New Chain Advice

[m-trax]

Plonked a new chain on this afternoon as the old one was really dirty.

So replaced shimano one for a sram powerlink (xt 8 speed setup).

Measured link for link and chopped out the extra, a few inches or so.

Now the gears dont appear to work properly underload - before they were effortless. The front won't go from middle to top, and it just feels a bit clunky on all front gears.

I tried tightening the tensioner up but it doesn't make any difference.

I am guessing my next step is to undo the cable and try to retighten with the tensioner wound in. Rather not have to do that though.

Anyone any other ideas and why would a new chain have made so much difference?

 

[REKIBorter]

How old are the cassette and chainrings? maybe the old chain was worn so much it will only work with your worn out drivetrain. Never had problems with SRAM 8 speed chains and XT kit myself.

 

[m-trax]

How old are the cassette and chainrings? maybe the old chain was worn so much it will only work with your worn out drivetrain. Never had problems with SRAM 8 speed chains and XT kit myself.

The age of the bike I am guessing. They are worn but I wouldn't say execessive - i.e not sharp.

If that is the case can I re-use the old shimano chain and put the powerlink on that? (The pin came all the way out of it when I split it).

I am on my hols and wanted to spend quite a lot of time riding it over the next two weeks. Should have left it as it was instead of fettling.

 

[Benandemu]

The cassette is worn.
Bet it's on the most used ratios as well, which is a sure sign. The old chain will have been profiled with wear to suit the drivetrain, and switching a component like the chain will cause it to ride the teeth of the cassette, and feel like it slips under load.
You could put the old chain back on for your planned journey in the short term and deal with the whole drivetrain at a later date.

 

[dyna-ti]

Yeah its the cassette thats worn.
Unless you change your chain when it becomes worn it takes the cassette with it.you'll go through many chains before the cassette needs changing.

Park do a chain checker ,when it shows your chain has stretched and needs replacing[great tool].
Funnily enough in 90% of this happening its the cassette rather than the chainring :? .


Another point to make is if your using one for a while and you take off the chian for cleaning.
Make sure when you put it on,you dont put it back to front or upside down,put it on the way it came off.
When a chain and sprockets have been running fine together for a long time they dont like changes

 

[m-trax]

I persevered but still couldn't get it set up right. So I admitted defeat and took it to a bike shop.

They didn't have an XT 8spd cassette only a deore lx one (they told me there has been a shortage of 8 speed shimano cassettes recently?).

I spent so long looking for a high spec m-trax it seemed silly for me to downgrade to something slightly heavier and not OE. I know it wouldn't make any difference just wouldn't feel right, they probably thought I was a nutcase in the shop.

So I saved myself the hassle and asked them to put the old chain on with a split link and set it up again. Will be fine for my hols now.

Lesson learned : Don't fiddle and replace bits adhoc without thinking it through.

So on the look out for an xt 8 spd cassette

 

[CAS]

I bought an 8 sp XT cassette from Evans recently - they were hard to find and not cheap. Evans do still have 8 sp 11-30 cassettes at £39.99 in stock though, which is what I bought.

I did quite a comprehensive search and couldn't find it cheaper !

 

[m-trax]

I bought an 8 sp XT cassette from Evans recently - they were hard to find and not cheap. Evans do still have 8 sp 11-30 cassettes at £39.99 in stock though, which is what I bought.

I did quite a comprehensive search and couldn't find it cheaper !

Thanks for the heads up on Evans. Please forgive my ignorance but what does the 11-30 mean is it the number of teeth on the bottom ring, and the top ring?

 

[CAS]

[
Thanks for the heads up on Evans. Please forgive my ignorance but what does the 11-30 mean is it the number of teeth on the bottom ring, and the top ring?

11 is the number of teeth on the smallest sprocket on your cassette and 30 the number on the largest- gives the range of the cassette basically. 11-30 is a wide range - you can get 11-28 in XT as well but Evans had sold out of that one!

 

[terryhfs]

If you can't find XT use Ultegra - there's plenty of Ultegra 8 speed stuff about and they occupy the same place in the range, so you're not "cheapening" your bike. You might need to accept a smaller spread of sprockets but that's not always a bad thing. 12-24 is a nice spread in an 8.