Replacing your chain is the guarantee of preserving your equipment and indexing. It’s also very easy at Shimano!
The tools
To mount a Shimano chain, you just need a chain drift compatible with the number of speeds but also with the crimping hardness of the rivet. Indeed, it is not uncommon to break the chain drift by chasing the rivet. A quality chain drift will not be useless so…
Pictures © Frédéric Iehl
Time and difficulty
For assembly, allow about ten minutes, if the old chain is removed and everything is clean. Otherwise we will close to half an hour to do everything. On the difficulty side, we are in the very easy if we have the right tools!
Stage 1
We pass the chain in the front derailleur and in the rear derailleur. On the latter, care is taken to pass the chain under the lugs (1 and 2) of the derailleur screed…
If the chain passes over the lugs and you do not want to open it, you can disassemble the derailleur screed to put the chain in the right place. But everything will have to be tightened firmly.
Stage 2
Then we « tend » the chain when it is on the big chainring and the small sprocket. The axis line of the derailleur wheels must be vertical.
Stage 3
We look at how many links we will have to reduce the chain. As we use a « fast » link, we must have two « internal » links at each end.
Stage 4
We therefore reduce the chain of the desired number of links. The rivet is removed with the chain drift.
Stage 5
The fast link has a direction of assembly. The arrow indicates this one, which corresponds to the traction of the chain.
Stage 6
As we work at the bottom, the arrow on the link goes backwards…
Stage 7
When the chain is in tension, the link will be well oriented.
Stage 8
The bike placed on its wheels and the fast link between the cassette and the chainring, we press the pedal to lock it! We usually hear a click that confirms the implementation.
We then control the indexing and make sure that no link « sleat ». This would mean that the fast link is not in place and that it will have to be « tend » for the Shimano chain to work perfectly.
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