How To Adjust The Headset On Your Bike | Installation, Servicing & Bearing Wear

The headset of your bike is the assembly the holds the forks in place inside of your headtube. They take a massive amount of impact and abuse and do need looking at from time to time. Jon gives you his guide on adjusting your headset.

Often headsets can work loose and so they will need tightening every so often. You often see people adjusting the headset preload bolt in order to tighten a loose headset, however, this will not work!

Firstly then let’s assume you have a loose headset, so let's loosen the preload bolt and then loosen your stem bolts, enough so that you can easily rotate the stem on the steerer. Now align the stem with your front wheel and tighten the preload bolt enough so that you meet a bit of resistance, this resistance is the headset bearing under pressure/preload, or tension if you like at either side of the headtube.

It can take a bit of toing and froing to get it spot on, but for nice smooth handling, it’s worth it. Despite all of this, if you’ve been riding for a long time with a loose headset or a tight one or maybe they are just worn out, in that case, you are best off actually replacing the bearings rather than riding along and risking poor quality handling.

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[gcntech]

Does your headset need adjusting? Follow Jon's guide and let us know how it goes. 👇

[zrsgamboa]

Nice explanation, Jon. Could you guys do a vid on how to cut a steerer tube using different techniques for the cutting? (i.e. pvc cutter, hack saw, and a dremel)

[sesujrice]

2:39 the way his body moves when he said stem bolts fascinate me

[AndrewTSq]

I am happy that I last year got the idea to build myself a bike from the scratch, buying all the parts and tools, and assemble it myself. Learned a lot (from watching GCN Tech videos!) and also made some misstakes (from thinking, "how hard could it be?"). Also when you ride alot you learn how your bike behaves, and when something is not as it used to be. Best thing is that all of my bikes are nowdays in tip top condition all the time :) The other week I got a question if my bike was brand new, and the feeling when you could answer "No, its been doing 7000km" was really nice :)

[samikhoury]

Super helpful. The additional spacer just beneath the top cap was the piece of insight I needed to get the rattle out of my headset. Thanks!

[arsipos]

FINALLY. I've just rebuilt my bike for the first time and got stuck on the headset of all things. I was tightening the pre-load bolt BEFORE the stem bolts and it locked up the steering. Almost drove me mad. Kept taking it apart and reassmebling with no change until I followed your instructions. Thank you for this video, I was ready to throw my bike out the window.

[SolarPowerChannelwithChris]

What I like about GCN, they are not arrogant like I find a lot of road riders. They seem like nice chaps and don't talk like you are stupid.

[unidentfd_user]

Thank you so much, GCN Tech. You just saved me money and a trip to LBS. I had a tiny play in headset in my Canyon Endurace and couldn't figure out why. Took me weeks before discovering this video and getting to undestand that stem bolts should never be tightened before top compression bolt. Such a rookie mistake! Now all is tight and secure, thanks!

[LUCYDIAMONDBOXER]

Great simple step by step process with clear explanation on the parts and their inner workings.

[MrLuigi-oigm]

I just replaced the bearings and grease on the headset of my 1978 Raleigh Super Course. Working on that modern headset looks much more convenient. 😁

[allenbellas]

This video showed me exactly what I needed to do to tighten my wobbly headset in about two minutes. This is the perfect how-to video.

[sudduthjonathan]

Great video. Clear and to the point now that I’ve done this once. When I first bought my bike I had the shop put on a different stem. I think the mechanic tightened down the preload/top cap too much and he damaged the five star nut inside the fork tube that the bolt goes into. I had to replace that as well. So, this wasn’t mentioned in the video...but if you’re not getting enough pre load it could be that the nut inside is damaged and/or sliding (not biting) inside the fork tube. I also had the top cap hitting the tube problem, but I have an extra spacer like was mentioned in the video. It’s no big deal, as the stem is really what holds it all together.

[ryu]

Great timing. Replacing my aluminium fork w/ a carbon steerer tube fork, and carbon spacers. Great tips!

[simonhoibergolsen]

great vdo. I thought my headset was gone and needed a new one. But after watching this VDO I found that I could fix it by loosening the right bolts and retightening in the described order. Problem solved. Many many thanks.

[D.Eldon_]

_Tip:_ The torque for the preload (top cap) bolt is usually close to 2.5 Nm. If you have a torque wrench, this is a good starting place.

[banjo]

Excellent as always from Jon. Perfect advice for myself this afternoon doing a headset service and fine tuning the steering tightness.

[tfmguitar]

Thanks Jon, the headset was becoming loose when I was tightening the stem bolts so tried with a 10mm spacer on top instead of 5mm and it worked. I guess after preloading the bearings and tightening the stem I could remove the 10mm spacer and add the 5mm one (just for looks)?

[leebridgwater]

Thank you GCJ, really informative and well explained

[batporio]

Funny that helped me solve a stiff headset on my son's balance bike :)

[BlueLn]

If you have a Specialized multi stem, they're slightly angled (so you can get 4 different angled handlebar positions with the one stem) with an angled shim and the top cap needs to be put on in congruence to the position of the shim so that it sits flat.