Meanwhile, in the pursuit of quietness, my Trance now seems to have developed creaks coming from the suspension pivots. I’ve unscrewed a couple of them and the bearings feel pretty smooth still. The bike is just over a year old.

I’m thinking of spraying a liberal dose of MO-94 on the linkages.

Good idea? Or is there a better solution?

Un bolt them, clean the dust / dirt off. Lube and re-torque. Job done.

Thanks.

What sort of lube?

I’ve got Teflon grease, anti-seize or ky-jelly.

I spent ages taking apart and greasing the pivots in mine, having tracked a creak down with complete certainty to one of the lower pivots. Turned out it was the direct mount chainring coming loose.

Check the pivot bearings near the rear axel if you have them there – they don’t move much, but are really prone to getting dry/knackered.

Check the pivot bearings near the rear axel if you have them there – they don’t move much, but are really prone to getting dry/knackered.

I second this (although I own an Anthem – exactly the same suspension design though). The two big bearings on the chainstay linkage are prone to seizing / rusting if you live in a damp climate and / or wash your bike regularly without somewhere to dry it afterwards i.e. most of the UK.

I try to take everything to bits at least once a year and give a thorough cleaning to all the linkages / bearings / bolts although the only creaking I’ve had on this bike has been due to a loose chainring bolt and some gritty sand getting between the seatpost and seatpost clamp.

People will tell you not to spray GT85 / MO-94 or similar anywhere near bearings but in my experience a very, very quick blast between the linkages (but not directly onto the bearings) once in a while after a deep wash seems to keep things ticking along nicely.

I give all my pivots a spray of Juice Lubes JL69 after every wash. Seems to keeps all the squeaks at bay. It’s a water dispersant and light lubricant and I read somewhere that it was fine for spraying into pivots so that’s why I bought it.

Thanks for the info!

Unscrewing the pivots, cleaning and lubing; doable without a bike stand?

Thanks for the info!

Unscrewing the pivots, cleaning and lubing; doable without a bike stand?

Yes, just very fiddly. There’s little metal washers behind most of the bearings that have a tendency to fall onto the floor and get lost.

Make sure that you remove the back wheel before taking off any bolts. Also, the big bolt that holds the large lower chainstay links together needs a bit of care to undo.

I seem to recall having to take the cranks off to get a tool onto the rear lower link pivot to stop it spinning. Also you might well want another pair of hands for the lower shock pivot. Lot of things to line up all at one there for reassembly. Suggest doing it a pair of pivots at a time rather than all of them with the swingarm dangling from the cables.

Any ideas how you get the main rear pivot linkage out.

I’ve took the cranks off and used a wrench to hold the nut while I unscrew the bolt, but once it’s off it’s not sliding through.

Does it need knocking through?

The forces going through the swingarm may mean it needs a bit of jigging about to pull through.

If it needs knocking through it may explain the source of the creak 🙂

It may be seized. Spray it liberally with GT85 / MO-94 and wait a few hours. Then start to tap it out very gently with a soft faced hammer. Mine was a PITA to remove the first time because one of the bearings had completely corroded but nothing that a bit of penetrating spray couldn’t solve.

Thanks for the help and advice folks!

Well that was fiddly… Managed to remove the pivots and linkages. Removed the races on all the bearings, cleaned and re-greased. I think some of the bearings need replacing as they were crunchy but massively better now.

A quick spin up the road and all is quiet and buttery smooth.

My handle bars however still creak a little. Ever since I switched to Nukeproof carbon bars they’ve creaked in the stock giant stem. Tried carbon paste, tried refitting and oppositely tightening the screws on the stem plate but never managed to shift it.

Nice one.

Right then bars…

My fixie road bike/commuter was prone for creaky bars. It was the pre-load compression washer in the top of the headset bearings against the fork steerer. You need to drop the forks, but the alloy steerer will get black deposits of alloy ‘stuff’ on them where the compression washer sits, as will the washer. Wire brush this clean again and apply grease. That was the main cause on my road bike, and it’s done it just once on my FS MTB, same process on both, remove the black bits where the parts rub.

I’ll give this a shot. My headset could do with a freshen up while I’m under the bonnet.

Thank you!

My local bearing shop recommends a light coating of lanolin spray (Lanox in Australia, not sure what you can get in UK) on the seals of cartridge bearings. It’s water repellent and won’t wash away like petroleum-based lubricants.

I had a similar issue recently. Creaking from suspension pivots (last thing i checked). It just needed the lower pivot axle to be greased. I didnt didnt do anything to the actual bearings. Greasing the axle did the trick.