A few weeks ago in the Alps, I clipped a rock with my rear mech…

It ended up with the rear mech “toeing out” I had a spare hander but this did not seem to be the problem and the cage looked straight also.
I had to limp home, but it was the end of the day so didn’t really matter.

Back at the workshop, I confirmed that both the mech hanger, and cage, and for good measure the drop outs on the frame were perfectly straight, I had a spare SLX mech with me, so that went on and all was well.

So I now have a really nice XT shadow + rear mech, that has the body bent….

1) GRRR, isn’t the mech hanger supposed to fail in this situation to protect the expensive mech /GRRR
2) Any tips on straitening it out, or is it just not going to be possible
3) Can you dismantle the bent bits and replace?
4) Or is it just as cheap for a new mech from ze germans….
5) I know if I was better I would not have carelessly ridden my mech into a rock

You might be able to straighten it. Then again, you might not. It’s normally the cages that bend and that’s relatively simple to get straight, if the body has bent then that’s pretty hard though. The only real trick is to contain the force to the bit you want to bend- so frinstance, if you try to straighten the body by swinging on the cage, you’ll just bend the cage too.