Brake Adjustment or

did I not put the wheel back on correctly?

In cleaning my chain I removed the rear wheel and now the brakes are so far out of adjustment the wheel will barely move.

There is plenty of brake clearance on one side but the other side is obviously pressed firmly against the brake pad.

I'll try removing/replacing the wheel again tomorrow but in the meantime is that what I should do?

Did you release your rear brake on the handlebar? If you have Shimano brakes there's a lever you turn. For Campy there is a pin that you push to release the brake.

You probably just need to loosen the quick release, center the wheel, and retighten it. Center the wheel between the seatstays and chainstays, not between the brake calipers. Are your dropouts horizontal or vertical? Horizontal dropouts are more likely to lead to a misaligned wheel if you don't center it carefully. If you have centered the wheel within the frame and the brake is still off-center, then you'll need to adjust the brake. Try loosening the bolt that attaches the calipers to the frame, centering the brake, and retightening. If that doesn't work there are additional tricks to getting it centered which will depend on the design of the brake.

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Originally Posted by Kathi

Did you release your rear brake on the handlebar?

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No, I have a quick release lever on the calipers.

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Originally Posted by DebW

Are your dropouts horizontal or vertical? Horizontal dropouts are more likely to lead to a misaligned wheel if you don't center it carefully.

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Vertical. I just need to drop the wheel back in again, thanks.

What kind of bike would have horizontal dropouts? Seem like that would make it hard to remove the wheel, like the derailleur would be in the way.

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Originally Posted by zencentury

What kind of bike would have horizontal dropouts? Seem like that would make it hard to remove the wheel, like the derailleur would be in the way.

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you'll find horizontal dropouts on TT bikes where you want to "tuck" the rear wheel into the seat tube. Minimum clearance required for race is 2mm (was it or something like that??). Cervelo P2's and Cervelo P3's are setup that way (I think). These aren't the only ones.

Getting pretty bad with details...

smilingcat

Now i have to go look.Maybe they are horizontal:confused: :confused: :confused:

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Originally Posted by zencentury

Vertical. I just need to drop the wheel back in again, thanks.

What kind of bike would have horizontal dropouts? Seem like that would make it hard to remove the wheel, like the derailleur would be in the way.

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Any road bike more than 10-20 (?) years old. Not sure when most manufacturers switched, but most bikes of the 70s and 80 and maybe 90s had horizontal dropouts. They are not completely horizontal, maybe 30 degrees off - the wheel slides forward and a bit down before it comes out. The forward motion clears the derailleur better than having the wheel move straight down. There are some pictures on Sheldon Brown's page.

http://www.sheldonbrown.com/gloss_dr-z.html#dropout

A horizontal dropout allows for chain tension adjustment on 3-speeds, single-speeds, and fixies. Hence old frames with horizontal dropouts are in demand for fixie conversions.

Zen, mine can easily be straightened by hand if it's just that the calipers got knocked askew. Usually I can just give the lever a good hard squeeze and they self-adjust.