I bought a 21-speed mountain bike one year ago, and I also use this bike most days for the 7 km commute to work. It is generally working quite well, but a few months ago, I noticed that there is a small clicking sound that seems to be coming from between the pedals (sorry, I don’t know the proper term for this!). There is usually one click per pedal revolution, coming at exactly the same moment in each revolution. Recently I have started hearing two clicks per revolution (the clicks are not evenly spaced within the revolution, but rather come together: <CLICK-CLICK> <GAP><CLICK-CLICK><GAP>…).
It does not make this sound when I am pedalling normally on the flat, but only when I am trying to accelerate or am climbing a hill: the harder I pedal, the more pronounced the noise.
The bike did not make these sounds when I bought it. On the other hand, I can only hear them (not feel them) and I haven’t noticed any change in performance.
Anyone have an idea what this is? Is it something I should worry about, or should I pass it off as normal bike noise?
A clicking or creaking area from this area of the bike is a common problem, endemic, and could be down to a few things. If we start out by recognising that the pedals are connected to the cranks, which are in turn connected to the bottom bracket, odds are one of these components is causing the sound and needs cleaning and re-tightening, or replacing. It is usually impossible to isolate the source of creaking sounds in this area, so a stepwise approach is usually required.
Easy things to do yourself would include taking off the pedals, clean, regrease and put them back on the bike. You could also retighten the crankarms to the bottom bracket using a large allen wrench. This is almost never a long term solution, but if you do it and the clicking stops for a while then it points to badly seated cranks as the culprit. See if there is any side-to-side play in the bottom bracket (BB) by holding one of the cranks near the pedal and see if there is any lateral movement to it. There should be none, if there is you need a new BB.
If the above doesn’t stop the evil clicking noise, then you either take it to the shop and ask them to sort it, or you get the requisite tools to remove the cranks and BB from the bike, clean, grease and reseat to spec. I can tell you how to do this if you’re interested.
I don’t know what bike you’re riding, but many BBs are not built to last and are essentially disposable items on a mountain bike. The bearings can be low quality and wear out fast, although I would expect a decent lifetime from a BB on a commuting bike. If this does turn out to be the problem a shop will fix it no problem, probably for the cost of one hours labour plus BB cost.
Do you feel a slip or jerk in the pedal when you hear the click? And do you only get it when you’re in a particular front gear?
If so, then I bet there’s a damaged or worn-out tooth on the chainring (the gear attached to the pedals).
You can find a bent tooth by looking carefully at the chainring, and the fix is easy: get a pair of pliers and carefully bend it back.
A worn-out chainring is a little less obvious, but looking carefully might help. The fix is to replace the chainring, and the chain at the same time (and a lot of people recommend replacing the rear gears at the same time too, because they tend to wear along with the chain.)
You may want to pick up a copy of “Anybody’s Bike Book” if you want to start fixing simple things yourself (and you should). It’'s a great book for beginning bike maintainers.
Is the front derrailier(sp?) centered? Because that sounds a little like when the FD is almost at the shift point. Tho that is more a “grind” sound than a “click”.
My bike started doing something like that a while ago, but it was more like a ping sound than a click. Turns out it was my shoe laces hitting the pedal shank, and the support that goes from the pedal hub to the back wheel hub. I was really concerned because this bike used to break spokes all the time. When I finally figured out what was going on, it was :smack: .
Was it a pretty cheap bike? I’m going to go with Myler’s idea-- Sounds like an exploded ball bearing or two. This has happened to me before and had a similar symptom.
Thanks everyone. The bike is a Scott Tampico. I think the sound is definitely a click and not a grinding. I have looked closely at the chainring teeth and don’t see anything amiss. I like **Bewildebeest’s **shoelace suggestion. In fact, I get that sound too, and that was the first thing I ruled out when I found this other problem. But the sound is similar.
I will check out the other suggestions. But I must warn – I am useless with repair sort of things and would much rather throw money at it.
But considering the various scenarios from the posters, is this a problem that needs to be fixed, or can I just live with it?
If it was a mountain bike that was sitting in the garage most times, I’d say a noisy drivetrain was not that big a deal. But you say that you’re commuting on this bike, most days, so in that case I’d get it seen to. A clicking/creaking crank is a textbook example of a repair that is far more economical to fix early than late. Say the problem is that the crank is not seated quite right on the bottom bracket (a common complaint). You can take it in now and the shop mechanic will clean and reassemble it for ten quid max, problem solved. Or you can ride the bike for another two months, in which time you have rounded out the crank due to the bad interface with the bottom bracket, and now need a new crankset (thirty quid rock bottom quality, fifty quid for a decent one, plus the mechanic’s costs for fitting it).
Besides, don’t you find that the clicking sound* extremely *irritating? I cannot stand riding a bike that creaks. Best of luck with getting the problem sorted out in any case.
Seems like either pedal bearings wearing out (inside the actual pedals) or the bottom-bracket loose or worn (the bottom bracket [BB] being, the hole in the bottom of the frame that the whole pedalling-arangement spins in).
As far as the pedals, most all platform pedals now are simply made with cheap bearings. But new platform pedals don’t cost jack squat, so buying a new pair is no big deal, only a few bucks. Cheap pedals are disposeable, they can’t be fixed, they use pressed-together bodies and sleeve bearings and often don’t have any access for re-lubing at all. When they go bad (in a year perhaps of hard riding) you toss em and pay $15-$20 for a new pair.
Alternately, the bottom-bracket bearings could be loose or worn. Stand at the side of the bike and grab one of the crankarms at the end where one pedal screws in, and push/pull the end of the crankarm “sideways”, with respect to the bike frame. If you get any visible movement, the bottom-bracket bearings need help. Maybe just tightening, maybe replacements. I am not familiar with the brand, but cheap bicycles now use very cheap bearings, as I’ve said elsewhere.
If you keep riding, and the BB bearings are shot, they will get worse and you will get more pedalling resistance just from this, and also you will hear a clunking/rumbling from the pedals and feel them rumbling as you push down on them.
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