Gear/Brake Cables

[l4dva]

Hi there,

I have the brilliant Boardmans Team Carbon road bike with the SRAM Rival Groupset. It started off as a brilliant groupset, the gear change was clean and precise. I had only ever needed to adjust the setup/indexing once at the start and its been fine.

The more and more im using it, the more sloppy the gear change seems to be becoming. I've read somewhere on here that the cables they use are the cheapest possible to keep costs down. From what I can see is they are Shimano SIS cable.. I don't know anything about cables or if this is good/bad etc?

Do you reckon I need to get new cables fitted? Is there such thing as a good or bad cable???

I'm avoiding Halfords at all costs and trying to minimise my LBS useage for minor gear tweaks (due to lack of funds) if posible so your advise would be greatly appreciated. Obvously I'd leave changing the cables to the pros in a proper LBS, but I don't want to be constantly going back asking them to make little adjustments and charging me each time...

Thanks!

 

[battered]

Cables are in different sizes - gear cables are typically lighter.

I fiind Shimano cables fine, I've had some on the hack for ever. If you keep them greased they never seem to wear out. Mine are very well greased though, when I assemble it I fill the outer with grease, slather the inner with more grease then assemble them. Once in, every year I unhook the outers, regrease the inner then slide the cables back and forth to get the grease into the internals. Some of my cable outers have lasted 15 years with this treatment, in year round use.

Give it all a good greassing, adjust everything and then see if it's not resolved.

 

[Will1985]

It might just be that the cables have stretched.

 

[montage]

Boardmans are renown for having crap cables, which leads to many people blaming the sram rival. I'd go for a better cable set if I were you

 

[battered]

Another check - get hold of the derailleur and waggle it about. In particular, twist it. Twist the parallelogram, if you get any discernible play then it's worn. Try also your jockey wheels, if they are waggling about then the gearshift will be rubbish.