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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wafter

wafter

I like steel bikes and I cannot lie..
Location
Oxford
Another exciting update..

On balance the drawbacks of using the Fuji for the commute appear fewer / less impactful than those of the Brompton, so that's been tucked away (pending appeasment of the seemingly perpetual list of jobs it needs) and the Touring pressed into service for daily duties.

Since work on the CdF unfortunately remains "ongoing" I have no leisure bike so pretty much every ride is astride the Touring; around 650 miles per month currently driving up the mileage at an unprecedented rate - the bike currently having covered around 3400 miles since it came into my ownership nearly three years ago :smile:

It needs a good wash and the ghost shifting issue persists, however little niggles / situations of my own making aside it's generally been very well behaved.


Recently an increasingly irritating clicking corresponding with the DS pedal stroke was confirmed as the result of my inability to tighten the pedals sufficiently; the DS item especially coming off pretty easily and leaving behind an area of galling on the register face of the crank :sad:

Not the end of the world as it's a utility hack and the crank was a little tatty anyway, but irritating all the same and a reminder of the value of pedal washers (and correctly torqueing pedals - although this is easier said than done if they only have spanner flats).

Pertinant areas were cleaned and the pedals refitted with some of my lovely 10p Ali Express washers; making sure to get the side of the washer with the radiussed edges facing the spot face in the crank to avoid further damage.

While I was at it the toe cages were removed as they're a bit of a pain in stop-start traffic; oddly revealing themselves to have been butchered to fit the pedals despite everything involved apparently being original-fitment.

The absence of the cages has been interesting from the perspective of seeing where my feet go on the pedals when unconstrained (spoiler: wide and wonky).

Binning the cages has proven a bit of a double-edged sword; no more feverishly pawing at the back of the weak-side pedal when pulling away however in the wet the grip afforded by the single well-worn side of the cheap ally pedals and their now-heavily-polished integral upstands is misery to say the least..

I don't really want to replace the pedals - especially as it still stings that I didn't pick up multiple sets of the excellent Nukeproof Neutrons I now have on the Ragley for a tenner while the opportunity presented itself. Depending on how enthusiastic I'm feeling I might drill and tap both sides for socket grub screws as this seems to be how most manufacturers now approach grip provision on their pedals; bringing the added bonuses of adjustability and replaceability..

In other news despite its battle damage and humble provenance it continues to get a steady stream of compliments - most recently from a cycle-positive mate at the pub, my neighbour and the chap on the tow path I've chatted to a few times - majestic bastard that it is!
 
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wafter

wafter

I like steel bikes and I cannot lie..
Location
Oxford
Gave the bike a rushed, half-arsed wash recently and discovered a few hitherto unknown areas of damage... There's a chip on the BB shell (not sure from where - don't recall dropping the chain recently and teh front guard typically does a great job of keeping flying debris in check) but it's no big thing to touch up as long as the paint's not dried out.

More concerningly the fallout from tyre rub on the inside of the left hand chainstay that I'd touched up previously has rubbed through again; despite no apparant alignment issues with the wheel. This has gone all the way through and corroded slightly so needs treating and touching up again ASAP.. I suppose were I really keen I could flat the paint back and stick a brass / ally plate over the top; although facilities to do such things are extremely limited at the flat.

There are also numerous light rubs all over the frame; can't remember which of these are pre-existing and which are the inevitable result of the amount of utlility use it's getting (with the inevitable mishaps such as sliding into contact with / past bike racks while filling the pannier bags).

While I'm less fussy about this bike given the condition it was in when I got it, this is a sobering reminder of how much frame tape I'll need to lash onto its replacement if my perfectionism is to be appeased.

Finally I'm still troubled by the ghost-shifting issue. Presumably if it was a cable friction issue it would only manifest after shifts to smaller sprockets (since this relies on RD spring tension to pull the cable through the outer, so one assumes it could hang up before the RD has reached the full extent of its travel and slowly work it's way through due to vibration etc). As such I've tried to keep a mental log of what the last shift was and when the shifting issues occur... although this has so far proven inconclusive.

I suppose I could potentially also test it on the stand by shifting then poking the RD to see if I can make it move any further than releasing the cable has..


In other exciting news the original / half-ish-worn chain has been pressed back into service and seems to be performing well after initially being sidelined for persistant squeaking. Seems that repeated waxings have eventually flushed out all the contaminents resulting from running oiled.

I now have two approximately similarly worn chains on rotation; both were waxed earlier in the week which was an opportunity missed to compare them and re-fit the least worn which I'll try to check next time. It's always a treat to refit a freshly treated chain with its buttery-smooth demeanour :tongue:
 
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wafter

wafter

I like steel bikes and I cannot lie..
Location
Oxford
Nearly getting thrown off while hammering through traffic yesterday has renewed my interest in resolving the ghost shifting issue...

I have actually managed to pay attention to the problem relative to direction of shifting and have noticed numerous examples of it moving to the adjacent larger sprocket moments after a shift has been made in this direction and having apparently settled on a particular sprocket... This probably rules out a cable drag issue since shifting to larger sprockets requires tension on the cable; which a dragging cable isn't going to suddenly provide.

I think I've also witnessed it ghost shifting in the other direction; which would fit with yesterday's scare since I was in a pretty high gear (small sprocket) and would have shifted to up to that point having stopped at some lights.

So in summary the issue appears to be that it randomly shifts in either direction.. again I think ruling out a cable issue; probably a shifter issue too since it might creep and release cable tension, but it's not going to go the other way.

I've given the derailleur another inspection and it does seem pretty sloppy laterally (certainly compared to the GRX item on my Genesis) - so I'm wondering if the pins are worn in the parallelogram and it just creeps / jumps in either direction with road vibration etc.

As such I suppose I need to put my hand in my pocket and replace the RD; hopefully not another shot in the dark.
 
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