Road Bike Headset Adjustment

Many peoples bicycle s headset is a little loose sometimes too tight.

Road bike headset adjustment. The headset is the bearing assembly that fits to a bike s head tube and allows the fork and front wheel to turn. Too tight and you feel like you re fighting your bike too loose and you re struggling to control it. We couldn t have expected this simple method of pre loading headset bearings to change the way we attach forks to frames forever but it did. 4 5 and 6mm would be a good place.

Although an improperly adjusted headset won t cause a fire or catastrophic bicycle breakdown it ll wear out the headset faster and make controlling your bike a little more difficult. Road cc first met rader and saw the prototype threadless headset at the world mountain bike championships in italy back in 1991. Improperly adjusted headsets often go unnoticed. Our bike headset guide includes a wealth of information on bicycle headset including headset standards maintenance and repairs different headset types and more.

When it s working as it should you probably won t notice your headset too much but you will become conscious of it if it needs regreasing or starts to wear out because your steering will begin to suffer. Depending on your bike the tools that you ll need for this job will vary but it s always good to have a torque wrench and a selection of allen keys to hand. Road mtb women beginners magazine offers bike insurance.