Rear hanger alignment

A lot is expected of your rear derailleur. You want it to be a precise, instantshifting piece of kit even under pressure in a dirty environment. You need to be able to rely on it in all conditions and that’s why it pays to nurture your poor toiling derailleur.

One of the most common problems to be routinely ignored is the alignment of the rear derailleur hanger (the part on the frame that the derailleur bolts onto). The gears are designed to work when the two jockey wheels hang vertically underneath the sprockets. This vertical alignment is the first casualty of a crash, but it’s often overlooked – you get up and brush yourself off, look at your bike and, if everything looks okay, you ride away. Bad things can happen next. If you’ve crashed and bent your derailleur inwards, the gears may still work, but everything has shipped inboard a little. Next time you stamp uphill in a low gear, you click the lever to find a bigger sprocket, but instead you dump the chain off the inside…

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