joeyduck

The Story
After months of shopping I found a bike for me. It is a 1999 Rocky Mountain Turbo, Time carbon fork, Easton Ultralite Tubes, full Ultegra 6500 groupset, Ultegra hubs laced to Mavic Open Pros, Ritchey headset and it had one owner. It fit me almost perfect, it was nimble, spry, comfortable and fast. The drive train was relatively new, the frame only have a bit of scuff from cable rub on the headtube and some minor road grime on the downtube. The fork was nice, clean, smooth and looked immaculate. Most importantly it also met my cost/quality/benefit criteria; I got it for $450.

Before buying it I took it for a 10-15 km test ride and ran it through its paces; it felt and worked great. I gave it fairly thorough look over, all things looked well and good with the physical and mechanical aspects. I rode it to work last week, worked fine, a little upshift hiccup on one part; didn’t think too much, ran through the gears and seemed okay on the way home.

Yesterday was my second ride on it, I went to work and back (11 km each way). On the way home at the top of the hill I upshifted in the chain ring and downshifted the cassette, I went to 53-19, went to 21 on the cassette. Coasting to the light, it turns green so I start. Click, click, upshift, no go?! Played, fiddled, stopped, inspected and every basic thing. Nothing to make it upshift. I puttered home the last km or two home while cross chainringing in 53-23, sad face.

The Dilemma
After research I find the 6500 series brifters are known to fail/wear out in the manner. Fair enough they are 15 years old, foolish me.

The Optimistic Solution
This weekend I am going to try to flush with WD-40 and relube and check the cables.

The Query
Assuming full failure what should I do, please answer the five questions below.

1. Tear down and rebuild it?
2. Replace the shifter with a 6500 off ebay and risk another failure, but keep groupset consistency?
3. Get a 9 speed Tiagra and ignore appearance. Will this play nice with the rest of the Ultegra components?
4. Upgrade to 10 speed. If I go 10 speed will I need (a) a new chainrings or (b) will I be able to put on a new brifter, cassette and chain?
5. If I am getting a new groupset, would my rear hub be compatible with 11 speed?

Retro Grouch 

Live one day at a time, baby. I'm betting on the optimistic solution. Don't jump off the "full failure" bridge till you come to it.

noglider 

Put loads of lubricant in it every day for three weeks or until it works properly again.

You may want to replace the cables and housings for good measure. Be sure to use proper STI-type gear cable housing.

peterw_diy

Pessimistic option 6: buy 11s Ergopower shifters and run a Shimergo setup.

joeyduck

It is the Friday of a long weekend. It gives me something to putter at to kill time at work. I am also one who tends to search and research for the solution which will provide me the most suitable outcome (deal, functionality, compatibility and durability) This may be the beginning of a long search to ultimately replace the setup.

Do you recommend a specific lubricant? The housing and cable were are at the top of the list to eliminate that source of problem.

Retro Grouch 

Why that's half of my tool kit.

"If it doesn't move, and it's supposed to, spray it with WD40."
"If it moves, and it's not supposed to, wrap it with duck tape."

noglider 

Normally, I don't recommend WD-40 as a lubricant, but this is one place where it can help. Maybe even penetrant such as PB-Blaster would be good. I used WD-40 on my RSX-100 brifters. The brifters came to me totally dead. The pawls just didn't catch anywhere. Then after a few applications, I switched to automatic transmission fluid (ATF), which is only slightly thicker.

For what it's worth, I happen to like ATF as a general purpose bike lubricant. It's a little too thin for chains, but if it's all I have within reach, I don't mind using it at all.

Figure out a way to position the bike differently each night before applying lubricant. You want it to seep into lots and lots of tiny little spaces.

It's almost three years since I've had my Bianchi Volpe, and I'm still using the original brifters. The system is a little sluggish and imprecise, but only a little. Some of that may be because of slop that a cheap derailleur tends to acquire. I'm living with it.

It is possible to take these brifters apart, but it looks very involved, especially the reassembly. That's why I recommend the lubrication remedy.

joeyduck

Even if the 11 speed Campagnolgo fit that is way outside my budget.

cycle_maven

1) No, just the WD-40 flush should do the trick. Might take a whole can and a couple of days, but it sounds like sticky pawls. Add a little tri-flow after the WD. If the flush doesn't work, I wouldn't try the rebuild; I'd go with the Tiagra. They're cheap enough and really not that much different than the Ultegra of 15 years ago. Ahh, maybe I'd try a rebuild after all, but knowing full well my likelyhood of fixing it would be nearly nil if the pawls are actually worn out or the ratchet is chipped. But that's not too likely; it sounds like the shifters are just old, not abused. Ultegra shifter can go many tens of thousands of miles without wearing out or damage in normal use.
2) No, the grease in Ebay shifters of the same age will be pretty much dried out as well.
3) Yes. Absolutely.
4) a) No. b) Yes.
5) No.

joeyduck

Great, and thank you. I am hoping it to just be flushed out and re-greased and good to go.

It was giving me a great ride then I spun out at 25 km/h. I was 5 seconds off my best on one segment. And I coasted for 40 seconds to a red light and then couldn't upshift. I have to get it fixed smash more of my PRs.

intransit1217

Brifter. The word makes perfect sense. But my brain just won't adopt it. Is there another word that may be to my liking?

HillRider

Great suggestion. That should only triple the cost of this project.

FBinNY 

as should be the case with any boondoggle.

cycle_maven

Except I made a mistake in my answer- Tiagra is now 10-speed. But Sora 3500 is 9-speed and it has now lost the little extra paddle that previously made Sora so irritating. They're more like the Tiagra of old.