Originally Posted by
Pepper Jack
Is it very easy to do actual damage when working with the chain or is it generally pretty easy to do if you know what your doing?
Depends on what you did.
If it's a mountain bike with triple chainrings, or a road bike with triple rings and a wide-range rear cluster, chances are you did nothing wrong. These drivetrains just aren't made to use the small-small combination. The small "climbing" ring is only to be used with the slow end of the cassette, i.e., the big cogs. Every derailleur system has "forbidden" combinations. Generally, the small chainring is for the slow end of the cassette, the middle ring can cover the entire cassette, and the big ring is only for the fast end.The important thing, though, is to have enough chain to shift into big-big without jamming everything up.
Shift into the middle ring and report back.