Okay, first off, I’m building up an old Javelin X-frame. It’ll be SO cool when it’s finished… But I’m having major problems with the front derailleur. The frame has a braze-on mount, and there’s no way to put on a clamp-type (no round tubes). The problem is that the FD is so far away from the chainring that it’s just not going to shift. Here’s a shot from the side that shows just how much room there is between the FD and a 55T chainring (chain is on a 44T inner ring in the pics):
There’s a good half-inch gap, to the point where the inner cage plate would shift right over the big ring (if the FD would move that far). Here’s a shot from the front:
And here’s a last shot from the back, showing the chain dragging on the bottom of the der. cage on the small ring (and a 13T in back):
So I know that I need to take out a couple links from the chain to increase the tension – that will help the drag problem a LITTLE bit. And I could go to a 60/50 combo up front (thank GOD it’s a 650 wheeled frame – yeah, no comments about the gap between the frame and rear wheel). But… Is there anything I can do (like use a FD that made for a compact system) to rememdy this?
Thanks in advance for any help.
