How To Rivet A Motorcycle Chain Without The Tool? Top 99 Best Answers

Installing a chain link correctly requires a suitable chain tool and a certain amount of patience and care. The connecting link kit includes a connecting link, side plate, four O-rings and a bag of chain grease. Attach your new sprockets and tighten the chain so it can be connected. The best place for this is on the rear sprocket. It’s the most comfortable spot as the sprocket helps keep the chain in place.

First lubricate the sealing rings with the grease and then slide two rings onto the two pins of the link. Now lubricate the back of the chain plates and squeeze the grease into the holes in the chain rollers. Then slide the link through from the back of the chain and try to push back as much fat as you can! You just can’t push yourself too hard with this, it takes all the fat it can get.

Now place the last two rings on the front of the link around the side plates and position them correctly. The fat helps hold them in place.

Then we need to press the outer panel properly. To do this, you need a suitable tool. The idea is to press the plate into the exact same position as all the other chain links so it’s exactly the same width. Some chain tools will provide you with spacer blocks to help you do this without over-tightening, but if you don’t have one, patience and care will suffice. Measure the width of the other chain links on the outside of the two side panels. Not the pens, the plates!

Now carefully push on your rivet tab until the rivet tab is the same width as the other chain links. Be careful and patient when measuring and don’t overtighten.

Now all we have to do is rivet the pins. Most pins on modern chains are hollow and must be opened with a suitable conical tool. Solid pin designs must be over-riveted using a suitable tool to repeat the riveting on all other pins. In any case, remember that you don’t have to overdo it. The rivets are there to ensure the plate can’t come loose, but there’s no force pushing the plate off unless something gets out of line anyway. And there you have it, you’re done!

Your installed rivet connecting link should be the same width and free to move as all other links. It should not be narrow or binding in any way. If so, then you made a mistake somewhere and need to buy a new link and start over.

If you have any doubts about the installation, consult a professional technician.

chain links. Finished!

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The master link or master rivet is what you need to find to make removing your bike chain a lot easier. There are easy ways to find that main link, and it all starts with a few simple tips so you know what to look for.

What is the main link of a bicycle chain?

The main link – sometimes called a quick link – is actually a set made up of two outer links, each link looking like the outer link of a chain.

Quick release links allow you to either connect or disconnect a chain, even if you don’t have a chain tool. This is the biggest advantage of a master or quick release link. It also acts as the set of the outer links of the chain and therefore connects two sets of the inner links of the chain.

A quick link may or may not be reusable. So when you split a chain to replace it, you may be throwing away the old master link.

There are two types of master links. One is a straight chainline compatible link found primarily in single speed and internal gear bikes. The other is an external derailleur compatible link.

The type of master link on your bike will determine how you should remove it before replacing your bike chain.

What is the main link of a bicycle chain used for?

The main or quick release link serves one purpose: it allows you to easily connect or disconnect your bike chain. There are specialized tools that make breaking a Master Link even easier, but as you can see in this video, even the most basic tools can do it:

Not all bikes have these connections. They are most likely to be found on BMX bikes, single speed bikes or 3 speed city bikes with internal gears. The more sprockets a bike has on its rear cassette, the narrower the chain has to be and the less space there is for that extra wide chain lock. If you are unsure, simply measure the width of the gap between your link plates. If it’s at least 1/8 inch, your chain should have a master link.

How to find the main link of a bicycle chain

Finding your Masterlink is easier than you think. First, go ahead and place the bike in a . If you don’t have a work stand, simply turn the bike upside down so it rests on the saddle and handlebars. Once it is in this position and stable, stand to the side of the drivetrain so you can look directly at the area where the chain is located. Then slowly pedal the bike, but watch the chain links go by.

If you look closely, you’ll notice that one of these links is slightly wider than all the others. The extra wide link is the main chain link. It shouldn’t be hard to find since it’s simply a broader link than the others, but you should be sure it’s the right one before proceeding to the next step.

How to remove a bicycle chain with the chain lock

Removing a bike chain is much easier if your bike has a master rivet. The first thing you want to do is take a good look at the rivet itself. It should either have a spring clip on the side of the limb that looks like a long horseshoe, or some special pins that are easy to detach. If it has the horseshoe shaped clip, just use needle nose pliers and pull off the piece that looks like a horseshoe. Then pull off the side plate of the link and gently pull the chain apart.

If you have a link with the special pins, simply bend the chain where the main rivet is and manipulate it as if you were trying to shape that link into a U. Once you have done this the side plate will slide upwards and after that you can pull the plate off and take the chain apart.

Each of these methods may sound a bit complicated, especially if you’ve never worked with them, but once you start working, you’ll see that the instructions make sense. It should be a very simple and quick task to complete.

How to shorten a bicycle chain with a chain lock

There are several ways to shorten a bike chain, but it’s a little easier when there’s a master link to work with.

If you remove the main link, make sure you keep it in a safe place. Hold the loose connection with a clamp so you know where to work, then grab the pin.

Next, remove the pin, but remember you may need to place a nail over the hook and gently tap the pin with pliers. This is because sometimes the pin can be difficult to remove, but you should still be careful when using pliers. Keep doing this until the pin is all the way out. After that you can take a slotted screwdriver and reattach the master rivet. When the rivet snaps, you know you did the job right.

How to remove a bike chain without a master link

No chain lock on the chain of your bike? No problem! All you need is a special tool called a and you’re good to go. The first thing to do is slide the chain off the front sprockets so the chain doesn’t snap when you release the tension. Take the chain tool and place it over any link, making sure the rod of the tool is aligned with a pin on the rivet link. Next, twist the tool’s lever to push the rod forward until you see the pin pop out. Once this happens it means your chain is open and you are ready to clean or replace it as normal.

None of these steps are overly complicated, and you don’t need any special tools—just a pair of simple pliers or a screwdriver. Overall, finding the main link is very easy as it is a completely different size than the rest of the links. As you spend some time getting to know your bike and the chains that make it run, it should become clear which are the master rivets and which are the regular ones.

The thing is, it’s important that you learn these skills because as a cyclist, you never know when you may need to clean, replace, or trim your bike chain.

Also keep in mind that these rules apply to both regular bikes and motorcycles, so learning these things can be very useful.

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Breaking a chain can ruin your day. Your stride hits the top tube and your foot hits the ground. My chains have only broken on the mountain bike, and only when shifting under load at the front, allowing a chainring to pry off its pin. How likely are you to break a chain from the sheer force of pedalling? I traveled to Germany to find out.

When riding a racing bike with derailleur gears, broken chains caused by simple pedaling are actually rather rare. In the 1970’s and 1980’s, chain breaks were mostly caused by improper maintenance, such as simply pushing a rivet in and out. Chain plates on derailleur chains used to be like those on crawler tracks – they were flat with two straight holes. The pins stuck out quite a bit.

The advent of 9 and 10 speed chains required special link pins due to the minimal protrusion of the pins from the plates. 5- and 6-speed chains were about 8 millimeters wide, 7- and 8-speed chains were about 7.3 millimeters wide. Today, 11-speed chains are 5.6 millimeters wide (5.25 millimeters for 12 gears). The pins of 11- and 12-speed chains are almost or completely flush with the face of the chain plate; this is achieved by beveling the edges of the pinholes and mushrooming the heads of the pins into these recesses in the faces of the plates.

Has the strength of the chains been sacrificed as they have become narrower to accommodate more cogs? This question is not new. On the 4th stage of the Giro d’Italia 2001, the chain of the Mexican featherweight climber Julio Perez (Panaria), who had attacked while climbing the Montevergine di Mercogliano, broke just 4 kilometers from the finish. At the time, experts wondered whether the failure was due to improper maintenance or ever thinning chains. This debate came up again in 2008 when David Millar broke his chain in the final meters of Stage 5 of the Giro d’Italia.

Nevertheless, powerful sprinters like Marcel Kittel, Andre Greipel and Peter Sagan regularly pump 1,500 watts through their 5.6 millimeter wide 11-speed chains without fail. As it turns out, the European ISO standard of 8,000 Newtons minimum breaking force for a chain offers a good safety margin.

The chains I tested in Germany all surpassed this limit by far without breaking. Great success right? Well, during the testing process, I noticed a separate phenomenon. The chains stretched a bit before breaking. So I decided to research further.

About the test center

I visited the Wippermann chain factory years ago and marveled at the enormous chain production and heat treatment capacity. I also loved the chain testing equipment, including the durability testing machine, which validates the company’s claim of making the most durable chains. I traveled to Wippermann again this June to test 11-speed chains and do tensile tests on other chains.

The 125-year-old, owner-managed chain manufacturer is run by the fifth generation of the Wippermann family. In addition to manufacturing Connex chains for all types of bicycles, including e-bikes and track bikes, and chains for other vehicles, Wippermann produces industrial roller chains and thick, multi-link “leaf” chains that lift the forks of forklifts and shipping containers on large cargo ships.

Wippermann manufactures in Germany, where labor costs are high, some of the world’s toughest environmental and restrictive building codes apply, and a high tax structure supports a welfare and healthcare system that looks after all. The factory is located in a lush, green valley in Hagen, in the Ruhr area of ​​west-central Germany. It uses large amounts of water and detergent to remove all of the oil required in the stamping, rolling and forming of all of its steel chain parts, and yet when it leaves the factory this water is of potable quality.

In-house, Wippermann continuously tests its chains and those of its competitors with a wide variety of test infrastructures. A giant 100-ton tensile testing machine tests foot-long chains for breakage; huge chunks of metal fly when the limbs break. Another endurance machine continuously tests the durability of a chain. Employees also examine the chains under the microscope. The tests are important – a broken bicycle chain can lead to a dangerous fall, a broken industrial chain can cause unfathomable destruction. Before each chain is packed, a machine pulls it with a 2.5-ton load and cameras inspect each link for defects. Wippermann guarantees that every chain will last 15,000 hours, an amazing number compared to what we cyclists expect from bicycle chains.

breaking load test

For this test, we used 14 different chains, cut into five 13-link pieces.

With a pin through the chain’s end hole holding it in place, the ends were mounted into the top and bottom heads of a Shimadzu tensile testing machine (above).

The two heads of the machine slowly moved apart, producing a graph of tensile force versus elongation in millimeters.

If the chain broke, the machine stopped automatically.

The results above show that all samples of the 14 chains were well above the ISO standard for breaking strength of 8,000 Newtons; In fact, all over 9,100 Newtons were tested before they broke. Wippermann’s internal standard is 9,500-11,000 newtons of breaking strength for their bicycle chains, and they achieved that; some of the others missed that.

For reference, compare the minimum measured breaking load to that of a 90kg rider standing on the pedal attached to a 175mm crank at the 3 o’clock position. The highest chain stress is on the smallest chainring: a 22-tooth on a mountain bike triple crankset that has a 1.76 inch (45 millimeter) radius. To calculate chain load, imagine a seesaw with its pivot point 175 millimeters from the end where the load is applied and 45 millimeters from the end where the force is transmitted.

The force on the pedal is 90 kg x 9.8 m/s2 (driver’s mass times gravitational acceleration). The load on the chain is then force times 0.175 meters (crank length) divided by 0.045 meters (radius of the 22-tooth chainring) or 3,500 Newtons, which is well below the 9,100 Newtons that all chains withstood.

At the same crank and pedal load with larger chainrings, the chain peak load is only 2,283 newtons with a 34-tooth chainring and 1,472 newtons with a 53-tooth chainring. Peak forces for road professionals are in the 3,000 to 4,000 Newton range. Even a 300-pound rider standing on a 200mm crank with the chain on a 22-tooth chainring only puts 6,044 Newtons on the chain, still well below the ISO standard of 8,000 Newtons and exceeding 50 percent below the 9,100 Newtons exceeded all of these chains.

These results show that with a properly installed chain, Kittel, Greipel and Sagan don’t have to worry about their chains breaking in the sprint. If you were using a 53-tooth chainring, you would have to pedal with 5,564 Newtons of force to achieve the 9,100 Newtons load on the chain. That’s the equivalent of a 1,252-pound Kodiak bear with his full weight on the pedal!

In chains without link cutouts, a breakage occurred at the end of an outer link; The outer link is either broken at the hole or prying off the pin. For chains with cutouts, the breakage occurred in the middle of a link, across the cutout. Nonetheless, the chains with cutouts (KMC X11SL Silver and KMC X11SL Gold) all withstood a load of at least 9,535 Newtons before breaking.

After our test I watched on a much larger test machine how some Wippermann industrial leaf chains were broken. I’ve seen one withstand 917,000 Newtons of pull before breaking – 100 times what bicycle chains can withstand. You should have heard the sound when it broke.

chain elasticity test

When testing the breaking load, I noticed that the chains tend to stretch at least 6mm before breaking, with those with cutouts in the link plates stretching significantly longer than those with full plates. I set out to quantify the elasticity of these two types of 11-speed chains.

Using the same Shimadzu tensile testing machine, three lengths of chain were gradually pulled 100 times with a force of 6,000 Newtons. This is a force roughly equivalent to the force a world-class kilo rider puts out on the first few strokes from the start. This is a much higher load than road riders are likely to ever put on the chain. After each pull on the chain, it was allowed to relax with a force of zero Newtons before being pulled again.

One chain had solid lugs, while the other two chains each had cutouts in the inner and outer lugs. Each section of chain was 31 links long, with an inner link at each end to engage the jaws of the Shimadzu machine. Because bicycle chains are 1/2 inch pitch, each link is 12.7 millimeters long, resulting in a calculated length of 393.7 millimeters, which is roughly the length from chainring to sprocket on a short-rear road bike.

After about 10 pulls, the solid chain stretches up and down an approximate range of 3.5 millimeters, while both chains with cutouts stretch up and down over an approximate range of 4.7 millimeters. Of course, we all constantly stretch our chains with every pedal stroke, and when we have chains with cutouts, they stretch a bit more.

When the chain behaves like a perfect spring with no energy lost as heat, all the energy is returned to the system. However, it is returned in a way that doesn’t provide any additional performance. In other words, when the chain is fully loaded during pedaling down, the chain stretches and stores this as elastic potential energy. Then, when the pressure with the feet decreases at the top and bottom of the pedal stroke, the chain contracts again. The chain’s contraction pulls the cog forward, but the same and opposite reaction at its other end is to pull the chainring back and slow the feet’s passage over the top and bottom of the stroke. And by stretching on the downstroke, the chain lets your foot drop down a little faster through the power stroke.

Obviously, if the chain were as stretchy as a rubber band, the bike would go almost nowhere; the foot would fall very quickly through the downstroke and transmit minimal force. Less chain stretch is clearly more efficient than more chain stretch.

A short physics lesson

We can quantify the worst case scenario where all the potential energy stored in the stretched chain is lost when it relaxes.

Then Hooke’s Law says that F = -kx and PE = 1/2kx2 where k is the spring constant for the chain, x is the amount of stretch, F is the force to stretch it and PE is the potential energy , in which it is stored is the chain. Ignoring the negative (which indicates direction), the spring constant for the chain with no cutout is:

k = F/x = 6000 N / 3.5 mm = 1,700,000 N/m (no cutouts)

Accordingly, the spring constant for the chain with cutouts is:

k = F/x = 6000 N / 4.7 mm = 1,300,000 N/m (with cutouts)

Now that we have the spring constant for each chain (and assuming it’s actually a constant for a bike chain, which I’m not sure about), we can use it to estimate chain elongation under different loads. We saw above that the maximum chain load for a 198-pound rider simply pedaling a 175mm crank with a 34-tooth chainring is 2,283 Newtons. So the displacement for the chain with no cutout at this load is:

x = F/k = 2283 N / 1,700,000 N/m = 0.0013 m = 1.3 mm (no cutouts)

And the displacement for the chain with cutouts at the same load is:

x = F/k = 2283 N / 1,300,000 N/m = 0.0018 m = 1.8 mm (with cutouts)

Then the potential energy stored in the no-cutout chain when stretched under that 198-pound load on the pedal is:

PE = 1/2kx2 = (1,700,000 N/m) (0.0013m)(0.0013m) / 2 = 1.4 joules (no cutouts)

And the potential energy stored in the chain with cutouts under the same load is:

PE = 1/2kx2 = (1,300,000 N/m) (0.0018m)(0.0018m) / 2 = 2.1 joules (with cutouts)

If all of this energy is lost, then the power loss is equal to the energy lost in chain stretch on each downstroke divided by the time for each downstroke. There are two descents per revolution of the pedals and 60 seconds per minute. So if the rider were pedaling at 100 rpm with the same peak load on the pedal for each revolution, the power loss in the chain without interruption would be:

P = 2*(100/min)(1.4J)/60s/min) = 4.8 watts (no cutouts)

And the power dissipation for the chain with cutouts is:

P = 2*(100/min)(2.1 J)/60s/min) = 7 watts (with cutouts)

The quintessence of chain stretching

In this worst-case scenario, where no potential energy of the stretched chain is recovered as forward motion, the chain with cutouts consumes 2.2 watts more power than the chain without cutouts.

That extra little stretch in the cutout chain costs something with every pedal stroke, while the 30 gram (at most) weight reduction gives something back when climbing or accelerating. But how do these compare? This 200-pound rider puts out at least 500 watts putting his full bodyweight on the pedals with each stroke, and if he entered those numbers into bikecalculator.com, it would take him 3.12 minutes to complete a 20-pound Riding a bike up an 8 percent incline for one kilometer. If this rider’s bike weight dropped by the 30 gram weight savings of a chain with cutouts, while his power dropped by 2.2 watts – the additional energy losses in the cutout chain versus a chain without cutouts – the same climb would now be 3.13 Minutes or 0.6 seconds take longer. Little. The difference would probably still be tiny if you changed the variables – length of climb, rider weight, etc. – to more realistic values.

In addition, one could argue that when the chain stretches, it does not perfectly engage the last teeth exiting the top of the chainring and the first teeth entering the top of the cog, resulting in a slight increase in frictional resistance. This would be difficult to quantify.

Conclusion: All of the brand chains we tested offered good security against breakage through sheer violence. And there’s no such thing as a free lunch; Sometimes the weight loss costs you more in flex than it offers in reduced force required to pull it up a hill.

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This article was co-authored by Ryaan Tuttle. Ryaan Tuttle is a home improvement specialist and CEO of Best Handyman Boston. With over 15 years of experience, Ryaan specializes in DIY and property maintenance using technology and craftsmanship. Ryaan holds his construction manager and home improvement licenses. Unlike most home improvement companies, Best Handyman Boston is licensed and insured. Boston Magazine and LocalBest.com named Best Handyman Boston as the best handyman in Boston. This article has been viewed 84,408 times.

Article overview

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If you need to cut a chain because you lost a key or need to make a chain to a specific length, you can use bolt cutters to do this. Find bolt cutters large enough to fit around the chain to be cut. Position the link as far back in the cutters as possible and then cut the link on both sides. If you don’t have bolt cutters, use a hacksaw, angle grinder, or jigsaw instead. Secure the chain in a clamp or vise, then saw through 1 link. Continue sawing until both sides of the link are cut in two. To learn how to cut small jewelry chains, read on!

How to separate chain links

But if it’s not a soldered chain, then you don’t have to CUT the chain.

Crystal channel chain with oval jump rings connecting the crystals

Fancy chain with a repeating pattern

How to open and close chain links

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Sometimes jewelry instructions call for you to cut off a piece of chain. It’s simple, all you need is a pair of wire/side/flush cutters to sever the link. When working with a soldered chain like this, the only way to separate the chain is to cut it. You can often separate the chain by opening and closing the links, much like a jump ring. This is especially useful when your design includes a fancy chain like this crystal channel chain. Or if you have a fancy chain with a repeating pattern like this, you need to keep each link to keep the pattern intact. Although the links in the pattern set of this fancy chain are soldered, the sets are joined together with oval jump rings, allowing entire sets to be removed to lengthen or shorten the chain while preserving the pattern. Other reasons you might choose to open and close chain links instead of cutting them are because you are short on chain and need each link or if you need to add some links to a chain to make it longer make, but you want the chain to look continuous. To open and close chain links, you need two pairs of chain pliers. With pliers in your dominant hand, grasp one side of the chain at about 3 o’clock. Grasp the opposite side of the limb with a second pair of pliers in the other hand. Pull your dominant hand towards you and the other hand away from you until the limb opens. Moving the two sides of the limb in this direction preserves the shape of the limb so it doesn’t get distorted. Remove the desired length of chain. Now close the limb by doing the opposite – pull your non-dominant hand towards you and your dominant hand away from you. Move the two tongs back and forth past the center until the cut edges align in the center and there is no gap. So the next time you need to connect chain links together, try this instead of connecting chain lengths together with a jump ring. Until next time…..