com/publish/cont...warranty3.html

Check the link

fetad

That deal is over. I haven't seen those shifters on Nashbar for a couple weeks.

td.tony

thanks for all your responses guys, the problem is fixed.
so i decided to try and spray some wd40 in it, but in the process i tried to just shove the cable through the shifter while shifting up to see if it will snag and start pulling it in. I felt it go in a little but, and when i looked at the other side, the cable end was sticking out from the other side! then i realized that the cable end had fallen out of the seating in the shifter, so i shifted down all the way, then shifted up and held it there to keep it open, and pushed the cable in the seating. Then i shifted, and it pulled the cable perfectly. whew.

but the annoying thing is, theres a ticking sound whenever my right crank arm is passing 11-12 o clock now that wasnt there before yesterday... its not very loud, but its enough to drive me crazy after 40 minutes of *tick tick tick tick tick*. I tried adjusting my front derailleurs low limit but still the ticking is there. oh well, just another problem to fix.


I saw the ultegras for $150 on nashbar a few weeks ago and i actually checked last night just incase my shifters needed to be replaced and turns out they dont have that deal anymore. that was a great deal though, i heard they were $150 on chainlove before also.

krems81 

ok, just a shot in the dark here, but have you checked to see that its not just the but end of your derailleur cable sticking out so it hits the crankset? that would be right around 11-12 o'clock

mr.smith.pdx

This is EXACTLY what happened to ME this morning. I noticed this strange noise every time I bottomed out the left pedal. I tried pedaling one legged on both sides, tried a whole bunch of other things to isolate the noise and it turned out my FD cable end had bent a bit to the right and was grazing the inside of the crank on each stroke.

I have to admit that I felt a little bit stupid, but happy that I could resolve it so easily.

td.tony

krems, you da man.