Recently my bike will only move if I’m in the highest gear. I can pedal at lower gears but it will not move my bike forward at any reasonable speed and when I get up to even a very low speed the pedals just spin with no resistance unless I'm at the highest gear. Even at highest gear I can’t get my bike moving very quickly because I quickly lose resistance on the pedals. Is there a way to fix this?
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7What sort of bike is it? Do you have gears only at the back, or at both the front and back? A well-lit photo of the bike from the right hand side would help a lot.– Greg HewgillCommented Apr 1 at 21:51
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1Clarifying: turning the pedals makes the chain move, which turns the rear cogs but they seem completely disconnected from the wheel?– Criggie ♦Commented Apr 2 at 1:04
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1 Answer
The way you are saying I guess is the ratchet failure. It could be worn out or just got stuck by the grease. Take it out clean it, reapply some grease in it, see how it goes.
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1Many freehubs aren't designed to be serviced, so the tools to open them aren't sold. Easy home made tools aren't strong enough and if you do get into the freehub you can release up to 50 tiny ball bearings. Realistically, while the diagnosis may be correct, the solution is to replace the freehub– Chris HCommented Apr 2 at 8:40
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2Just a question to everyone who assumes that it's a freehub or freewheel: How would the ratchet know which gear is used?– ojsCommented Apr 2 at 9:52
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1@ojs My guess is its on the fuzzy edge of working sometimes and sometimes not. Maybe the chain on the large cogs puts more/less twist on the freehub and its internal ratchets than the smaller cogs. But yes if its a freewheel, replacement should be cheap. A freehub could be more expensive.– Criggie ♦Commented Apr 2 at 10:13
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2@Criggie a different plausible explanation would be that the OP has one of the internal gears that have multiple ratchets that are used with different speeds, and one of them would be broken.– ojsCommented Apr 2 at 16:28