timstone

I am doing a drop bar conversion on my hybrid from a flat bar and am in the process of installing new shifters and some other things. I've gotten around to the shifters and have them installed but there is no shifting happening when moving the levers. I am obviously new to doing this so any help or tips would be appreciated.

fietsbob

Shifted them to 90 degrees, down, them pulled all the slack out of the cable before you tighten the clamp onto the cable.??

timstone

Yes I installed them facing downward pulled the cabled and then held it from the end of the cable with some vice grips to make sure it didn't loosen again.

CCrew

*shudder*

Grand Bois

Why?

timstone

I'm wondering the same...you have to hold it somehow....


Anyone got any ideas of things I can try?

CCrew

Vice grips are the tool of the devil You need high strength locking pliers for a cable? Get a hammer out while you'r at it and give it a few whacks

seawind161

Neither bar end is shifting? Are they pulling cable (when disconnected from derailleur) when you operate them? Are you sure you have the cable threaded through the shifter(s) correctly?

ryanwood

sounds like the cable is routed through the shifter wrong.

vice grips destroy cables, those cables are braided and will crushed by the vice grips, you don't need the cable to be that tight. That's why derailleurs can be adjusted.

timstone

Ok so I think I sort of found the problem....if you couldn't tell this is my first time ever installing shift cable...though I had no problem with the brake cable.

I think the problem at first was that the shift housing wasn't long enough from the shifter to the first cable stop and the cable was actually coming out from under where it was taped.

Now I've cut a longer cable housing and run the cable back to the rear derailer just to test it out. I put it under the pinch bolt and move the shifter, the cable gets tight but when I move the shifter back down it pokes back out of the shifter instead of tightening back to it's normal position. How do I fix this?

timstone

OK OK....I've got them both shifting now. I still need to do adjustments to both derailers but without adjustment now I am not able to get to my largest chainring and the shifting in the rear is hit or miss. I don't actually get a gear change in the rear until about 3rd or 4th gear and it's pretty sloppy. I've got no idea on how to adjust either really so I will need to watch some videos.

Grand Bois

It's vise grips and there's nothing wrong with using them to grip cable in an area that will be cut off and discarded anyway.

CCrew

They suck regardless the spelling, and are the choice of bubba mechanics everywhere

They do however go well with mullets and holding up the tailpipe on that rusty Camaro

timstone

Great. Now that we've got that spelling error down...

I'm having trouble adjusting my rear derailleur. I put the shift lever in the lowest gear (down) and the the chain is on the largest chainring up front. I have no problem adjusting the high limit but the low limit doesn't move toward the wheel, it will only move toward the frame.

I also had a problem with cable tension...once I shift through all the gears...or...attempt to shift through all the gears and then return to the low gear the cable is always loose...what is causing this?

Rear Derailleur is a Shimano Altus if it makes any difference.

CCrew

RD shouldn't make a difference. This however sounds like the cable isn't fully clamped down at the RD and once you exert tension it's slipping back through the clamp. In a tensioned system you shouldn't be able to achieve more slack like you're getting.

timstone

I've got them "working" but I think they can work a lot better if someone that knew how to adjust the derailleurs did so...Some shifting is sloppy...like on the rear going from the large cog to the smaller there's a bit of hesitation....going up works...but as going down...on some cogs the chain just doesn't want to go up...I tried adjusting the one barrel I have which is the one right at the rear derailleur but I was unscrewing it nearly all the way without much change in how it shifted...I am gonna ride it this week and see how it works.

Jeff Wills

That sounds like there's friction in the cable or cable housing somewhere. You need to double-check each point where the cable enters or exits the housing, and make sure there's no kinks in the cable where it runs inside the housing.