Creakings, clickings, tickings, clankings and knockings.

I have a Boardman Road Comp. Have had the left hand side crank work loose in the past, so have tightened that up in the past, with no torque wrench I am sad to say. Someone posted previously about having to re-tighten. I am concerned about possibly overtightening and doing more damage to the cartridge. What is the prevention? Would a "thread-lock" kind of product work, or is it something more indepth?

went out on a rode ride this morning and increasingly, every time i was out of the saddle climbing my bottom bracket made a creak. i have a bianchi 1885 from 2005 if that helps.
does anyone know what to do/how to fix it? any help would be great.
cheers,

The most irritating and annoying creak and groan on my bike is me, especially out of the saddle up hill :oops: :shock:

Surprised no-one beat me to that one :roll:

I had an irritating small pinging noise from the rear Fulcrum Racing 1 when straining uphill in a low gear. Disappeared when I put a small drop of lubricant on each spoke crossing point.

andy advanced wrote:

ive recently changed my pedals to the new keo crbons and whenever its damp or wet the left one makes a strange achey creak sound. ive just put it down to the new "grip" cleats.
anyone else had this?

Have had the same creaks since I changed to new cleats with the rubber grips, can be quite annoying. The rubber strips have started to peel off from use, (only 2 wks) prob best to remove them completely.

I thought I had a problems with my SPD's when under load, that was until my carbon seat post snapped in half and the noise went away, yey! no wait

i had a similar problem with my keo carbons, if the air was slightly moist or damp the cleats would creak like hell.. pain in the butt, still does it

My tricross developed a 'tick' and creak that were intermittent but close to constant - for miles and miles it would go on then when I took it into the shop... nothing! Ha ha. Anyway, it was in time with the revolution of the pedals regardless of what gear I was in, so I started out by trying out my other shoes (different cleats) and then gave the pedals some attention. It didn't work. I swapped out pedals. No difference. SO - given the area it seemed to be coming from and another visit to the LBS we changed out the bottom bracket and it was silky smooth all the way home. Then I set off later for a ride with a friend and sure enough: tick, tick, tick, tickcreak, tick etc.

One more phonecall to the LBS and we had the answer - I checked the chainring bolts. 3 out of 5 were a little bit loose, so I tightened them :oops:

I think it is a mechanical impossibility for slip to occur without the chain jumping teeth on the chainrings or (and much more likely) on the sprocket teeth, or for the freehub to be faulty/worn. It may be very difficult to observe, and if it is the freehub the whole cassette and chain will jump together. It would suggest a worn cassette and chain or freehub. An alternative possibility is a stiff chain link, which will jump every complete revolution of the chain. Jumping is more likely to occur in the smaller sprockets.

All about freehubs here and here. It is the bit on the drive side of the hub on which the cassette slides on, and allows freewheeling and drive. It has pawls (sort of a ratchet system) that allow movement in one direction not the other, and it is what makes the clicking as you freewheel.

You can get a chain for as little as £1.99 here and it looks like 5/6/7 speed chains are interchangeable. You can spend more of course.

As it is 5 speed and possibly an older bike, you may have a freewheel rather than a Freehub, if so you would need a threaded freewheel rather than a cassette. Could be as cheap as £9.99 (maybe cheaper if you shop around).

It is much less likely that the chainset would need replacing, they last a lot longer, the smaller rings wear first.

You really need to get advice from a good local bike shop (LBS), as you need to know exactly what parts you have and need, and also some special tools are required for cassette removal (not too expensive, but they add to your costs). Evans often don't qualify as "good" however, and if you go to a bad one you will probably get sold stuff you don't need and/or pay over the odds, or get duff advice, or get no help at all. A "good" Evans shop will be a different matter, but the skills of the mechanics varies widely. A traditional LBS is also more likely to have experience of your setup and have the parts.

At best, you could get it sorted for between £15 and £20 using parts bought online, but if the costs do rise a lot it may be worth considering if it is worth spending to keep this bike going, versus buying a new one. Of course it might be a much cherished and / or classic bike which is worth the input, but if it is an old "hack" bike, even a bill of £50 could make it an economic write-off as you could get a much newer and better secondhand hack for that price.

ah, understood (sorry for calling it a hack bike :oops:). So find a good traditional local bike shop and let them help you cherish it. If you talk with them, build up a relationship, you may learn a lot from them about your bike and how to fix things.

What bike is it?

I have an annoying pop on my left foot when I get over TDC on the left. I just get this little pop up through my pedal.

At first I assumed the cleats were worn and replaced these - no joy
Then I assumed it must be the pedal, replaced them - no joy
So I've got brand new pedals and I'm still getting a pop up my foot, what is it? Is it my crankset/ The crank arm isn't loose and I can't seem to get any play out of the bottom bracket when I go and test it.

HELP!!

I had a regular clicking / creaking / ticking noise when the bike was being put under load (although rarely under full load). After looking at this link:
http://www.jimlangley.net/wrench/keepitquiet.html, I took the chainwheel apart, greased the sections where the different chainrings contact each other, fully tightened the bolts and the noise has disappeared

I now have another creaking noise ... it comes from the front of the bike (I think), so I'm thinking headset / handlebar / stem ... again its worse under acceleration, and bizzarely, its worse commuting back home (after its spent the day in my toasty-warm office) than it is commuting in the morning (after its spent the night in the freezing garage!) Guess its something about metal bits having expanded slightly in the warmer environment?

Some annoying noises so far:

Ticking noise coinciding with wheel revolution - usually computer magnet striking something

Apparently identical noise on pedal revs. - coming from saddle which must be worn where the rails enter the front of the shell!

It was - I have now sorted this one by taking the saddle off and holding it front end down then filling the nose where the rails enter it with epoxy glue [it's a Selle SLR in case you were wondering]

More clicking on pedal revs. - bottom bracket (tightening usually worked although have had to replace it)

Very similar noise to that - seat post and saddle rails (sorted by greasing and re-fitting)

Also similar! - pedals slightly loose (can't tell until you tighten them and noise disappears)

Creaking/squeaking - usually handlebars or pedal / cleat (some grease applied to the bar clamp or cleats usually sorts that out)

Tinkling wheels - if mostly at low revs. may be bits of grit or aluminium swarf inside the hollow of the rims. Takes a while to work them out of the valve hole.


In general the frame distributes noises so efficiently that it can be very difficult to tell where they are coming from