Hey guys,
I’m curious as to how quiet / smooth your drivetrains run on your bikes.
I feel like mine is not as quiet as it should be, and it gets me worried about how much wear i’m putting on my components. I installed brand new chain (wipperman) chainring (fyxomatosis / cycle underground) and cog (phil wood) (all 1/8), recently and figured that it would take some time to ‘wear in’ before it because quieter. I’ve been riding it daily for over 3 weeks now and it dosent seem to be getting any quieter. The only time my bike seems to feel really quiet is just after a fresh chain lubrication, which within a week of riding becomes hell noisey again.
I’ve checked my chainline using the sheldon brown method, and I am less than a millimeter out. My chain tension seems fine, and the noise dosent change if I make it looser or tighter.
How much noiser should the drivetrain sound when backpedaling? Mine gets quite loud.
Could it just be just the lube that I am using? I after that famous silent riding experience everyone keeps talking about.
Bring it to one of the weekly rides and these professionals will be happy to provide an on-the-spot assessment for the price of a couple of pots, or a random sexual encounter of an unspecified nature. Otherwise all I can suggest is, put it up on a stand, give it a spin, shoot some mobile phone video of it, host it 'n post it, or at least let us know how old the bike is and when the last time you had the bottom bracket serviced. If that’s starting to go then it might be compounding the noise situation. That will be a pint of draught and a photo of your underpants please.
If it’s this wipperman it’s supposed to sound like a swarm of bumblebees. the price you pay for it’s strength (or so a certain mr white once told me)
depending on how clean your chain is before you re-lube (or the type of lube used) you may find that you are losing all your lube pretty quick and getting back to a gritty/dry chain.
If it’s substantially louder, something is probably amiss, but everything is new so…
… maybe chainline? Get a straightedge (not brendan) or something to triple check it. 1mm can be a lot if your cog is only 3mm wide if you know what i mean.
Calteoh, some chains are quieter than others as I recently found out. I was running one of those gold and black NJS chains until I rooted it doing something dumb on my commute. ShifterDan changed it for a cheaper plain Izumi silver one for me which he rated as one of the quietest - and I have been running it ever since - while not quite ninja quiet it is substantially quieter than the previous (more expensive but nicer looking) chain I had.
If you are interested I can find out from him which chain I now have and post a follow up note.
Thanks for the tips guys.
Chain I’m using is the Connex White Star Chain 1 1/18 Track Chain. I guess I’ll just have to stick to lubing it up more frequently.
