Took me over an hour to realize my rear derailleur hanger was bent by like 2mm

I was chasing this ghost shifting on my road bike for three days. Replaced the cable, reindexed the gears, even swapped the chain. Nothing fixed it. Finally I threw on a derailleur hanger alignment tool that I borrowed from a buddy and one pass showed it was just barely bent. I bent it back in like two seconds and it shifted perfectly. But here's the thing - I spent probably four hours total over those days messing with other stuff. The tool took five minutes to set up. Has anyone else had a dumb fix like that where you overthink it and the answer is just grabbing the right tool from the start?

2 comments

2 Comments

rosek738d ago

Read a bikepacking blog that said like 80% of shifting problems are just bent hangers.

the_wendy7d ago

A $7 hanger alignment tool fixed my shifting completely.