Switching a brifter to bar end shifter - front derailleur

[simon the viking]

I've always thought that the set positions of brifters on the front derailleur causes more chain rub than old fashioned friction shifters, I've used Sora, Tiagra and currently 105. I know accurate adjustment can cut a lot of it out but I still think its a compromise. the butterfly lever on first bike when I got back into cycling seemed to work the front mech better

I was thinking about getting a left hand bar end shifter and try it, has anyone done this and would it work okay with current 105 front mech?

I have seen that they aren't as cheap as I thought they would be might have to keep an eye out for a single second hand one if I do it.

 

[Sharky]

When I was commuting, I too got fed up with the front changer. On a hilly route, I was forever doing the "Shimano Shuffle". Up on the front and two down at the rear etc. So I just removed the double chain rings and replaced with a 40t n/w chain ring. The chain needed to be shorten a tad, but all worked fine across all 10 sprockets. And to change up/down just takes a single click.

 

[simon the viking]

I'm glad I'm not the only one! Dropping to one chain ring in the middle of the 2 is a bit father than I want to go but can see why someone would do it....

 

[GeekDadZoid]

I use friction shifting on my Holdsworth and love that I can dial in any combo of front and rear and make it run silently.

Actually the best thing is being able to dump a whole cassette in a second, but the infinite-ish adjustability is fab.

 

[simon the viking]

the plan if i do it is run the rear mech on the brifter and front mech on the friction lever.
Not planning to sell the bike anytime soon, but should be able to put back to standard if required.

 

[cyberknight]

doable for sure, i ran bar ends on my subway conversion

 

[IanSmithCSE]

Good morning,

I recently did some accidental and some intentional experiments and found that running 50x11-28 would give me all the gears that I needed.

As you might guess from these ratios I haven't fully bought into the very low gears on offer on many road bikes, 50x28 is the same gear as 42x24 (the normal bottom gear in the 1970s and 1980s) or 34x19.

Unfortunately this was on an 8 speed 11-32 cassette so it was an effective 1x7, big/big wasn't a good combination, meaning that the spacing was not ideal. Had I spent the time and effort I probably could have aligned things so that I could have had 50x32 which would have been useful for a few hundred yards on a couple of routes.

I am unsure if you are on 9/10/11 speed 105 but all of these would fill in the range nicely.

So if you have 10/11 speed 105 and are happy to cross chain big ring to second biggest sprocket you may find that you can just change the cassette and take the front mech off.

Personally I would stop at 32t on the rear as I never have any chain slack issues that might occur with chains long enough to work with a bigger sprocket. Part of this may be because I like to ride down hills so I use 50x11 when available, although if pushed to lose the 11 tooth for a better spread elsewhere I probably would.

I have long moved away from my love of DT shifters for the rear, I doubt that 5 speed STI (never made) would offer much over DT but as the numbers of sprockets went up STI makes these extra sprockets more usable, for me at least.

STI front mech shifters are a different story, I went from straight from DT to Di2 and only recently used mechanical STI for the first time. Both times they were 2000 series on used bikes, one pre and one post the Claris rename and am very underwhelmed.

The frames weren't suitable for a band on shifter and I was reluctant to try and super glue a mounting boss on, I did think about it, but by the time that I found anyone willing to sell me one (https://cycle-frames.com/collection...8-0850-nova-lever-boss-kit-for-aluminum-frame) I had lost interest.


Bye

Ian

 

[cyberknight]

Good morning,

I recently did some accidental and some intentional experiments and found that running 50x11-28 would give me all the gears that I needed.

As you might guess from these ratios I haven't fully bought into the very low gears on offer on many road bikes, 50x28 is the same gear as 42x24 (the normal bottom gear in the 1970s and 1980s) or 34x19.

Unfortunately this was on an 8 speed 11-32 cassette so it was an effective 1x7, big/big wasn't a good combination, meaning that the spacing was not ideal. Had I spent the time and effort I probably could have aligned things so that I could have had 50x32 which would have been useful for a few hundred yards on a couple of routes.

I am unsure if you are on 9/10/11 speed 105 but all of these would fill in the range nicely.

So if you have 10/11 speed 105 and are happy to cross chain big ring to second biggest sprocket you may find that you can just change the cassette and take the front mech off.

Personally I would stop at 32t on the rear as I never have any chain slack issues that might occur with chains long enough to work with a bigger sprocket. Part of this may be because I like to ride down hills so I use 50x11 when available, although if pushed to lose the 11 tooth for a better spread elsewhere I probably would.

I have long moved away from my love of DT shifters for the rear, I doubt that 5 speed STI (never made) would offer much over DT but as the numbers of sprockets went up STI makes these extra sprockets more usable, for me at least.

STI front mech shifters are a different story, I went from straight from DT to Di2 and only recently used mechanical STI for the first time. Both times they were 2000 series on used bikes, one pre and one post the Claris rename and am very underwhelmed.

The frames weren't suitable for a band on shifter and I was reluctant to try and super glue a mounting boss on, I did think about it, but by the time that I found anyone willing to sell me one (https://cycle-frames.com/collection...8-0850-nova-lever-boss-kit-for-aluminum-frame) I had lost interest.


Bye

Ian

my set up is 50/36 11-28 and that works for me , i dont need the small ring unless im hitting a long steep hill or i want to work on spinning