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Fixing a SRAM 11 speed GX rear shifter on my mountain bike. I was on a downhill MTB holiday and fell off, snapping the thumb trigger on my rear gear shifter. R

Fixing a SRAM 11 speed GX rear shifter on my mountain bike. I was on a downhill MTB holiday and fell off, snapping the thumb trigger on my rear gear shifter. Replacing the shifter is usually like a £30 part, but I was in an alpine resort in summer so the shops that stocked them were charging nearly £100! I had my tools and some super glue so sat down to repair it. The snapped part fixed in two minutes but getting that part in place required the complete disassembly of the internal mechanics of the shifter which was all tensioned with multiple hidden springs, the internals literally burst apart half way through carefully taking it apart. We had no instructions, no YouTube video (since it is usually cheap enough just to swap out) and no diagrams. It took me and a random guy staying in the chalet 3.5 hours to put it back together, we essentially had to spread everything out and think from first principles of how a shifter works, the specific features of that shifter (rapid fire, mutiple down shifts with one leave arch) and build up how those peices would match how it operates. Must have been 30 part, all small and all tensioned with three(?) springs. 6 months later still working fine but man did we get a mental workout that day. Next day I had to fix my 3 axis gimbal but that was a lot easier.

simooooo 8y ago
I decided to dismantle my Saint shifter one day. Good fun. That big coiled spring got me.
ArthurN 8y ago
I empathize! These kinds of shifters are SUPER hard to put back together. Quite literally, so many moving parts in such a tight space. If you inadvertently bend the springs or coils too much, you could end up ruining the whole thing. I had a similar situation happen to on a Shimano Deore shifter, which is even less complex than the SRAM you mention. For others who have never had this "joy", it looks like there's at least one video at least partially showing what the OP had to go through: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nrfKQfXJgd0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nrfKQfXJgd0 Jump to ~2:00 to get a sense of how finicky this stuff is.
- simonbarker87 8y ago
  That video was released a month after I fixed mine! Could have done with that.
ehnto 8y ago
Are you making YouTube videos of your mountain biking adventures or just videos for fun? I would be keen to see them as I am getting into it now myself.
- simonbarker87 8y ago
  We had been planning on doing a couples MTB channel as my wife was looking for something outside of work to make up for a lack of interesting projects at work. In the end she landed up getting a job at Aston Martin and now I just use the gimbal for fun with our friends when riding. I recommend BKXC and Seth’s Bike Hacks as good channels that avoid all the Gnar downhill stuff
  - ehnto 8y ago
    Those are a couple of my favourite channels! Mountain biking for the everyman. Singletrack Sampler and BCPov are a couple of my recommendations. BCPov does some pretty awesome bike treking videos too, with camping and all the other stuff involved with multiday rides.
johnjohnsmith 8y ago
That's pretty funny and I'm glad to hear something other than another barely believable "I did this god mode hack" story... The mechanical realm doesn't get enough love. Indexing shifters have become better, but progressively more miniaturized (and ironically flimsier IMO) over the past 30+ years. Good work!
collyw 8y ago
Curious if your hourly rate at work works out at more than £28.5 per hour, as that's what your time would have cost. Saying that I imagine the satisfaction was worth it. (I do a lot of my own bike repairs and a 5 minute youtube video usually works out as closer to an hour or two when I try.)
- simonbarker87 8y ago
  I see where you are coming from but since I was already on holiday it would have been pure cost. It’s not like I could have spent that time earning money, I would have just come back from France feeling over charged for something that it turned out I could fix myself. Very satisfying to do as well.

simooooo 8y ago

I decided to dismantle my Saint shifter one day. Good fun. That big coiled spring got me.

ArthurN 8y ago

I empathize! These kinds of shifters are SUPER hard to put back together. Quite literally, so many moving parts in such a tight space. If you inadvertently bend the springs or coils too much, you could end up ruining the whole thing. I had a similar situation happen to on a Shimano Deore shifter, which is even less complex than the SRAM you mention. For others who have never had this "joy", it looks like there's at least one video at least partially showing what the OP had to go through: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nrfKQfXJgd0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nrfKQfXJgd0 Jump to ~2:00 to get a sense of how finicky this stuff is.

simonbarker87 8y ago
That video was released a month after I fixed mine! Could have done with that.

ehnto 8y ago

Are you making YouTube videos of your mountain biking adventures or just videos for fun? I would be keen to see them as I am getting into it now myself.

simonbarker87 8y ago
We had been planning on doing a couples MTB channel as my wife was looking for something outside of work to make up for a lack of interesting projects at work. In the end she landed up getting a job at Aston Martin and now I just use the gimbal for fun with our friends when riding. I recommend BKXC and Seth’s Bike Hacks as good channels that avoid all the Gnar downhill stuff
- ehnto 8y ago
  Those are a couple of my favourite channels! Mountain biking for the everyman. Singletrack Sampler and BCPov are a couple of my recommendations. BCPov does some pretty awesome bike treking videos too, with camping and all the other stuff involved with multiday rides.

johnjohnsmith 8y ago

That's pretty funny and I'm glad to hear something other than another barely believable "I did this god mode hack" story... The mechanical realm doesn't get enough love. Indexing shifters have become better, but progressively more miniaturized (and ironically flimsier IMO) over the past 30+ years. Good work!

collyw 8y ago

Curious if your hourly rate at work works out at more than £28.5 per hour, as that's what your time would have cost. Saying that I imagine the satisfaction was worth it. (I do a lot of my own bike repairs and a 5 minute youtube video usually works out as closer to an hour or two when I try.)

simonbarker87 8y ago
I see where you are coming from but since I was already on holiday it would have been pure cost. It’s not like I could have spent that time earning money, I would have just come back from France feeling over charged for something that it turned out I could fix myself. Very satisfying to do as well.