adlai

I decided to be cute when configuring the bicycle and put a 10 speed rear derailleur on it. It is a 2x9 system, sensah shifters which I am pretty sure are 9 speed.

Anyways, I have shift problems. Low and high gear reach fine but like the 24t cog (2 cogs down) will skip around.

Any advice?

veganbikes

Get a proper 9 speed derailleur that is compatible with your shifters. That is the important thing. Nothing cute here just poor research and planning and buying. It does happen people do make mistakes but you are likely to have shift problems trying to mix 9 and 10 speed and odd random different derailleurs. You might be able to fudge around with limits and tension and maybe it will work a little better maybe but the 9 speed derailleur compatible with your shifter is the real way to do this or upgrade your shifters, chain and cassette to 10 speed Microshift.

Hondo6

Rather than have everybody guess, how about providing FD/RD model numbers? Those often makes a difference, and I suspect it may well do so here.

adlai

I bought the parts over a year ago so I don't really remember.

Sensah ignite shifters.

Microshift r10 medium cage rear derailleur.

Road shifters, road derailleur, it should work

Hondo6

I did some further checking, and in theory it appears that the OP is correct in saying that his current configuration should work. Disclaimer: this assumes (1) that the info published about the derailleur and shifter are correct, and (2) that the shifter, derailleur, and cassette in question are not defective and are not at extreme opposite tolerance limits or worn out.

"R10" is MicroShift's designation for their Shimano-road-compatible 10-speed road groupset. Per Microshift's website, all three RD's available for this groupset are compatible with Shimano 10-speed road shifters.

Sensah Ignite shifters are also Shimano road compatible. In particular, the Sensah Ignite 9-speed shifters are advertised (from an Amazon listing) as being Sora compatible.

Other than 6-8 speed Dura Ace and a couple of Shimano's latest 10-speed road/gravel groups (Tiagra 4700 and a GRX group whose designation escapes me), from 6 to 10 speed all Shimano road rear derailleurs supporting indexed shifting used the same actuation ratio: 1.7:1. (The same was true of Shimano mountain derailleurs supporting indexed shifting through 9 speed, but Shimano 10-speed mountain derailleurs changed to a different actuation ratio.) They were thus largely "mix-and-match" compatible - provided you matched shifters with cassettes and didn't try to exceed an older SIS rear derailleur's maximum lateral movement capability or other limits too badly (max chain wrap, min/max cog size).

In this case, the OP is using Shimano-compatible 9 speed shifters with a Shimano-road-compatible RD to shift a 9-speed cassette. In theory, this should work. In practice, the OP is having issues characterized by the OP as "skipping around" on one or more cogs.

OP: a more detailed description of your shifting issues would help. You indicated "low and high gear reach fine". Do the shifts from smallest to next smallest to 3rd smallest work well? If not, where do the problems start? Same question regarding upshifts from largest to 2nd largest - does that work well? How about the middle 3 cogs - do they shift properly, both when upshifting and downshifting?

What precisely do you mean by "skip around"? Did you also perchance change chains when you installed the RD? Have you tried another 9-speed cassette and gotten the same results?

More info here would be helpful. Remote diagnosis of, well, any issue needs all the info it can get.

Iride01 

OP, Is this issue only when shifting in a particular direction? If it's when shifting from the cogs with the most teeth to the cogs with fewer teeth then it might be a cable binding up somewhere and not fully incrementing at the time of the shift. Or perhaps you have the cable routed wrong going into the pinch bolt. Gummed up DR parallelogram might also cause grief, but you seem to indicate this is new.

bluehills3149

I have these exact same shifters on an originally 2x6 centurion ironman. With the original 6,spd rear der. it shifts perfectly and Shimano s road der. From 6 to 10 spd have the same pull ratios (bar some durace and tiagra models) so yes, this should not be a compatibility issue.

adlai

Thanks for replies.

I messed around with it some more today.


I feel like it could be one of two things. It feels like there are ten indexed speeds in the space of the 9 speed cassette.

I also wonder if perhaps the cable housing to the derailleur is either too long or too short.

It seems okay on the extremes, on the outer and inner limit it is fine and doesn't fall off the chain. But between it does skip around, doing a half shift to the speed above.

adlai

noobinsf 

This article refers to mountain, and between 9 and 10-speed, things started to go different between mtn and road in Shimano's world.

9-speed Shimano mtn and road had the same pull ratios. 10-speed Shimano mtn had different pull from 10-speed Shimano road. 10-speed Shimano road has an additional variable, because the Tiagra 4700 10-speed series (vs Tiagra 4600 10-speed) was 10-speed with the 11-speed pull ratios. You'll sometimes see 10-speed road gear that specifies "not compatible with Tiagra 4700" or somesuch.

I suspect your issue is simpler, though. Have you fine-tuned cable tension at the cable adjusters, either at the downtube cable housing stop or at the rear derailleur? A quarter-turn or two might have things in line and shifting perfectly. It's worth a try if you haven't done this already.

EDIT: I recently went through this with one of my bikes. 9sp Shimano cassette, R10 rear derailleur, and 9sp indexing Microshift bar end shifters. A couple of misaligned shifts at first, but after a couple of small adjustments at the cable adjuster, it shifts perfectly.

adlai

It is a interior route through so maybe it is catching on something.

So it does have 10 indexes. Do I adjust the derailleur so that the 9 speeds are 2-10 or 1-9?

70sSanO

If you have 10 speed shifter it won’t work with a 9 speed cassette either way.

Get a 10 speed cassette.

John

79pmooney

Just speculating here. You say you are pretty sure your shifter is 9-speed. Pretty sure? If it's 10-speed. I would expect it to behave exactly like you describe. Follow me here.

9 and 10 speed run the same cable pull to derailleur cage movement ratios. (Except that 11-speed ratio'd 10 speed stuff). The first and last cogs are roughly the same distance apart. So both shifters, 9 and 10-speed move the derailleur the same distance as you run the max number of shifts from 1 to 9 or 10. So, in low and high gears, either shifter works just fine on either cassette. One shift away will be slightly off with the wrong shifter, by roughly 10%. Not enough to matter much. But middle of the cassette? Now the wrong shifter places the derailleur exactly between cogs. The derailleur and cogs will be quite schizophrenic. (Pedaling hard? I like this cog! Easy going? Now that other one fits me better. Does this sound familiar?)

If I were you, I'd look at that shifter hard and verify that it is dead certain it is a 9-speed. (The derailleur? If it is indeed NOT an 11-speed cable pull RD, it should work just fine. Its pulleys might be optimized for a slightly skinnier chain but that won't make any real difference.)

I've done enough friction shifting with modern ramped cassettes to know well the schizophrenics of chains placed between cogs. With modern Shimano cogs, it isn't hard to find that intermediate location where it will shift reliably with pedal pressure. But sadly, it always goes to the wrong cog! I'd like to sent those cassettes to a shrink to get them to go the other way.

adlai

Yeah that's where I am leaning too. Might just change it to microshift centos

noobinsf 

I don’t know — if you cycle through the choices here, it looks like Ignite is Sensah’s uniquely branded 9s group, while the 10s group compatible with R4600 is named Quantam, while the 10s compatible with R4700 is called something else entirely.

https://www.amazon.ca/SENSAH-Shifter...ZTW?th=1&psc=1

Why not just try the cable tension adjustment first?

Hondo6

Don't think you want to do that unless you plan to change both the rear shifter and RD. The MicroShift Centos groupsets (10 and 11 speed) both are designed to use the new Shimano 11-speed pull ratio. Their shifters and RDs won't work with components that use the older 1.7:1 Shimano pull ratio.

Koyote

Tell that to my D/A 10sp RD that is currently on a Shimano 9sp drivetrain. Works perfectly.

70sSanO

Of course a 10 road RD will work with a 9 speed drivetrain. The RD actuation ratio is 1.7:1 for 6, 7, 8, 9 and 10 speed SIS RDs; Tiagra 4700 and the inverted 7400 DA excepted… funny how those groups and numbers are the odd balls.

Go put a 10 speed shifter with that 10 speed RD and 9 speed cassette and report back.

John

Koyote

Ah, yes, I read your post too casually. You are correct, of course!

adlai

Yes will likely change cassette and chain too. The sensah shifters actually aren't really great. Might sell them.

Hondo6

That would work. Just wanted to make sure you hadn't missed that bit.

FWIW: the Centos 10 stuff is pretty hard to find. But there are a few "mini-groupsets" (FD/RD/Shifters) available still out there.

philbob57

I think the report will say the shifting is iffy, since the cog spacing is different on 9- and 10-speed road cassettes (2.56 mm vs. 2.35 mm); the 10-speed cogs are thinner, too.. I don't know how big the problem will be, but I'd bet a lot there will be problems. Although this is what John might have meant when he posted....

Sheldon Brown's website is your friend, though it's not the only source for these numbers.

maddog34

just checked 5 cassettes... two 8's, a nine, and two ten speed cassettes...

the thickest was the 9 speed(Sun Race)... the thinnest was a Shimano 105 10 speed... the second thickest was an XT Ten speed cassette(1.9mm)... all were between 2.07mm and 1.76mm... the largest cog was measured on all 5.... the two 8 spd. were a lower level shimano and a sun race... both right about 1.86mm

Measured two chains... a 951 SRAM 9 sp. and an X10 KMC... both measured 2.26mm between the inner sideplates. :-D Outer widths on these two chains do vary a bit but inner width is the same.

my curiosity set in.... the THINNEST cassette cog i have here in my collection is a Dura Ace Titanium 10 sp....... 1.6mm.

conclusion: Use governs cog thickness more than any other factor... at least below 11 speed... all from 6 sp. up to 10 sp. are considered "3/16" " width.. a figure from chain roller width.... i tend to order a "5 Speed" chain for the few 5 speeds i replace a chain on... they're pretty rare in my shop.....

kinda thinking the cog-to-cog CENTERLINE spacing is the main factor to consider with cassette/shifter pairings, eh? ;-)

defraz

I think the same... i've a long experience in mating differente speed-rd-cassette, mainly in mtb world, and with the same pull ratio, as in this case, the shifter and the cassette have to have the same number of speed. You can mate a 9 speed cassette, with a 9 speed shifter, and a 8-9-10 speed shimano road derailleur. Normally, if the chain doesn't rub in the derailleur, there is no problem when the speed of the derailleur is higher than that of the cassette.

A couple of thing are worth mentioning:

-) this is true with Shimano-sram or compatible (sunrace, ecc. ecc.) cassette. Campagnolo 8-9-10 cassette have a different spacing than the others,
-) shimano road 8-9-10 shifter have a high pull ratio (1.7), so with little cable movement it causes an high derailleur movement. So, it can be highly sensible to regulation problems.

adlai

Update: got rid of the sensor shifters and installed microshift centos 10. Kept the rear derailleur, also swapped out front derailleur. 10 speed cassette, chain, and shifters.

works very well. Only thing is that the chain doesn’t quite feel direct, like it feels thin. Also, chain fell off of largest front chainring once today.