bar-end shifters

John Forrest Tomlinson wrote:
On 6 Jan 2006 20:53:14 -0800, wrote:


John Forrest Tomlinson wrote:
Do you carry spare saddles on rides? I've broken them but sort of
like living on the edge.....

Sounds like you need to lose weight.

I broke one when I weighed 140 pounds (alloy rails -- mistake we
agree) and one with solid steel rails when I weighed 150-155. I think
I broke another with non-alloy rails at that weight too but am not
sure if they were solid or what.

You broke a saddle rail, and you still don't know whether it was solid
or hollow? Didn't you look? Hey, I call bull**** on that! ;-)

I have one friend whose brifters locked up on him.

So he couldn't pedal at all? Wow.

Not what I said. He couldn't _shift_ at all.

He was recovering from a
fairly long illness during which his bike sat in his heated garage.
When he felt well enough to put it on the trainer, he found the STI
stuff had changed it into a single speed.

Sounds like a maintenance issue to me. That bike, in general, should
be looked at.

Hmm. I've got bikes that I ride maybe once a year. Some friction,
some index, but none STI. They _always_ function just fine. Yes, it's
a maintenance issue - but one that shouldn't occur.

- Frank Krygowski

"Robin Hubert" wrote in message
nk.net...
JJ wrote:
"Jim" wrote in message
oups.com...

Hello there,

I was reading the Trek Web site, and found the 520 comes with bar-end
shifters.
What benefits do the Shimano Dura-Ace bar-end shifters offer, compared
with
modern integrated shifters? Is the 520 the only modern bicycle equipped
with
bar-end shifters?

Thanks in advance.

-Jim


This is from personal experience; With a semi-loaded 520 touring bike
(medium size back pack + two fully loaded rear panniers), the bar-ends
were a pain to shift, particularly on hills. I found that I wasn't able
to match my physical capacity to efficiently moving the bike.

Could you please explain that last statement? It makes no sense to me.

The analogy would be a manual transmission car with a sluggish shifter. IOW,
the quicker I can shift, the sooner I am in the right gear and the easier it
is on the energy output. This energy output needs to last between 40 and
100KM every day for up to two weeks, many times either in hilly terrain or
maybe the flats with a 20KM+ headwind for most of the day.

Switched to 105 brifters and found that I was always in the best gear.
Coming up to a grade you can simply click through the gears like paddle
shifter on a Ferrari. Coming down the other side, click, click, click...
always the most efficient gearing. Same thing on the flats, you get to
the gear you need quicker and easier. I found I have more energy and am
less tired.

On my annual Euro tour I'll bring a set of down tube shifters or bar ends
in case of something goes awry with the supposedly delicate brifters.
YMMV.

My experince with touring shows me there's no difference. Usually, you
pick a gear and go for a while.

Not for me, I weigh anywhere from 210 to 225 lbs. Now add the loaded
panniers, back pack and the steel framed 520 bike and there *is* a lot of
shifting going on. Everyday, at the very least, is the town or city traffic
as you come in and out for that nights stay. Most days are going to have
several towns that you go through. This equates to a lot of stop signs and
red lights. I used bar-cons last year because of the often mentioned
reliability issues. I had several minor crashes, one of which I'm certain
would have smashed the right side brifter, had I been running them. But I've
found that the smooth transition up and down the gears with the brifters is
such a big difference in efficiency that I'm going to chance breakage this
year (I'll bring a set of bar cons or downtubes, just in case).


There's no frantic F-1 racer paddle shifting going on, and this is not
mountain biking we're talking about.

Who said any thing about "racer" or "frantic?" The paddle shifter comes
equipped on street Ferrari's that are used in everyday driving.

There's no dicing about as if in a criterium or closely packed road race
where you might have to answer a move very quickly.

Try this "closely packed road race:" Amsterdam (or any other city FTM), not
in a bike lane, at speed keeping up with the Amsterdammers who are directly
in front and behind you... on your left- moving vehicular traffic, on your
right- parked cars; clearance on either side, less than a foot.

For touring, loaded or not, the location of the shifters simply doesn't
matter enough to give a hoot. Now, if you happen to like one shifter over
another, fine, but it really, really doesn't matter for this kind of
riding (or any recreational riding FTM)...

Robin Hubert

Bwaaaahahaha....! Doesn't matter for "this kind of riding?" You call it
"recreational?" After you get out of the flats of the Netherlands from
Brussels on it is one hill after another. Next you'll suggest dumping the
12-34 cassette in favor of an 11-23, because, "it really doesn't matter."

Nope, thumbs. See
http://www.ihpva.org/incoming/2002/Dragonflyer/df2.jpg.

Oh! I see. That's a damn fine setup.

JJ wrote:
"Robin Hubert" wrote in message

My experince with touring shows me there's no difference. Usually, you
pick a gear and go for a while.

Not for me, I weigh anywhere from 210 to 225 lbs. Now add the loaded
panniers, back pack and the steel framed 520 bike and there *is* a lot of
shifting going on. Everyday, at the very least, is the town or city traffic
as you come in and out for that nights stay. Most days are going to have
several towns that you go through. This equates to a lot of stop signs and
red lights. I used bar-cons last year because of the often mentioned
reliability issues. I had several minor crashes, one of which I'm certain
would have smashed the right side brifter, had I been running them. But I've
found that the smooth transition up and down the gears with the brifters is
such a big difference in efficiency that I'm going to chance breakage this
year (I'll bring a set of bar cons or downtubes, just in case).


There's no dicing about as if in a criterium or closely packed road race
where you might have to answer a move very quickly.

Try this "closely packed road race:" Amsterdam (or any other city FTM), not
in a bike lane, at speed keeping up with the Amsterdammers who are directly
in front and behind you... on your left- moving vehicular traffic, on your
right- parked cars; clearance on either side, less than a foot.

For touring, loaded or not, the location of the shifters simply doesn't
matter enough to give a hoot. Now, if you happen to like one shifter over
another, fine, but it really, really doesn't matter for this kind of
riding (or any recreational riding FTM)...

Robin Hubert

Bwaaaahahaha....! Doesn't matter for "this kind of riding?" You call it
"recreational?" After you get out of the flats of the Netherlands from
Brussels on it is one hill after another. Next you'll suggest dumping the
12-34 cassette in favor of an 11-23, because, "it really doesn't matter."

The issue isn't range of the cassette, it's how instantaeously you need
to shift from one gear to another.

Although that brings up two related disadvantages of STI:

1) You're limited in how many cogs you can downshift at one stroke of
the lever. Not so with bar ends (or Campy, IIRC).

2) Shimano limits front granny rings to something like 30 teeth for
front STI. You can retrofit a smaller one, but then the front shifting
gets very clumsy when you need to shift out of it.

Admittedly, that last bit about clumsy shifting can be overcome with a
bit of patience (and that's how my daughter did it when I retrofitted
her bike that way) but for the person who, like yourself, thinks
instantaneous shifting is mission critical, it's an obvious
deal-breaker!

BTW, I understand there's lots of room for personal taste. But I've
ridden the US coast-to-coast on a bike with friction bar-ends, and I've
ridden across the Appalachians and in the similar insanely steep,
choppy hills of Devon, England with downtube shifters. (Not to mention
- horrors! - riding in cities!)

I don't recall any need for a few dozen extra inaccessible moving
parts!

- Frank Krygowski

Tim McNamara wrote:
The Wogster writes:


Index problems, can be problems with any index shifter, the index
shifters on my MTB could suffer any of these issues, considering
that they are Shimano, they could suffer all of the index problems
that brifters do.


OK, the point must not have been explained clearly enough by myself
and the several other people who've addressed this. Every down tube
and bar end shifter of which I am aware can be *either* friction or
indexed. There's a little adjustment on the lever to allow this.

Your "trigger" shifters suffer the same problem as "brifters." We get
that. The equivalent for mountian bikes would be thumbshifters.


No, your not listening to what I said, your so preoccupied with dissing
brifters, that your simply restating your opinion. Seems it would be
easy to build a brifter that had a friction mode, would be similar to a
downtube shifter mechanism, mounted in or on the brake mechanism.

You could crash, if you need to brake, after you have moved your
hand to shift. Putting the shifters beside the brake lever, makes
it a short distance to perform the shift, and get back to the brake
hoods where you can easily brake.


Hmmm. I guess I don't have a problem with (1) controlling my bike
one-handed and (2) I can brake from more positions than on the hoods.
Have you ever ridden with downtube or bar end shifters? You're making
problems that basically don't exist.


Yup, had downtube shifters back in the 1970's, they were fine on a 5
speed deraileur, but we shifted a lot less in those days, because
shifting was a pain in the donkey, so why bother unless you really
needed to. With 8 and 9 speed cassettes, you find yourself shifting a
lot more. Personally I prefer indexed shifting, part of the price
though, is that you need to adjust it more often, to keep the indexing
working properly. This is more a cable issue, then a shifter issue.

Perhaps a bigger issue, is that the indexing should be built into
the deraileur and not the shifter, or a separate mechanism near the
deraileur.

There's a reason that it is not in the derailleur. That was already
tried in the past and abandoned. You might enjoy reading _The Dancing
Chain_ by Frank Berto et al.

Perhaps it was abandoned too early in the design process, after all
indexing at the shifter worked. Seems like it would be easy to build a
small box with the proper cams and gears inside, that mounts on the
chain-stay or downtube, that did the indexing. Would shorten the cable
run, and simplify the shifter in a single stroke. When you replace the
deraileur, you replace the indexer as well.

W

-snip-
The Wogster writes:
Perhaps a bigger issue, is that the indexing should be built into
the deraileur and not the shifter, or a separate mechanism near the
deraileur.

Tim McNamara wrote:
There's a reason that it is not in the derailleur. That was already
tried in the past and abandoned. You might enjoy reading _The Dancing
Chain_ by Frank Berto et al.

Well, since modern index systems were only possible (within
reasonable limits of cost and durability) after general
manufacturing techniques had reached a suitable level of
precision [and are greatly improved from early efforts by
enhanced tooth form, chain design and control wire/casing],
it's not clear to me that it couldn't be done effectively
now. Consider something like a Positron with fixed
cog-to-cog detents and a single adjuster which simply moves
the entire assembly in or out. There's no good reason to do
that rather than, say a Chorus system, but I believe it is
possible.


--
Andrew Muzi
www.yellowjersey.org
Open every day since 1 April, 1971

Tim McNamara wrote:
The Wogster writes:


However most of these problems are indexed-shifting issues, rather
then specifically brifter problems.


It's specifically a brifter problem in that brifters tie you into
index-only modes of shifting and reduce your choices. For most
riders, I suspect, that is not a problem- just like for most people,
the lack of freedom in Windows software is not a problem. For those
of us that find problems in index shifting or in Windows' unfreedom,
there are alternatives like bar-end shifters and GNU/Linux. One of
the great things is that there are choices!

Yes, and I much prefer the indexed thumb shifting of my 2005 Norco
Bushpilot, then I did to my 1976 Sekine 10 speed road bike.

Indexed shifting has issues, part of the problem is that you have
the indexing happening at the shifter, meaning the cable is part of
the process. Suppose you took a stepper motor, a dynamo, a
capacitor and a small circuit board, run a three wire cable to the
shifter, which becomes a simple 3-way switch. When you shift, the
switch completes a circuit, the circuit board logic then causes the
stepper motor to move the deraileur, which could be by pulling a
short cable. Now the indexing happens at the deraileur, rather then
at the shifter.


The virtue of a bicycle, which you seem to not have noticed, is its
simplicity. BTW, this sort of thing has been tried. And abandoned.

It will likely be tried again, and eventually someone will get it right,
and then most new bikes will come with electronic indexed shifting,
and most people will like it, of course there will be some old farts in
here, that will still want their cable operated friction downtube and
barcon shifters, because if it was good enough for 1959, then it's good
enough for everyone, for ever. It's still fairly simple, and makes the
shifter a lot simpler, would cost less too. Would make it possible to
design a bike that is automatic shifting. When crank speed increases
above say 80RPM, then shift up, when crank speed decreases below 50RPM
then shift down, of course it would need to know when to shift the front
only, when to shift the rear only, and when to shift both. That would
eliminate the shifter entirely.

W

Dane Buson wrote:

Johnny Sunset wrote:

You have to break the frame while braking to match Chalo!

True. I don't think I'm even in the running.

Of all the posters on rec.bicycles.*, I think I've only met two in
person, and Dane is one of them.

He's right-- he's a good-sized guy, and he rides hard, but he'll have
to go to extraordinary lengths to be as harsh to a bike as I am.
Perhaps he could take up freestyle ramp riding, or MTB downhill racing.


Come next August, he could attend the Dead Baby Bikes 10th Annual
Downhill Race and participate in the perennial Huffy Heave:
http://www.fortunecity.com/olympia/c...7/huffyhve.htm

That's pretty hard on a bike. Excuse me-- I meant "bike".

Chalo Colina

Dane Buson wrote:

Johnny Sunset wrote:

You have to break the frame while braking to match Chalo!

True. I don't think I'm even in the running.

Of all the posters on rec.bicycles.*, I think I've only met two in
person, and Dane is one of them.

He's right-- he's a good-sized guy, and he rides hard, but he'll have
to go to extraordinary lengths to be as harsh to a bike as I am.
Perhaps he could take up freestyle ramp riding, or MTB downhill racing.


Come next August, he could attend the Dead Baby Bikes 10th Annual
Downhill Race and participate in the perennial Huffy Heave:
http://www.fortunecity.com/olympia/c...7/huffyhve.htm

That's pretty hard on a bike. Excuse me-- I meant "bike".

Chalo Colina

The Wogster writes:

Tim McNamara wrote:
The Wogster writes:

Index problems, can be problems with any index shifter, the index
shifters on my MTB could suffer any of these issues, considering
that they are Shimano, they could suffer all of the index problems
that brifters do.

OK, the point must not have been explained clearly enough by myself
and the several other people who've addressed this. Every down
tube and bar end shifter of which I am aware can be *either*
friction or indexed. There's a little adjustment on the lever to
allow this.

Your "trigger" shifters suffer the same problem as "brifters." We
get that. The equivalent for mountian bikes would be
thumbshifters.

No, your not listening to what I said, your so preoccupied with
dissing brifters, that your simply restating your opinion. Seems it
would be easy to build a brifter that had a friction mode, would be
similar to a downtube shifter mechanism, mounted in or on the brake
mechanism.

You haven't said anything about that before now. Brifters with
friction shifting existed about 50-55 years ago. They were
abandoned.

You could crash, if you need to brake, after you have moved your
hand to shift. Putting the shifters beside the brake lever, makes
it a short distance to perform the shift, and get back to the brake
hoods where you can easily brake.

Hmmm. I guess I don't have a problem with (1) controlling my bike
one-handed and (2) I can brake from more positions than on the
hoods. Have you ever ridden with downtube or bar end shifters?
You're making problems that basically don't exist.

Yup, had downtube shifters back in the 1970's, they were fine on a 5
speed deraileur, but we shifted a lot less in those days, because
shifting was a pain in the donkey, so why bother unless you really
needed to. With 8 and 9 speed cassettes, you find yourself shifting
a lot more.

Sorry, that's just illogical. The number of gears in back makes no
difference as to whether or not you shift gears. The difference is
brifters- you find yourself shifting a lot more with brifters, which
would be the same if you still had 5 speed freewheels.

Personally I prefer indexed shifting, part of the price though, is
that you need to adjust it more often, to keep the indexing working
properly. This is more a cable issue, then a shifter issue.

It's an indexing issue. Indexing is intolerant of maladjustment
outsidde of a very narrow range of tolerances. It's not a "cable"
issue- it's an issue of the entire system.

Perhaps a bigger issue, is that the indexing should be built into
the deraileur and not the shifter, or a separate mechanism near the
deraileur.

There's a reason that it is not in the derailleur. That was already
tried in the past and abandoned. You might enjoy reading _The Dancing
Chain_ by Frank Berto et al.

Perhaps it was abandoned too early in the design process, after all
indexing at the shifter worked. Seems like it would be easy to build
a small box with the proper cams and gears inside, that mounts on the
chain-stay or downtube, that did the indexing. Would shorten the
cable run, and simplify the shifter in a single stroke. When you
replace the deraileur, you replace the indexer as well.

Again you seem to have dreadfully missed the issue. Do you happen to
work for Shimano?