So, this might have happened... NBD - 2016 Fuji Touring workhorse

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Gunk

Guru
Location
Oxford
I can say with absolute certainty that Sora STIs will not play well with other than a road FD. Spent many an hour trying, trust me. Get a Sora FD.

I couldn’t get Sora 2x9 Brifters to work with early an 105 front mech, I farted about for hours, in the end I slapped a used Sora on and it all worked perfectly in seconds. Not all Shimano 9 speed is cross compatible.
 
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wafter

wafter

I like steel bikes and I cannot lie..
Location
Oxford
I can say with absolute certainty that Sora STIs will not play well with other than a road FD. Spent many an hour trying, trust me. Get a Sora FD.
I couldn’t get Sora 2x9 Brifters to work with early an 105 front mech, I farted about for hours, in the end I slapped a used Sora on and it all worked perfectly in seconds. Not all Shimano 9 speed is cross compatible.

That's odd as AFAIK 9sp stuff should all be compatable... what were the problems you were each having / do you know what the specific problem is?
 
That's odd as AFAIK 9sp stuff should all be compatable... what were the problems you were each having / do you know what the specific problem is?
With a triple, you could have only two out of three working cleanly, with the inner ring always a problem. This also applies the other way round - MTB front controls would not play with road shifters. My experience with this extends across 8 and 9 speeds, trying to make things work on the two Scott roadies I've mainly used. My current setup, using Sora 9-speed mechs and flat bars, uses Claris/Sora left hand lever and a similar but MTB-series for the right hand. The left hand is from an 8-speed set, the right hand for the 9-speed cassette.
 
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wafter

wafter

I like steel bikes and I cannot lie..
Location
Oxford
With a triple, you could have only two out of three working cleanly, with the inner ring always a problem. This also applies the other way round - MTB front controls would not play with road shifters. My experience with this extends across 8 and 9 speeds, trying to make things work on the two Scott roadies I've mainly used. My current setup, using Sora 9-speed mechs and flat bars, uses Claris/Sora left hand lever and a similar but MTB-series for the right hand. The left hand is from an 8-speed set, the right hand for the 9-speed cassette.

Thanks - that's interesting and sounds like the shifters' "cable pull" and FD's movement ratios are different - if you ever feel like measuring these differences by all means chuck them in my thread on the subject - would be great to build a body of knowledge on this as there seems very little information about regarding such compatability :smile:
 
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wafter

wafter

I like steel bikes and I cannot lie..
Location
Oxford
The cable pull just wasn’t long enough to pull the mech over enough to allow the chain to go on to the largest ring, in the end I found out that they were just not compatible.

Thanks - so it seems that the 9sp Sora shifters have a shorter cable pull / require an FD with a higher movement ratio than earlier offerings..?

If I find myself in an idle moment I'll maybe take a look at the Shimano compatability charts to see if these will shed any more light on the situation :smile:
 
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wafter

wafter

I like steel bikes and I cannot lie..
Location
Oxford
Yesterday I fitted the currently idle M6000-SGS RD I have for the CdF flat bar to the Fuji to see if it would help to narrow down the source of the ghost shifting.

I knew indexing would be out as the movement ratios are different between 9sp (1:1.7) and 10sp MTB (1:1.2ish apparently) but this wouldn't matter with the friction shifters. What would matter was total amount cable pulled; which proved insufficient to get the RD to traverse more than about seven of the available nine sprockets, so off it came again..

While cleaning the existing M591 RD I inadvertantly allowed the torsion spring at the main mounting bolt to escape; which was fun to reassemble.

Once back on the bike I gave the B screw a good crank to add some more preload as the chain seemed a bit slack. This seems to have improved the ghost shifting to the point where it could be down to driver error with the friction shifters. I did however also try indexed again with the same old problems - for which I think a not-quite-compatable shifter is probably to blame.

No tangible progress but potentially closure on this issue as it's useable and I can't be arsed to change the shifters..
 
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wafter

wafter

I like steel bikes and I cannot lie..
Location
Oxford
I'd left the B-screw with about 4mm of exposed thread beneath the head (so potentially another c. 4mm of preload available on the derailleur's torsion spring)...

However, thanks to the need to get a screwdriver in there to adjust the typical, silly JIS cheese / cross head screw I couldn't really add any more preload while taking the load off the spring (to avoid destroying what little paint might remain on the hanger where it contacts the screw).

Thanks to Shimano's quality documentation a bit of digging revealed the B-screw is apparently M4x12mm; a size I conveniently, randomly have a whole box of in stainless with socket cap heads :tongue:

As you add preload to the B-screw its carrier rotates about the main RD pivot; thus causing its angle to change relative to the face it engages on the hanger. Subsequently with a flat-ended screw you'll most likely end up with only the edge of the screw's end contacting the hanger with a correspondingly tiny bearing area.

Since this isn't great from the perspective of limiting damage to the dropout / its finish I popped my bolt into the council lathe and gave it a bit of a ball end:

IMG_20250608_181948.jpg



Once fitted the better access with the Allen key allowed me to add more preload to the RD than I'd previously managed. The screw is noticeably less tight in the carrier's threads (perhaps the originals are made a shade oversize to keep them secure) however given the amount of load on it from the RD spring I doubt it's going anywhere; and if it does I can always add some threadlock.


IMG_20250608_182554.jpg



I couldn't resist a quick test ride and a total of four miles gave no ghost shifting and seemingly improved shift quality; however I've had plenty of false dawns in the past so will wait until I've put more miles on it before a final verdict.

Going out with no pannier bags, rucksack or tunes in the cool evening air really reminded me of how good the bike is / how much I like it. The bike feels sold and silent - the unfamiliar absence of the pannier bags chattering on the rack confirming absolutely no squeaks, rattles, knocks or bloody-freehub noise from the bike itself.

The two loudest sounds to the rider are wind noise and the tyres on the road - making it feel ridiculously refined compared to everything else I own; despite its modest provenence :smile:
 
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