Hi all,

I have been given a Silver Fox Abyss MTB and haven't been able to set up the front gears. The changers are SRAM 3.0 comp but the front deralieur is "Falcon" branded, which doesn't seem right to me. I think it has been changed at some point and thus has never worked..

Presumably, I should have an SRAM front deralieur fitted to a bike with SRAM hand grips?

Can anyone a part number that I should be looking to buy? (The bike has three chain rings on the front)

No, as long as the actuation ratios are the same for the shifters and derailleur, you can mix and match any brand.

For your bike, do you really expect to get any better performance in upgrading the FD? Thinking that just putting some decent cables would probably improve the shifting issues you having.

Any Shimano low level FD will work for you . If the FD need replacing . If not check this out , Repair Help Articles | Park Tool , this should help .

Falcon is a company that makes cheap knock-offs of old Shimano derailleur designs.
Those SRAM 3.0 Comp twist shifters have a 1:1 actuation, which means SRAM derailleurs are needed to go with them. They won't work with Shimano derailleurs. The Shimano compatible versions say "MRX" on them (I have some in my parts bin).

EDIT: OK, I guess it doesn't matter for front derailleurs, where the cable pull for Shimano and SRAM are similar. You can't drive a Shimano rear derailleur with those shifters though. So that Falcon FD is probably just in need of service.

Well, the shifter doesn't seem to pull the derailler quite enough, if you see what I mean? I can adjust it so that it'll do rings one and two but not three or I can get it to do two and three but not one. It won't do all three, however.


I realise all the shifters/deralieurs are bottom of the range but the falcon one just appears to be a lot cheaper made than the others, if you see what I mean, so suspect it's a replacement. I'm not 100% convinced it has ever worked properly.

I gather the front grip shift is just a friction shifter so I would expect it should work. Either wind the limit screw in so the derailleur is in the middle position or use a screwdriver to jam the front derailleur somewhere towards the middle position and install the cable. Re-adjust or remove the screwdriver - now the cable should be slightly tight in the small ring, see if you have enough travel.
Otherwise you might need a MTB front derailleur, they have different travel than road derailleurs. But I expect it should work the way it is.

Actually it's not strictly a friction shifter, it's "micro indexed" shifter (i.e. has many more clicks than just 3), so you have both indexing and the ability to trim the FD.

If I didn't hate twist shifters as a general concept, I'd say it's a pretty decent piece of kit.

Either way, it's not a compatibility issue that the OP is having. Likely it just needs to be serviced or replaced. Those Falcon shifters are certainly cheap, but they usually work in my experience. A FD is not a complex device.