Derailleur is probably fine, but the derailleur hanger is most likely bent.
Thatdirtykid on
Looks quite bent, probably just the hangar but it’s hard to tell from a photo. With a 7 speed you can probably get it close enough without the proper tool to measure how straight the hangar is against the rim. I recommend taking the derailleur off and getting the hangar as perpendicular to the axle (parallel to the cassette teeth) as you can
Twentysix2 on
Always tricky depending on the angle that you’re taking the picture from, but to my eye it definitely looks bent inward
kermatog on
Hard to tell, but either the derailleur hanger is bent (soft metal, can gently be bent back or replaced) or the seat/chain stay tubes are bent (more serious and should probably be looked at by a mechanic).
EDIT: the more I look at the picture the less confident I am
GreenGhostBravo on
Looks bent, probably during either shipping or moving. I would bet you could get away with bending it back until the gears on the derailleur are lined up with the cassette.
dunncrew on
Clearly bent inwards. Pulleys should be in line with the cogs. Probably the derailleur hanger part of the frame that the derailleur attaches to.
stevens_hats on
It’s bent. The proper way to fix would be with a derailleur hanger alignment tool. The way I’d do it would be to grab the whole derailleur and gently bend outwards so it’s aligned. It’s an inexpensive frame and derailleur and easily bent back.
Reinzwijn on
Derailleur hanger needs to be fixed or replaced
carpediemracing on
hard to tell as camera lenses will distort things.
**HANGER**: It looks like the lower pivot is not parallel to the floor. This means the hanger is bent. However if the lens is distorting the angle of the lower pivot, it may be that the hanger is okay.
**DERAILLEUR:** If the lower pivot is parallel to the floor it means the cage itself is a bit tweaked.
If you pivot the pulley cage down, it’ll point inward at the bottom. This is typical if the bike got dropped/leaned/etc on the derailleur side. Depending on history, like how many times it got dropped and how hard, and how many times you bent things back and how far, you might be able to do a simple tweak to get it good.
**HANGER FIX** If the hanger is bent, and it hasn’t been bent back too many times, you should be able to put an Allen wrench in the upper pivot bolt (the bolt that mounts the derailleur to the hanger) with the Allen wrench handle pointing down and gently, gently pull up and out. Let go, see where it sits now, and repeat until it’s a bit more squared to the bike. Hangers are designed to break before your frame (it’s like a “fuse” that will fail before the frame fails) so they are intentionally made a bit weak. If you’ve done a lot of tweaks etc or it seems very stiff (when you bend metal a lot it gets stiffer and stiff, aka “work hardened”) then you are probably at the limit and should replace it.
Usually it’s 2-5 gentle nudges and the derailleur lines up.
(As a side note, when I get a bike, I buy 2 or 3 hangers just in case. It’s terrible trying to get one quickly when the original one breaks, and IT WILL BREAK eventually. it’s much easier if you open your tool box and you have one there, you open your saddle bag and it’s nestled in your spare tube, or you open your gear bag and it’s there at the bottom of the smallest pocket. Those are the three places I keep my dropouts. And although I say it’ll break, I have yet to break one in the 15 years I’ve had this frame and in the prior 15 years I didn’t break one either, so I have a bunch of unused hangers.)
**DERAILLEUR FIX** If the hanger is NOT bent, then it’s the pivot. You can massage this as well. I would twist the pulley cage down so it’s sort of where it would be when there’s a chain in it, grab around the pivot for the pulley (not the lower part of the cage), and gently, gently pull up and out. You want the pulley cage to be more vertical and not tilting in as much at the bottom. You do NOT want to bend the actual pulley cage, which is why you’re grabbing near the pivot bolt. This requires a bit more force than the hanger bolt (do NOT let the bending force travel to the hanger) because you’re trying to bend where the pulley cages attach to the pivot bolt. It might take 3-6 nudges. I do a lot of teeth gritting because it’s a sketchy move and if I nudge too hard I can bend the pulley cage down low or the hanger or something.
I did this for many years when I was in a bike shop (mechanic then manager then owner over about 15 years, and I still do this for me and friends now, 25+ years later). **Definitely go lighter than you need, repeat if necessary.** It’s like cutting something shorter – you can’t uncut something but you can keep cutting a little more off.
9 Comments
Derailleur is probably fine, but the derailleur hanger is most likely bent.
Looks quite bent, probably just the hangar but it’s hard to tell from a photo. With a 7 speed you can probably get it close enough without the proper tool to measure how straight the hangar is against the rim. I recommend taking the derailleur off and getting the hangar as perpendicular to the axle (parallel to the cassette teeth) as you can
Always tricky depending on the angle that you’re taking the picture from, but to my eye it definitely looks bent inward
Hard to tell, but either the derailleur hanger is bent (soft metal, can gently be bent back or replaced) or the seat/chain stay tubes are bent (more serious and should probably be looked at by a mechanic).
EDIT: the more I look at the picture the less confident I am
Looks bent, probably during either shipping or moving. I would bet you could get away with bending it back until the gears on the derailleur are lined up with the cassette.
Clearly bent inwards. Pulleys should be in line with the cogs. Probably the derailleur hanger part of the frame that the derailleur attaches to.
It’s bent. The proper way to fix would be with a derailleur hanger alignment tool. The way I’d do it would be to grab the whole derailleur and gently bend outwards so it’s aligned. It’s an inexpensive frame and derailleur and easily bent back.
Derailleur hanger needs to be fixed or replaced
hard to tell as camera lenses will distort things.
**HANGER**: It looks like the lower pivot is not parallel to the floor. This means the hanger is bent. However if the lens is distorting the angle of the lower pivot, it may be that the hanger is okay.
**DERAILLEUR:** If the lower pivot is parallel to the floor it means the cage itself is a bit tweaked.
If you pivot the pulley cage down, it’ll point inward at the bottom. This is typical if the bike got dropped/leaned/etc on the derailleur side. Depending on history, like how many times it got dropped and how hard, and how many times you bent things back and how far, you might be able to do a simple tweak to get it good.
**HANGER FIX** If the hanger is bent, and it hasn’t been bent back too many times, you should be able to put an Allen wrench in the upper pivot bolt (the bolt that mounts the derailleur to the hanger) with the Allen wrench handle pointing down and gently, gently pull up and out. Let go, see where it sits now, and repeat until it’s a bit more squared to the bike. Hangers are designed to break before your frame (it’s like a “fuse” that will fail before the frame fails) so they are intentionally made a bit weak. If you’ve done a lot of tweaks etc or it seems very stiff (when you bend metal a lot it gets stiffer and stiff, aka “work hardened”) then you are probably at the limit and should replace it.
Usually it’s 2-5 gentle nudges and the derailleur lines up.
(As a side note, when I get a bike, I buy 2 or 3 hangers just in case. It’s terrible trying to get one quickly when the original one breaks, and IT WILL BREAK eventually. it’s much easier if you open your tool box and you have one there, you open your saddle bag and it’s nestled in your spare tube, or you open your gear bag and it’s there at the bottom of the smallest pocket. Those are the three places I keep my dropouts. And although I say it’ll break, I have yet to break one in the 15 years I’ve had this frame and in the prior 15 years I didn’t break one either, so I have a bunch of unused hangers.)
**DERAILLEUR FIX** If the hanger is NOT bent, then it’s the pivot. You can massage this as well. I would twist the pulley cage down so it’s sort of where it would be when there’s a chain in it, grab around the pivot for the pulley (not the lower part of the cage), and gently, gently pull up and out. You want the pulley cage to be more vertical and not tilting in as much at the bottom. You do NOT want to bend the actual pulley cage, which is why you’re grabbing near the pivot bolt. This requires a bit more force than the hanger bolt (do NOT let the bending force travel to the hanger) because you’re trying to bend where the pulley cages attach to the pivot bolt. It might take 3-6 nudges. I do a lot of teeth gritting because it’s a sketchy move and if I nudge too hard I can bend the pulley cage down low or the hanger or something.
I did this for many years when I was in a bike shop (mechanic then manager then owner over about 15 years, and I still do this for me and friends now, 25+ years later). **Definitely go lighter than you need, repeat if necessary.** It’s like cutting something shorter – you can’t uncut something but you can keep cutting a little more off.