So I think I’m dealing with my second bent derailleur cage (SRAM GX)…broke a chain when shifting and putting down the power on my XC bike. Replaced the chain etc and the shifting was garbage. To keep a long story short it looks like the cage is bent. I’m pretty confident is isn’t the hanger, I’ve checked it 3 times with the Park Tool DAG and it right on the money. This is the second time it happened to me (the other time was a crash IIRC). Last time I just replaced the derailleur and it fixed the problem, this time I tried straightening it, and I ‘think’ I’ve got it right, still need to do a test ride, but it seems to be shifting well in the stand.
So my questions are these: 1. Is this a thing with SRAM derailleurs? there was at least some operator error in this last one, but seems a bit weird. 2. Any utility in getting a derailleur higher up the hierarchy? 3. Any tips for bending it back, or just eyeball it? 4. Does the ‘clutch’ feature on AXS prevent this sort of thing?
Its a big upfront cost, but the crash protection mode on the gx axs is superb. Ive had at least 3 rock strikes that im confident would have been the end of the life for a mechanical derailleur. I heard the rock strike, the sound of the motor pulling it inboard, few pedal strokes and it came right back out. Didnt even need to adjust indexing, limit screws…anything…it just worked. I thought it was a gimmick at first but im a believer. If you think of it that way, thats $300 in gx derailleurs so im not far from the break-even point!.. at least thats how im justifying the purchase
Not really a Sram thing…you money shifted. a xx1 probably would have suffered the same fate. If you shifted under that much load that you broke the chain, its unfortunately user error. I dont believe the higher end ones are any stronger, just lighter.
Higher end derailleurs generally mean lighter not stronger. I’ve now bent 2 AXS cages in 3 years. Unfortunately I’m kind of a crashy rider and it tends to be on the drivetrain side . You can probably pull/bend the derailleur to get it mostly shifting well, but likely it will struggle in a few gears. It’s a bit of a hack, but if money is tight it may be good enough. The parallelogram is likely bent and there’s no way of getting that back to the original shape. In fact when I tried to perfectly align the hanger shifting got worse.
The AXS derailleurs have a feature that supposedly moves if it gets a sudden impact, but that’s better for rock strikes and not crashes. At least in my experience. I’d recommend a new derailleur at some point if perfect shifting is your goal.
. You can probably pull/bend the derailleur to get it mostly shifting well, but likely it will struggle in a few gears. It’s a bit of a hack, but if money is tight it may be good enough. The parallelogram is likely bent and there’s no way of getting that back to the original shape. In fact when I tried to perfectly align the hanger shifting got worse.