Rear wheel and brake issue

timmy_mallet

Hello all,

Recently started to try to maintain my road bike (Lapierre Audacio)... I removed the rear wheel to give the bike a clean (following some online vids about how easily to remove it and replace it), but now I have a small problem..

When I put the wheel back on, it is closer to one seat post than the other, the non-casette side, and the brakes are not aligned as they were before. I had to slide one of the pads down to touch the rim, as it as on the tire. And I have been fiddling with the centering (it's not even close to being centered now to allow the pads to touch the rim at the same time)

I think the wheel is correctly in the dropouts, it looks flush and doesn't wobble.

Any thoughts on what could be wrong?

Cheers

seamus

If the tyre is noticeably closer to one of the seat stays, then the wheel is not sitting evenly in the dropouts.

Turn the bike upside down, completely loosen the quick release, and use your thumbs to push on both sides of the hub, while at the same time gently pulling the chainstays apart.

Cee-Jay-Cee

Turn the bike upside down, release the wheel again and make sure it's fully seated in the drop outs when tightening the QR skewer.

If it's still off centre then your brake caliber could be slightly loose. Loosen it slightly with a 6mm Allen key (I think) and centre it on the rim, then pull the brake tight and re-tighten the caliber.

There is also a centering screw on the caliper although it only allows small adjustment once you have the caliper centred on its mounting point.

G1032

Same issue on my hybrid Trek. Got fed up one day trying to align the brakes so brought it to the lbs (not where it was bought though)
They said the frame isn't exactly true/straight/correctly aligned (I forget the term they used) but that basically the wheel will never be centered properly. They reckon it should have been spotted by the lbs where I bought it and sent back straight away. I just leave the back wheel in leave now unless absolutely necessary to remove but I don't cycle that bike a huge amount anymore do it doesn't really matter too much

timmy_mallet

Cee-Jay-Cee wrote: »

Turn the bike upside down, release the wheel again and make sure it's fully seated in the drop outs when tightening the QR skewer.

If it's still off centre then your brake caliber could be slightly loose. Loosen it slightly with a 6mm Allen key (I think) and centre it on the rim, then pull the brake tight and re-tighten the caliber.

There is also a centering screw on the caliper although it only allows small adjustment once you have the caliper centred on its mounting point.

Ok, I'll give that a go now and see what happens.

The caliper is not centered on its mounting for sure, i had to move it because after replacing the wheel, it was noticeably higher (pads on the tire) than before, so I removed/replaced/removed/replaced x 10 and fiddled with the mount and pads.

The bike only had done about 500km before I started to mess about, and had never given any problems with the rear brakes either, so I'm assuming the mess is all down to me and not the bike.

omri

This should be helpful.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2pnbJ64zvME

timmy_mallet

FIXED!!

Removed the wheel. Centered the calipers. Turned upside down. Replaced wheel (was a bit tricky upside down). Fiddle with the QR skewer a small bit until it fitted into the dropouts.

Reset the pads to the correct height. all seems fine.

Rode a few 100km with it incorrectly in the dropouts

Thanks for the help.

timmy_mallet

omri wrote: »

This should be helpful.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2pnbJ64zvME

Yes, the GCN stuff has been extremely useful since I've begun riding and fiddling