Six weeks ago I got into a pretty serious bike accident (it was just me and totally my fault) which included me breaking my arm. The handlebars were forced pretty askew and I got that taken care of easily and thought that everything else seemed okay on the bike. Today, I took it out just around the block in my neighborhood and noticed that I cannot turn the wheel very far to the left and seemingly too far to the right. As I was investigating, I saw a potential culprit for the problem and dropped the fork out. I hope the picture is clear enough to see, but it appears that the steering/fork/rotation stop (not sure the correct term) got turned about 70-80º. If I am not mistaken, the nub, which is currently sitting at about the 1 o'clock and 7 o'clock positions should actually be aligned with the crown (3 and 9 or 90º and 270º) as the piece in the head tube has nubs oriented at 6 and 12 (0º & 180º).
Does anyone have any suggestions on how to fix this? I'm hoping to be able to do it on my own rather than trying to lug it over to the shop. It is a pretty heavy e-bike and I don't have a car right now let alone one large enough to get the bike into. Any help in fixing this is much appreciated!
by lefty175
3 Comments
It looks like the stop is part of the headset cup so to re- orient it you will need to remove it and press it back in. Not impossible without shop level tools (headset removal tool/headset press) but also not easy if you have 0 experience. I have worked in 7 shops over 15 years and I would expect something like 30-50$ for this. If you cant afford that you can definitely bang it out with hammer and socket extension then carefully use the headset and preload bolt to press it back in. That last part may be the trickiest.
I also see the crown race is rotated which can be easy to impossible to remove without proper tools. It really may be best to bring her to the shop. Worth trying first but it may or may not be tough.
Also how are the fork and wheel doing as far as straightness after this hit?