We’ve all been there.
That annoying creak that really winds you up.
How far have you gone to get rid of it?
I bet there’s someone out there that’s said to hell with it and bought a whole new bike just to free themselves of that tick, grind, squeak, knock, groan noise.
Come on spill the beans on your list of new stuff to silence your bike.

Swapped bb, pedals, chainset, seatpost and saddle, rear wheel (all parts off other bikes), new gear cables (thought maybe they were rubbing against something) stripped and greased all suspension pivots turned out to be a cracked seat tube so yeah new bike 😉

Got an old bike that I think the bb threads are getting a bit tired on, need to use saint or RF BBs with long threads and crank them up tight, standard shimano creak.

Good effort DONK but trying bit’s off another bike doesn’t cut it. 🙂

I’m talking splashing cash on new stuff.

My approach to bike maintenance

Avoids riding with Bregante. 😛

Hey stu 🙂 I simply ride my bike through as much mud and water as possible. Hey presto squeak gone 😀 I’m living at the foot of the Wrekin now if you ever fancy a ride, between that and the ercall there’s some great (steep) riding

My old kona developed a creak, didn’t spend much but tried everything, bb, headset, forks, pedals, seat post, seat etc.

Ended up the frame was cracked, so I bought a new bike.

Ringo.
Been a while since we’ve done the Wrekin so might just take you up on that.

Back in the days before it was common knowledge about certain Orange5/certain skewer creaks, we changed just about everything (bar skewer) on a customer’s S/H 5 in an attempt to quieten it. He gave up in the end,and sold the frame to a friend (with a Shimano skewer) who had creak-free riding until it was stolen.Mr original creak replaced it with a Ms Isle frame that had been through a similar process with incurable chainsuck (new drivetrain, chainlines, mech’s etc), no problems with chainsuck on that frame with new components, no problem on new frame with original components. Still scratching my head many years later,still, at least we now understand the creak.

Excellent. I’m available most Mondays stu and Tuesdays 🙂

I’ll give you a shout next time I’ve got a slack Monday/Tuesday then.

Are you bringing your dog? 😆

Stripping Tasha’s Nicolai in the campsite car park trying to find the creak, then heading into 18Bikes who removed and regreased the headset cups while I waited. All to no avail. The bike got wet and it went quiet. I don’t think my solution of pissing on the bike at the start of every ride went down very well. Eventually found to be the TT pivot

Little helpers by ritcheyp20, on Flickr

I might bring both my dogs 🙂

I had a good one today. Convinced that my BB was noisy I freewheeled for a bit to see if there was any other noise. I couldn’t hear anything other than my Hope Hub clicking away. Pedal again – noise came back. This went on but got no worse – then I discovered it was the velcro on my knee pad clicking off my shorts. What a tit!

then I discovered it was the velcro on my knee pad clicking off my shorts.

🙂 riding up a hill one day could hear tch, tch, tch every pedal stroke, even more worryingly it seemed to be coming from my knees, always worry about my knees, turned out the leg grippers of my lycra shorts were catching the inside hem of my baggies lifting up a little then slapping down. Doh!

IT was one of the main reasons i sold my Giant XTC29. No matter what, every time i stood up on it, i got a creak… couldn’t fix it… ever…. .

Sold it.

I had a cracker in France, i was on the Spearfish…. Climbing a hill there’s a ‘ting… ting… ting….’ On the way down…. nothing !!!

Hours of frustration later… it was the litlte clip on the saddle bag, tip tapping against the seatpost after i’d forgotten to do it up after it had been on workstand being lubed….

Oh… how we laughed.

I had a creak on my tinbred, went on for months. New BB, pedals, bearings in hubs, even cut a wedge off the bottom of the seatpost as I’d heard that could cause creaking – all to no avail.

After a particularly annoting 24 hours creaking up hills at Mountain Mayhem, I found this:

P6040250 by T*inbred, on Flickr

Quick trip to the local yacht builders and their titanium welding man put a weld on it for £30, and its been fine since!

swapped pedals a lot.

PD-M545 platform SPDs on the road bike, and lightweight race type pedals on the MTB was one silent combination. Swap them round, and click click click. Must have been 1 tiny bit of grit in the threads.

The new BB, seatpost, cassette, etc. were all a waste of money.

hmmm seen a lot of OO frames crack there, is it something about OO chainstays or is it a common thing across all bikes and OO’s popularity is weighting the numbers? (my kinesis broke there aswell 🙁 )

I’ve been chasing it for a while – changed BB, cleaned and regreased all the suspension bearings, overhauled the rear shock, changed the cassette (not because of the creaking, but anyway..), changed chain, cleaned everything. Applying force on different bike parts (by spinning, pushing, pressing 🙂 ) i eliminated wheels, pedals, fork and other parts as potential cause. Still the noise is there..

Today I read esher shore’s post which confused me. On the topic “Copperslip / Anti seize paste all equal ?” he writes:

on a daily basis in my workshop, I am dealing with customers with high-end road bikes coming in with ‘creaking cranks’ where the original dealer has assembled the bottom bracket and crankset with grease…

can it be that it’s my ignorance that causes the problem? (I also reinstalled BB using grease).I don’t know what else I could do to make this creaking sound disappear. I was thinking to change all the bearings, but if it will not help then it will be just a waste of money.

if anybody has the same experience with Canyon AM 6.0 from year 2011 and has any hint to share – me and my bike would be very grateful 🙂

well as I see this forum is just blossoming with activity 😀

Anyway I will post my success story, maybe google will parse it and somebody will have my success.

So finally I have managed to win the fight against THE CREAK! and the solution cost me only 20€ – Shimano anti seize paste. I have done a complete overhaul on my bike – took every single screw or a part that have threads (BB includied), cleaned the threads, pivot screws etc with ISO in order to remove all the grease that I have previously used as lubrication and lubricated it with Shimano anti seize paste. The only parts that I left untouched were the fork and the wheels. The next day I had only one disturbing noise which was caused by an overtightened pivot screw and after I have released it a bit all the creaks were gone. Peace… my baby runs smooth again 🙂

I rented a very nice Carbon Specialized Roubaix when I was on Maui in order to take on the local challenge which is a 5hr straight climb up the side of a local volcano. Started at 3am in the dark and all I had to concentrate on was the ridiculous creaking and cracking coming from somewhere beneath the saddle. Confirmed all my suspicions about plastic bikes but was driving me mental.

Tried regreasing the seatpost with my banana skin which did nothing, and tried loosening and retightening saddle clamp bolts, which did nothing. Stuck the stereo in and listened to the Chemical Brothers for a couple of hours then just put up with it. Shop didn’t believe me of course, the mechanic tested it by applying some force with his hands while the bike was on the stand, obviously it only happens 2hrs in to a 7hr ride!

On another note, I eventually sold my Orange Patriot because it ghost shifted when pedaling over bumps. Eventually sold it with the caveat that the ‘gears needed sorted’. The new owner replaced all the cables, including a significantly longer final section to the rear mech, and had no problems since. D’oh!

Have an annoying click when i stomp on the pedals while out of the saddle. I just try and time my breathing so my pants/puffs and wheezes dround it out.

Problem solved 8)

Old thread but just been through this…

Clicking road bike, even commented on by others. Under load, seated or stood in low gears, the bike was clicking away irregularly, roughly in time with the pedals. Silent when freewheeling.

Stomped up and down, no movement, no cracks.

New push fit bb with a smear of loctite. Still clicking.

Greased pedal axles, nope.
Tighten chainring bolts, nope.
New chain, nope.
Tightened cassette, nope.

Swapped rear wheel, bingo.

Stripped cassette, cleaned freewheel, service bearings, rebuilt cassette with light smear of grease.

Refitted wheel, bugger, still clicking!

Swapped qrs and cured it!

So the Mavic qr is silent and Ultegra qr clicks like mad. Odd, as I thought Shimano qrs were meant to be best.

Going to lube the can and grease threads and see if that works…

As per 40mpg -changed and grease everything and then found crack in Klein around bottom of seat tube and BB. New frame fixed the creaking

I had an annoying tick tick tick when pedaling. Some days it was OK and others it was doing it most of the time. After a few weeks of trying all of the usual stuff, it turned out that it was the end of my shoe lace hitting the bottle cage on each revolution 🙄 .

I had an annoying clunk on my bmx when I was younger. Every time I put in a right pedal stroke or jumped the bike.
I Put up with it for months including using for my paper round everyday. Then one day I happened to look down as I was pedalling along and noticed the drive side chain stay opening up. Turns out the tube had completely snapped just behind the drop out.

double post

All I’m saying on the mater is TF I’m NOT the only person to have pissed on my frame !

I have a Chameleon with a EBB, I know where the creak is.

Creak near pedals:
Double check torque, still creaking.
Remove and grease threads, still creaking.
Remove, clean threads, plumber’s tape, still creaked.
Remove tape and replace with threadlock: still creaked.
Over-torqued a bit: stopped creaking for about 2 hours, then started again.
Build completely new bike with new chainset but same old pedals: no creak!

There’s probably a reason those cranks on the first bike were new but cheap on ebay. Regardless, the solution to a squeak on your bike is to build a new bike.