Hi all,
I put a speed link on a sram 9 speed chain a few weeks ago, but haven’t used the bike yet, I am now wanting to remove the chain in order to put the new front mech on however the speed link seems to be pretty stiff, I know you have to squeeze the middle of the link together however it just doesn’t seem to want to budge. Does anyone have any ideas?

Cheers

I made a little tool to pull the 2 halves together with a bit of a wire coat hanger

Did you just wrap it around the link or was a little more sophisticated than that?

Basically just a squared off U-shaped bit of wire that goes through the links either side of the quick link to act like tweezers and pull the pins towards each other while you squeeze the plates.

You can buy proper pliers for splitting Masterlinks but some folk on here disapprove. I love mine 😉

I wouldn’t want to carry a pair of special pliers on every ride unlike my little wire gizmo

I think I might invest in a set of the KMC pliers at some point though

I wouldn’t want to carry a pair of special pliers on every ride unlike my little wire gizmo

can’t think of a trail-side repair when you would need to split your chain at the power link?

I got some of the pliers as i decided I am going to run a couple of chains and keep swappling them over – pliers work ace and make life much easier. You can do it without the pliers for sure, however once you’ve got some you won’t readily give them away.

Cheers lads, mite look into those pliers, ended up just breaking the chain with a chain tool, sort of deceives the idea of a speed link but i will keep working at it and it will hopefully come off at some point.

Cheers

If you haven’t ridden the bike yet, now is an ideal time to start learning the knack of removal rather than resorting to the tool. I used to struggle, but now with a few seconds wiggling, I can undo one that is covered in oil/grime/mud mid-ride.

De-rail the chain to give some slack, look at the powerlink to determine which way the plates are going to slide (i.e front plate could slide left or right depending on which way up the powerlink is installed) and then press plates together whilst sliding the front and rear plates in the opposite direction. Flex the chain back and forth. If its freshly installed its almost certainly poor removal technique so keep trying!

Nae I can do them fine as I have one on my other bike, just couldn’t understand why this one was so stiff :S