How to stop a slipping seatpost

So there will be those that say if you are sure you have a correctly sized seatpost for your bike and use the correct torque all will be fine, but sometimes you can do all these things and the post still slips, so what else can you do?

Friction paste

There are lots of different pastes on the market that are like grease but with some particles added to aid grip. These work well and sort out a lot of slipping issues, but it’s worth noting they are not all the same. Two I have tried are the ones from Park Tool and Finish Line. The Finish Line one is a clear gel with small beads in it. It grips well without marking components, although I have found it can lead to creaking. The Park Tool one has a much finer grain to it and I’ve found it grips very tightly, but it is incredibly abrasive and will take the paint finish off your seatpost if you’re not very careful.

Additional seat clamp

This is quite a neat solution that you’ll see the pros use in races like Paris Roubaix. It’s an additional clamp that fits directly onto the seatpost on top of the regular clamp. It works really well and has the advantage of marking your seatpost height if you disassemble your bike often. BBB make a good one called “postfix”.

Surly Constrictor

This is a replacement seatclamp that is simply bigger and stronger than anything else on the market and allows you to clamp the seatpost hard using a massive hex bolt. It’s nicely engineered but pretty big and heavy so you’ll need to decide if it suits your bike. I’ve found that when you first attach it it looks almost comically huge, but you soon get used to it. You’ll want to be sure that your frame and seatpost can take the strain before you use it (it’s really designed for steel frames rather than lightweight carbon ones).

Hopefully one of these solutions (or a combination of them) will sort out your slipping seatpost issues.

Comments

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