Shake, Rattle and Roll

It takes a while to get to know a new bike. In the case of my new Ribble, this is especially the case. It has a Shimano Di2 Ultegra groupset, and Mavic Cosmic Pro Carbon wheels, which have deep section rims. Both of these are new to me. The 883 also has a very stiff frame. It's by no means uncomfortable and gives great feedback about the surface of the road. But it has an interesting and unexpected side effect, when it comes to diagnosing little creaks and rattles. It almost rings!

I've had a couple of rattles to diagnose. They've both turned out to be minor, but they sounded as though a major failure was imminent. My conclusion is that the wheels and the frame amplify the sounds to some extend, making them sound much worse than they really are!

The first sound developed after I'd been riding the bike for a couple of weeks. It sounded like a combination of a creak and a pinging noise, that was intermittent but that gradually seemed to get louder. I couldn't correlate the sound with the way I was riding. Sometimes it would happen while freewheeling, sometimes while climbing seated, sometimes while standing and sometimes when cruising. In the end I decided that it was probably coming from the front wheel. It sounded like something was about to collapse. To confirm that it was the wheel, I swapped it for the front wheel from my Willier Izoard. The result? Instant peace!

A Google search for odd noises from Mavic wheels revealed an adjustment about which I had no idea. Mavic's have a bearing adjustment built in. It turned out that my front wheel bearing had worked out of adjustment. With the wheel installed, it was possible to rock it from side to side a little. The side to side movement was triggering various pings and creaks within the wheel, which was amplifying the sound to alarming levels. A simple adjustment of the wheel bearings restored silent operation. Phew!

The second sound developed a couple of weeks later. This was just as mysterious. It occurred when seated or standing. So not a creaking saddle then. Sometimes it was quite loud, other times almost absent. It seemed to be louder when riding harder. Also, it only seemed to occur when on the small ring at the front. On the large ring, everything was fine.

The penny finally dropped, and I checked the bolts that hold the small and large rings together. Bingo. They had all worked loose. I've never seen this happen before. Application of a little thread locking compound and re-tightening the bolts cured the noise. Once again, a relatively small movement generated a noise amplified to alarming proportions by the resonance of the frame.

These were tiny faults that were frustrating to track down. But it was a great learning experience, and I feel I know the bike a lot better now.