Installing Specialized Expedition Rear Derailleur
User-Contributed Guide
An awesome member of our community made this guide. It is not managed by iFixit staff.
In this guide you will learn how to install and adjust your rear derailleur so that your gears shift properly through the full range of gear ratios.
- Author: Travis Tonder
- Time required: 30 to 45 minutes
- Difficulty: Moderate
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What’s a Derailleur?
The derailleur is your bike’s gear shifting device. When you adjust the shifter on your handlebars, the derailleur pushes your bike chain to the next gear over, and then adjusts the length of the chain to accommodate the change in gear size.
In steps 2 and 3, we adjust the high and low end adjustment stops, which set the maximum inward and outward distance that the derailleur can move the bike chain. Setting these boundaries prevents the derailleur from shifting the chain off of the sprockets and onto the axle.
By putting the shifter in the highest gear in step 4, the cable is let out as far as possible when we clamp down on it. This ensures that all slack is removed from the line.
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Step 6
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Fine tune the derailleur by tightening or loosening the barrel adjuster screw. Loosening this screw causes the derailleur to move slightly towards a larger sprocket, while tightening it moves the derailler towards a smaller sprocket.
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Shift through each gear while pedaling. The derailleur should move the chain one gear over each time you shift up or down.
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If the chain skips or makes noise when you are not shifting, use the barrel adjustment screw to fine tune the derailleur alignment.
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Repeat the previous steps until the derailleur shifts smoothly and makes a minimal amount of noise.
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