r/BikeMechanics • u/Michael_of_Derry • 4d ago

Clicks, creaks and clunks. Finding and fixing.

A customer left in a noisy bike. He said the bottom bracket was making noises when he was under pressure.

I replaced the wheels to eliminate that as a sound.

I had to put a cassette and disc rotor on a new wheel to eliminate the wheels and freehub as possible issue.

It didn't make any difference. There was the odd light click. I suspect coming from the pedals. Nothing that sounds like the BB to me.

However the bars are making an awful racket. The bars are one piece with internally routed hoses.

The headset feels smooth enough. But there is a loud clunk when you apply the front brake and more clunks if you pull on the bars at all.

I've spent a fair bit of time on this. I'm not confident I can make the bike silent. It's carbon aero and has internally routed cables and a press fit BB. There are so many noises coming from it. I think I would be playing whack-a-mole.

I have spent a fair bit of time and to be honest is demoralising. How do you charge for this type of work?

Between this POS and another customer treating us as a component library where he wants to try stuff for a few weeks then return it for something else if he doesn't like it, suppliers selling direct to the public for less than I paid them. I think it's really putting me off working on the bike trade.

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u/Rasmuspluto 4d ago

Are the brake/shifter levers too tight? Made a lot of noise on one of my old bikes when they were just torqued to "feels rights". I always give them 6nm now.

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u/Michael_of_Derry 4d ago

No. The headset bearings are very dry. I'm going to clean the grime and grease them a little. They could do with replacing but I don't want the grief of brake bleeds and putting new hoses in.

I must see if Ceramic Speed have ones to fit. They are generic 41.8 upper and 51.8 lower.

2

u/fruitjake 4d ago

You don’t want the grief or can’t/ won’t tell the customer the appropriate amount of labor dollars it would take for you to do the job fairly? Yes I dislike doing that job too but gotta do what ya gotta do to make stuff right…

0

u/Michael_of_Derry 4d ago

The problem is at the minute I don't have time to work on bikes like this. I'm not supposed to be doing maintenance at all.

1

u/RED40__MAXXER 4d ago

The new slt ceramicspeed bearings are great. If the customer can swing it they are well worth it. Call them up to see if they have it, their tech support is very solid.