Answer Me This

I have a question for the more mechanically-inclined readers.

I’m having an issue when I hook up the new bike to my trainer. Not long after I begin pedaling, I’m experiencing some sporadic false shifting, meaning it both sounds and feels like I’m shifting, but the gear doesn’t actually shift.

With my pea-like brain, I’m assuming this is the result of either one of two things. First, because the frame is a lot less stiff than the aluminum frame I was riding, perhaps my weight is causing the frame to flex once I set the rear skewer in the trainer and that, in turn, is creating tension on the rear derailleur cable where it sits in the cable guide under the crank housing.

Any thoughts on that one?

Second, I was thinking it may have something to do with the tension where the trainer meets the skewer, although I tend to settle the connector (whatever that thing is called) against the skewer so that it doesn’t push the chain stays any closer together than they already are. Does that make sense? In other words, I don’t think the trainer is in any way pushing against the rear derailleur.

Any other thoughts? If anyone reads this in the next day or so and talk to Trek Tommy (again, my apologies, although I don’t know his last name), put the question to him and let me know. That dude seems to know everything about bike mechanics. If you happen to talk to him and remember to ask him the above, you can click on the little white envelope icon at the end of this post and shoot me an email. Or just call me at 718-619-1501. I’d appreciate that.

(Between you and me, I get the feeling the problem is related to number one above, the issue with the cable tension. If it is, I’m wondering how the hell I’m going to relieve the issue.)

Finally, I tried reading The Death of Marco Pantani by Matt Rendell, but after fifty pages, I gave up. When every other word is the name of some obscure Italian village or long Italian name, the reading gets a bit tedious after a while. In the event I ever find myself with absolutely nothing else to do--and I mean nothing--maybe I’ll pick it up again, but until then, Mr. Pantani’s biography is going to have to wait.