Arch
Married to Night Train
- Location
- Salford, UK
Well, I dunno if you'd count having one for review in Velo Vision, and two taken on the Velo Vision SPEZI coach trip....
I spotted one on that Amsterdam webcam (see thread in Commuting), last week.
Woodrup Chimera - first impressions
- Thread starter vernon
- Start date
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Well, I dunno if you'd count having one for review in Velo Vision, and two taken on the Velo Vision SPEZI coach trip....
I spotted one on that Amsterdam webcam (see thread in Commuting), last week.
U
User169
Guest
When I was commuting by train, I used to see them reasonably often.
Piemaster
Guru
- Location
- UK City of Culture
GrumpyGregry
Here for rides.
The engineering values and execution on that Santos are simply wonderful....
....until you get to the rohloff shifter which I feel looks exactly what it is, a flawed, bodged afterthought. Surely some european engineeer somewhere could come up with a rohloff shifter for drop bars even if it was a bar end type a la J-Tek?
snailracer
Über Member
The drivetrain is "inside" the rear triangle so your ankle does not rub the chain or chainrings. It would be possible to space the pedals further apart, but there are limits to how wide they can be spaced before comfort and efficiency are affected.
OP
OP
vernon
Harder than Ronnie Pickering
- Location
- Meanwood, Leeds
I am surprised that there isn't a satisfactory solution. Thorn employ some wierd stubb....
Stop press.
In trying to find the stubb solution I came across a French engineered twistgrip shifter here . It's several pages down.
MacB
Lover of things that come in 3's
- Location
- Farnborough, Hampshire
I've seen one concept trigger shifter that was enormous, like a dinner plate with a wooden spoon trigger sticking out the side. I was indulging myself thinking about this the other week and actually exchanged e-mails with J-Tek about it. With the Rohloff indexing being in the hub the shifter itself is a simple pushme/pullme affair. One cable being pulled in and the other being unwound as you shift. The total amount of cable being pulled is 96.2mm, or 16 steps of 7.4mm each. Unless you alter the hub then you need the shifter capacity to be able to cope with this. You could do this with something based around the existing just altered to trigger form.
Basically you move the rotating ring the cable wraps around from having the handlebar run through the middle of it. Turn it sideways on to the bars and mount a trigger mechanism in the centre of the ring where the bars previously resided, plenty of space for that, voila you have a trigger shifter.
To refine it further you want to get the ring as small as possible, 96.2mm of cable would require a diameter of 30.7mm assuming you were using the full 360 degrees. Scale it up a bit to allow for cable entry/exit so about 35mm should do it and seal this in a casing like a big polo mint with cable entry and exit points on the one side. The centre of the polo mint would be for the shift levers and the mechanism. You could stick to straight friction by having a 4 arm lever above and below the disc, like a sort of double sided ninja throwing star. Or you could have just one ratchet and return lever each side like an normal thumb shifter, that would mean a more complex mechanism though.
If you want to be able to shift multiple gears then the 4 arm friction option would work better. If one at a time is ok then the trigger would be fine. The diameter of the disc could be reduced by having the cable wrap in a spiral manner but this would increase thickness.
GrumpyGregry
Here for rides.
I notice the Santos+Rohloff has a snubber bearing to prevent drive belt slippage. Elegantly built in to the removeable dropout but only as good as the bolt holding the snubber in place.
Gates imply in their literature that a snubber is mandatory with a Rohloff yet the Woodrup doesn't seem to have one, or any alternative, so far as I can see. EDIT: Doh! Because it is there if you look in the pictures.
I'd worry that in high torque situations the belt will slip, the slippage will cause wear to belt and sprocket and over time you get a viscous circle. It will work fine when new but after a few years? One wrong gear selection and chewtastic slippage, any level of wear on the sprocket and chewtastic slippage.
Even with the snubber fitted slippage can still happen, the belt is compressible and when ratcheting can force the snubber bolt to slip, then you are stuffed until you adjust it. Counterintuitively the Gates belts get longer the colder they get so don't expect your summer setup to work to well in the depth of winter.
Theoretically the snubber is in the wrong place too! But pragmatically I doubt it makes a difference though I'd prefer belt and braces of two snubbers, one as is and primary one where belt starts to wrap though that is difficult to do on a normal diamond frame.
Gates imply in their literature that a snubber is mandatory with a Rohloff yet the Woodrup doesn't seem to have one, or any alternative, so far as I can see. EDIT: Doh! Because it is there if you look in the pictures.
I'd worry that in high torque situations the belt will slip, the slippage will cause wear to belt and sprocket and over time you get a viscous circle. It will work fine when new but after a few years? One wrong gear selection and chewtastic slippage, any level of wear on the sprocket and chewtastic slippage.
Even with the snubber fitted slippage can still happen, the belt is compressible and when ratcheting can force the snubber bolt to slip, then you are stuffed until you adjust it. Counterintuitively the Gates belts get longer the colder they get so don't expect your summer setup to work to well in the depth of winter.
Theoretically the snubber is in the wrong place too! But pragmatically I doubt it makes a difference though I'd prefer belt and braces of two snubbers, one as is and primary one where belt starts to wrap though that is difficult to do on a normal diamond frame.
GrumpyGregry
Here for rides.
Good twist shifter but the drop bar levers need to actually exist before I'd be convinced, and why Magura hydraulics only, no ta.
OP
OP
vernon
Harder than Ronnie Pickering
- Location
- Meanwood, Leeds
Greg,
The Woodrup does have a snubber. It is indeed a mandatory part of the licence to build Gates belt drive bikes with Rohloff. I asked the Dutch owner of the only other belt drive bike about it and he mentioned its necessity for manufacturing rights to be granted later confirmed by Woodrups.
You might be unaware of the protracted bureaucracy involved in getting a Gates belt drive bike approved for manufacture. A sample frame has to be sent off to Germany for extensive flex testing to ensure that misalignment of the drive train does not occur and the tale does not end there. My mind drifted as Woodrup and son told me the back story of the bike's gestation and the focus of my attention was the quality of brazing on the luggless frame in its unpainted state closely followed by other Kevin Sayles' creations in the frame building loft.
I am more happy with the quality of build, engineering excellence, performance and the truly bespoke service that is on offer at Woodrups and it matches that of Santos. You have to remember that continental tastes are quite different to UK ones and Magura rim brakes are quite common an a wide variety of quality bikes.
Woodrups are justifiably proud of their bike and having first hand experience of it I'd say that they have a winner. I was a dyed in the wool Rohloff hater and as recently as last month had expressed doubts about whether or not it was the bike for me - a question of need (to do a job extremely well) vs want (inspired by the bling factor). I've been touring, audaxing and leisure cycling for the past seven years using a range of bikes, none of them particularly unsatisfactory and I'd be happy to dispose of four of my bikes and use the Chimera it really is the mutts nuts.
YMMV
The Woodrup does have a snubber. It is indeed a mandatory part of the licence to build Gates belt drive bikes with Rohloff. I asked the Dutch owner of the only other belt drive bike about it and he mentioned its necessity for manufacturing rights to be granted later confirmed by Woodrups.
You might be unaware of the protracted bureaucracy involved in getting a Gates belt drive bike approved for manufacture. A sample frame has to be sent off to Germany for extensive flex testing to ensure that misalignment of the drive train does not occur and the tale does not end there. My mind drifted as Woodrup and son told me the back story of the bike's gestation and the focus of my attention was the quality of brazing on the luggless frame in its unpainted state closely followed by other Kevin Sayles' creations in the frame building loft.
I am more happy with the quality of build, engineering excellence, performance and the truly bespoke service that is on offer at Woodrups and it matches that of Santos. You have to remember that continental tastes are quite different to UK ones and Magura rim brakes are quite common an a wide variety of quality bikes.
Woodrups are justifiably proud of their bike and having first hand experience of it I'd say that they have a winner. I was a dyed in the wool Rohloff hater and as recently as last month had expressed doubts about whether or not it was the bike for me - a question of need (to do a job extremely well) vs want (inspired by the bling factor). I've been touring, audaxing and leisure cycling for the past seven years using a range of bikes, none of them particularly unsatisfactory and I'd be happy to dispose of four of my bikes and use the Chimera it really is the mutts nuts.
YMMV
CharlieB
Junior Walker and the Allstars
- Location
- Therivermeadowatthepileofstones
How about taking it out on the next FNRttC, Greg?Strida. Strictly urban. An infrequent sight in London and seen occasionally on the streets of my home town, when I'm riding mine.
GrumpyGregry
Here for rides.
Vernon
I stand corrected on the snubber bearing and have edited my own post accordingly.
It's a beautiful bike and I hope you get many years reliable use from it.
Let us know how it goes once she is run in.
Greg
GrumpyGregry
Here for rides.
Very little chance of that tbh. Spares for a Mk III (though mine is a home upgraded Mk "III.5" in that it has a conventional hub+spokes+rim i.e. not plastic injection moulded, rear wheel and folding bars) are almost impossible to find these days and if something were to break she would be skip fodder.
Plus I can hear, in my imagination, the belt skipping going up the Beacon as I type!
Piemaster
Guru
- Location
- UK City of Culture
I reckon keeping the driveline similar to what it is at present would be possible, but it would take a fair bit of re-engineering as the rear frame spacing would need to be reduced, say to the same as the front, as there would be no need to accomodate any driven pulley. And who says the rear wheel can't be offset to retain the same chainline? The Surley Pugsley is offset, but it is something of a niche bike.
Not saying it is the most practical of solutions, just an idea for a different approach. I'll blame it on being an engineer "if it isn't broke, it doesn't have enough features yet"
