twentynine inches • one gear • zero travel

Rotor Stem Installation Rotor’s S2 stem uses double-threaded screws with two different pitches. Each screw has a fine pitch in the faceplate and a coarse thread in the stem. Installing a handlebar most likely requires a couple of tries the first time you do it. I installed my Syntace handlebar and it took three attempts to get it perfect. When you start, it’s very important to have the bolts stick out of the faceplate equally. Rotor suggests 5.5 mm. Using calipers that’s where I started. Next, you want to turn each bolt about a turn into the stem. Make sure you notice when the bolt catches the thread and give each bolt a full turn from there. Now alternately tighten each bolt by the same amount; I used half turns. Using my calipers, I checked the upper and lower gap of the faceplate to make sure it was parallel. It was off by a few tenths and a quarter turn more on one bolt corrected it. The trickiest part of the whole procedure is to reach the full tightening torque when the bolts are flush to the faceplate. Mine were still sticking out a little, so I removed the faceplate again and set the bolts at 5.8 mm and started all over. I got the faceplate to be parallel within a tenth of a millimeter and reached the recommended tightening torque the moment the bolts were flush. Job done! It sounds more complicated than it is, the installation is fairly easy. It might take a few attempts, but by the third or forth anyone should get it right. The job requires a torque wrench and I recommend a set of calipers rather than just eyeballing things. Zoom

Rotor Stem Installation

Rotor’s S2 stem uses double-threaded screws with two different pitches. Each screw has a fine pitch in the faceplate and a coarse thread in the stem. Installing a handlebar most likely requires a couple of tries the first time you do it. I installed my Syntace handlebar and it took three attempts to get it perfect. When you start, it’s very important to have the bolts stick out of the faceplate equally. Rotor suggests 5.5 mm. Using calipers that’s where I started. Next, you want to turn each bolt about a turn into the stem. Make sure you notice when the bolt catches the thread and give each bolt a full turn from there. Now alternately tighten each bolt by the same amount; I used half turns. Using my calipers, I checked the upper and lower gap of the faceplate to make sure it was parallel. It was off by a few tenths and a quarter turn more on one bolt corrected it. The trickiest part of the whole procedure is to reach the full tightening torque when the bolts are flush to the faceplate. Mine were still sticking out a little, so I removed the faceplate again and set the bolts at 5.8 mm and started all over. I got the faceplate to be parallel within a tenth of a millimeter and reached the recommended tightening torque the moment the bolts were flush. Job done! It sounds more complicated than it is, the installation is fairly easy. It might take a few attempts, but by the third or forth anyone should get it right. The job requires a torque wrench and I recommend a set of calipers rather than just eyeballing things.