Is this a “cable stretch” symptom? The bike was bought brand new in June and hasn’t had a service since. Can I sort this out myself? If so what do I need to do?

TiA for any advice.

DS

Have a look here DS

Have a look at the loop of cable outer leading to the rear mech. Has the outer come out of the a ferrule and got hooked up? It makes the cable run tight way before it’s managed to pull the mech all the way up to 1st.

Cable stretch won’t stop it going to the small sprockets. Myself and others have noticed that the new design X9 mech seems to develop this issue. A friends one had the rivets on the parallelogram bit too tight and had to be loosened with a centre punch and mine struggles to get into the smallest sprocket.

I wander if the new design could do with a stronger spring?

Also seems very sensitive to mud stopping it working.

A shame as I really liked sram stuff

how weird. i had this exact problem last night, tried new cable (ballache which involved dismantling an x9 shifter, glad i use xt) tried a shed load of lube on all moving parts and its still sluggish moving into the smallest cog. i think it must be a design fault, quite surprising.

Yep, quite a few people have had this problem with recent X9 rear mechs, including me. Here, here, and here are examples just from STW. Lots more similar cases if you Google for it elsewhere. Basically the spring is too weak (or the rivets are too tight, it amounts to the same thing). Your best bet is taking it back to the shop. If you can’t do that for some reason you might be able to sort it by applying loads of GT85 or WD40, and if that doesn’t work try whacking the rivets (carefully!) with a centre punch to loosen them up. Make sure you’ve definitely got the thing set up right first though!

Don’t count on it being fixable or getting better with time, return it if you can. I never managed to sort mine properly after two months’ reasonably heavy use, and ended up replacing it completely.

phew, not just me – spent an hour yesterday affy trying to get chain into smallest sprocket after fitting new cable. Bought mech and new shifters from Merlin in May, just not used the bike much and new cable neededas i frayed old one. ps unscrew the silver cap, remove black cover and its dead easy to change cable!!!