Riding to work this morning and my rear derailleur got caught in the spokes, and did the classic explosion.
Looking at my hanger and it looks quite bent, no idea how this happened though as I’m confident it wasn’t bent when I went out (I’d taken the RD off to clean it just the night before)
Does this look like it can be bent back? It’s a Reynolds 708 steel frame
by Daleoo
9 Comments
You should be able to bend it back. If you don’t have the special tool for it, I would take it to a shop and let them do it.
If it breaks you can self it back on
Is that a derailleur hanger component, or is it part of the frame?
Definitely need some bend back
That can probably be brought back to life but it’s going to be on the more involved, multi-step end of things.
Its distorted enough that it wouldn’t be surprising if the threads/roundness of the hole are a little messed up. Shop-type hanger alignment tools aren’t necessarily the first step when a hanger is this bent.
A good order of operations would be rough it in with an adjustable wrench or Knipex plier-wrench, then chase with M10x1 tap, then put the hanger alignment tool on it. If you’re doing a home repair, there’s nothing really wrong with using an M10 axle and a locknut for the job and aligning it into parallel with another axle and hardware set clamped into the frame.
It’s extreme enough that having it break when re-aligning it is a much likelier outcome than usual on a steel bike, which is usually a non-concern except in situations like this. You minimize the risk of that happening by doing it in as few bends as possible (exceeding the yield as few times as possible), and so conceptually there’s an argument to going straight to the DAG-type tool and doing it all in 1-2 bends. In practice there’s a need to get it roughed in and then fine-tune it unless you’re a steel whisperer. If you have a steel whisperer handy by all means utilize him/her.
Damn that’s some bend! Definitely do it with a proper hanger alignment tool, it may break and if it does that’s sorta game over for your frame. May be an idea to heat it up slightly before you bend just so it bends easier and may make it less likely to snap. Also like someone else said, do it in as few bends as poss, if you end up going a little too far, you’d be better off bending the Derailleur to get the alignment right than trying to go back and forth, just going to weaken it more
You might want to retap the threads too looking at that. If it came into me at work I’d probably say yes I’ll do it but can’t promise it won’t break either now or in the near future. Good luck!
That’s too bent. Bend it back, careful though.
I’d like to see the final outcome of this. Post pictures after you get it fixed.
Rooough. If it breaks, I’d do a single speed conversion just to keep using the frame. Godspeed!