Creaking bars

redvee

for the last couple of weeks I've had a creaking noise coming from the bars/cockpit of my bike so I addressed the issue the best I could by

Undoing stem clamp bolts and greasing them and tightening them back up to the recommended torque setting

Same as above with the steerer clamp bolts

Same again with the shifter clamps but no grease on the threads as I'm worried about losing the nut from the clamp if I take the bolt right out.

If the noise persists is it a sign of new bars needed?

PhilipPirrip

Looking at your bike list if it's a carbon fork then the other material contact point you need to check is the skewer in the dropouts.

Carbon's very good at transmitting sound around a bike whether it be just the fork or the whole frame which is why questions about untraceable creaks crops up a fair bit

keef66

Can you make it creak just by heaving on the bars? Does it happen when moving and when stationary? Pedalling and freewheeling? Even when you're off the bike?

Are the gaps between the faceplate and the stem all nicely even? Headsets can also creak. Dropouts and QR skewers sometimes. I've even had creaky wheels.

redvee

keef66 wrote:

Can you make it creak just by heaving on the bars?

The bars creak when I'm holding the tops of the bars either side of the stem. I'll reseat the front wheel and the faceplate is equally spaced.

vimfuego

Had something similar on my MTB a couple of months ago. I went through all kinds of theories and attempted fixes, ultimately breaking down seemingly most of the bike, lubing & re-tightening just about every bolt I could find. Anyway, eventually I stripped down the headset, the bearings were basically fine & I didn't have a new bottom bearing in stock to swap them out anyway, so I just cleaned everything, applied some grease and re-fitted. Hey-presto, no more creaking. No idea if it was cleaning up the headset or just the act of re-assembling the thing that helped, but worth a shot if it's still creaking.