Small Bicycle Parts – Inconspicuous Yet Important

If you compete in road cycling races, you know the situation: there’s a massive pile-up and a competitor suddenly rides into the back of you and hits your derailleur – and suddenly you’re standing at the side of the road with a bent derailleur hanger. Only if you’re lucky can you bend the hanger back into place in moments like these – but in most cases, it will have to be replaced. The derailleur hanger is just one of many examples that show how fragile bicycles can be when it comes to small parts. A defective spacer can quickly affect the function of the entire cassette, and loose chain ring screws mean that the front drive no longer runs perfectly. A broken sleeve on the handlebars and stem poses such a safety risk that it needs to be replaced immediately.

But what small parts do bikes have? And what should you look out for when buying them? Below we introduce you to the most important small parts by category – from aluminium spacers to Torx screws.

Bicycles are mechanical products that consist of more than a thousand parts. For this reason, it comes as no surprise that screws are the most important parts in a bicycle workshop. Bottle holder, crank or chain ring screws are just a few of many examples of where screws are used on a bike. As they have such widespread uses, bicycle screws come in all kinds of shapes and sizes, and can be made of steel, aluminium and titanium. They are also available with different screw heads. Hexagon socket or Allen screws are particularly popular, Torx screws are also common and classic Phillips screws are used every now and then too. At BIKE24, you will find a large selection of bicycle screws – from classic spare screws through to screws for fine-tuning and saving the last gram of weight.

Sleeves and spacers are also classic small parts for bicycles. Sleeves come into use in various situations, for example, they can serve to increase the diameter of a seat post so that it fits into a larger seat tube. Steer tube adapter sleeves are also widely used and ensure that a fork with a thinner tube fits into a larger head tube. Sleeves are often used for bearings too.

Spacers are there to optimise your sitting position. They are placed on the steer tube to increase the height at which the stem is clamped on. The result is a more upright sitting position. Spacers come in all conceivable sizes, and those measuring 2 mm, 5 mm, 10 mm and 20 mm are very common.

There are many small parts that make up the drive and gear system. In addition to the crank and chain ring screws we’ve already heard about, the derailleur hanger mentioned at the very beginning, for example, also belongs to this category and serves as the fastening point for the derailleur onto the bicycle. What’s more, cables and guides are also among the small parts that make up a bike’s gear system. Battery holders for the seatpost also belong to this category. As electronic gear-shifting systems become increasingly widespread, this small part is needed more and more often.

Certain special tools also fall under the small part category as you need them for installing the small bike parts onto your bike. Spider nut tools are used for dismounting the spider on certain cranks, and there are also adapters for optimally adjusting the cage height of the front derailleur and thus making for smoother gear changes.

Here is a brief summary of small bicycle parts: 

• There are more than a thousand components that make up a bike. Most of them are small parts.
• Small bicycle parts are found in all areas of bicycle technology,
  and are particularly common on the drive and gear system, in the cockpit and on the seatpost.
• At out shop, you will find a large selection of different small parts for all kinds of purposes.