Bent Derailleur Hanger

No riding this week as I was on the beach in the Outer Banks in North Carolina.

I was able to figure out my shifting problem before I had left. I am pretty sure the problem with the Fantom 29 is a bent derailleur hanger. I did not see any damage to the derailleur itself. Good thing because a replacement would be $55.

The Motobecane Fantom 29 is equipped with a replaceable rear derailleur hanger. The replaceable hanger is specifically designed and engineered to bend or break and sacrifice itself to save the frame or derailleur from what would otherwise be non-repairable damage.

As you can see from the picture on the left, the chain "walks" to the inner side of the teeth on the cassette sprocket and then skips down with each revolution. It only does this in the lowest gear. That would tell me that the derailleur is leaning toward the wheel.









When you look at the hanger itself it does not look bent. It must be very slight. I may attempt a repair by making my own alignment tool and using a technique as described on the Parks Tool Website.

In any event, I purchased a replacement hanger at bikesdirect. Even if I can straighten the existing one, it is probably good to have a spare.

I was surprised that bikesdirect sells replacement hangers but they do. I emailed them on July 19 at 11:21 pm to ask if they had a model number and a source as to where to buy a replacement. I thought they might point me to bikeisland.com which I believe is run by the same company as bikesdirect. Instead on July 21 at 4:35 pm they emailed me a link at bikesdirect for replacement hangers. They are $20 and includes free shipping and no sales tax. I googled other sources and $20 is a good price. I ordered one on July 27.

When I get a chance this week I will complete the repair. In the mean time the Raleigh Grand Prix will be my ride.