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The Un-Official Guide To Fixing Headset Play - Please Add Your Advice Here Hey Everyone,

I wanted to create a guide to help troubleshoot headset play regardless of bike brand. By no means am I an expert, and I hope others can add to this thread. Please understand this guide/thread isn't intended for airing our bike brand grievances or calling out user errors. Ultimately we all just want our bikes to work as intended.

Common Reasons For Headset Play

1. Steerer/Fork isn't cut low enough, or an extra spacer is required above the stem to properly compress the top cap. When initially cutting the steer tube, an extra 2-4mm below the cut line needs to be accounted for in order for the top cap to recess properly.

2. The headset bearing (upper or lower) doesn't sit inside the head tube cup snug enough (laterally, front to back). Velobuild, for example, provides 52mm diameter headset bearings. Other headsets sold online or for other bike brands may only be 51.8mm diameter. That 0.2mm is the difference between a snug fit or loose headset. If your bearings are loose this will always cause play. You can add a couple layers of tape inside the bearing cup to prevent the bearing from moving around. Or just buy a new 52mm headset.

3. The top headset bearing is recessed too far into the head tube cup, causing the headset cover to rub on the frame, preventing the complete headset stack to properly compress. If this is the case you will need a thicker headset bearing (7mm, 7.5mm or 8mm thick) or a thicker c-ring so that it sits flush with the top of the headset opening on the frame, thus preventing the headset cover from rubbing the frame. EDIT: Another resolution is adding some micro spacers between the c-ring and top cap.

4. The upper and lower headset bearings are installed in reverse. Some bikes (like Yoeleo's recent G21 gravel bike) provide a set of headset bearings, with one of the two bearings being slightly thicker than the other. The thicker of the two bearings needs to be installed on top of the head tube, and the thinner bearing on the bottom. If these two bearings are installed in reverse order then...see Common Issue #3

It is critical to do a dry run of installing the crown race, headset bearings, c-ring, headset cap, stem/cockpit, and any additional spacers before actually proceeding to building up the bike. Also be sure to compare and inspect the two headset bearings to confirm they are in fact the same size and thickness.
August 02, 2022, 02:23:09 PM 		1
Re: My TanTan TT912 build That looks GANGSTA!
I suspect you're light and small, otherwise you wouldn't use a 50/34 on a TT bike, but FYI, you can get a REAR 140 to 180mm adaptor for cheap these days. Peak Torque sells expensive ones (I'm sure they're wonderful) but I found a cheap REAR one on bikeinn, and with mechanical brakes at the very least, bigger disks are better. I'm yet to find affordable front adaptors.
I've built 4 bikes with these brakes, and 5 bikes with hydraulic brakes.
I've used this very same BB.
I tried using these bottles but they flew off the bike, they lasted me 1 ride.
Best of luck with the mechanical shifting, will be curious to hear how it's working.
Kudos on the KEB-SL compressionless Jagwire brake housing, I've used that too, and you can absolutely feel the difference compared to cheaper housing.
It's a pity you're stuck in the middle of the build because of seller's mistakes though.
Keep us posted.

February 20, 2024, 07:20:23 AM 		1
Re: My TanTan TT912 build Looks awesome, well done!
The whole thing looks stiff indeed. That seatpost is scary, i dont see how anything can deflect, so good thing you have fat tyres and steel spokes and not carbon ones. Make sure you follow recommended PSI and dont go italian by putting 100psi in 32C tyres. I have italian friends, i stopped trying to explain to them that it makes no sense to over inflate big tyres. Good, big tyres at the right PSI completely change a bike.
Such a chonly boi will never be light, if you check out triathlon forums, you will see people's bikes are super heavy, comes with the territory.
The bike looks like a sail, for sure it's going to be awful in cross winds :) Be careful when you see trucks, you can get pushed or sucked in hard on something like that, try not to die.

Thanks for taking the time to post, it's great to see Chinese TT frames.
March 22, 2024, 01:16:49 PM 		1
Re: Looking for Tri/Short nose saddles I have the padded carbon sitero copy, and the WildSide version in plastic and metal rails. The WildSide is slightly wider than the carbon. On both, I find it difficult to not sit pretty much on the nose, forward of the cutout. And I have pretty wide hips for a man AFAIK.

As a long-time sufferer of numbnutz, compared to my Spesh power saddle that is my reference, both are supremely comfortable for nose sitting, but will not make you impervious to numbness. I think for that you need something like a Dash saddle.

Anyways, it’s a nice saddle. Its width makes it hard to use a lot of the surface area, but also makes it fairly comfortable to sit on the nose. I’m still deciding if I’m going to swap out my power saddle, but I think it’s worth a shot if you think it could be a fit for you.
April 02, 2024, 02:55:25 PM 		1
Re: Airwolf: What is this model inspired from? [Trek Madone] took me a while to get through all the hassles building this bike but here it is ready to ride now:

- issue with upper headset play solved by mounting an additional c-ring as a spacer above the compression ring
- lower headset bearing needed some alu tape wrapped around the inside (fork diameter was too small for lower headset bearing, but the bearing has the dimensions as the "original")
- front brake caliper needed to be filed as the upper bore hole in the fork was about 2mm off
- the delivered seatpost mount cracked at about 3-4NM torque while mounting the saddle tilt screw (see photo). As i think this is a general construction issue and i don't trust the replica here, i bought a slightly used original one
- no feedback coming back from airwolf, only that they will check with their quality control...

Overall the bike fits and rides quite good. Coming from an aero bike of the first generations i subjectively would say that this one feels a bit stiffer and more aerodynamic. However i guess that a big factor for this is coming from the wheels.
April 06, 2024, 02:00:42 PM 		1
Re: In-frame triangle storage box ala Speedmax Bumping this thread because I found a company with some very interesting concepts
https://www.on-lynecomponents.com/collections/the-holy-rail/products/holy-rail-triangle-box-kit

I don't think they quite make exactly what I want but a modular slider rail is a very interesting idea to me. Maybe as an intermediate DIY product this could be exactly what we were looking for
April 23, 2024, 05:40:27 AM 		1