Groupsets

Am 04.06.2020 um 18:48 schrieb :

By the way yesterday was a glorious day: after multiple f*ck ups my
gravel bike frame arrived at the LBS just (a couple of days) within
half a year from the initial order (december 7 2019)! The last f*ck
up was that they didn't include the right documents so the frame
couldn't clear customs and was stuck at the Fedex depot for more than
a week 18 km from the LBS. Unbelievable...

I've also just bought a gravel bike, due to an injured tailbone.
I haven't been able to ride my recumbent since before my home office
days (and the beater bike was stolen at the railway station); used the
kids' bikes occasionally (and the tandem my daughter got for her birthday).

Last week, while waiting in town for my wife having a laser operation on
her eye I went into a bike shop and bought whatever €1000 gravel bike
with fitted fenders and lights they had available (rather the 52cm frame
now than the 55cm frame in a month), exchanged the standard 40mm tires
by 32mm tires, and wow:

First 12km round (with 3km though suburb 'yield-to-the-right') clocked
me a 24.9 km/h average, a few days later 26.1 km/h, after three months
of no bicycling!
On my recumbent, the way home from work is 11km with next to no suburb
riding, and it's 22 km/h in winter and 24 - 26 km/h in summer with good
training.

My 14-year old son immediately borrowed the bike for a two-day trip with
his friend camping in grandma's garden, he is immediately in love with
the bike, and he'll borrow it again next week for a week-long tour with
his friend's family.

Maybe I should get a €1500 gravel bike in July when they reduce the
sales tax to boost the economy?

Let's see whether I switch back to the recumbent next season or stay on
the road bike!

On Thursday, June 4, 2020 at 9:34:48 AM UTC-7, Frank Krygowski wrote:
On 6/4/2020 10:31 AM, jbeattie wrote:
On Thursday, June 4, 2020 at 12:30:27 AM UTC-7, Dennis Davis wrote:


Perhaps (6) is better replaced by:

(6) Requires levels of skill not present in modern cyclists.

Really? So one should buy DT shifters to develop a useless skill? At least that should translate into some performance advantage, which it doesn't.

Perhaps the "useless skill" is the ability to ride with (gasp!) only one
hand on the bars?

I do know several cyclists who hate taking a hand off the bars. They
stop every time they want to swig from a water bottle.

My son has never touched DT shifters, and he was going 40mph down Mirror Lake Highway no-hands, waiving his arms like a bird. Freaked me out. Sagan has probably never touched DT shifters and he wheelies up hill, waiving an arm ala rodeo cowboy. Are you saying DT shifts are necessary for learning other skills -- like typing is necessary to learn piano? BTW, great ride: https://bbrelje.wordpress.com/2013/0...ghway-cycling/


I ride with many younger, skilled riders who have never been in the same room as a DT shifter. They can ride one-hand, no hands, bunny hop, wheelie and do single track on a road bike at incredible speeds. All race CX and would laugh at DT shifting. I doubt anyone in the pro peleton has used DT shifters.

Dopes who can't handle a water bottle won't be saved by DT shifters. They just won't shift.



And I recall the article linked here a few years ago, where several
young racers did a comparison test, riding a long climb on current bikes
vs. vintage (1980s?) racing bikes. At least one complained about feeling
insecure having to move a hand to shift - poor baby!

Well he could certain drink from a bottle and climb, so that's either misremembered or perhaps more nuanced. The testers were racers and capable of riding no hands up hill at speeds we could not attain.


I raced for decades on DT shifters along with my cohorts -- who then ****-canned them because they were clearly inferior to STI. No more pack wobble going into or out of high speed corners on a rolling course as riders reached down for gears, no more sitting to shift while climbing out of the saddle, no wrong gear when sprinting because riders could just shift -- and shift a lot.

Yes, if I were racing, I'd want STI. But bicycling =/= racing; there are
other ways to ride. If someone prefers the simplicity or light weight of
downtube shifters over the convenience, complexity, non-repairability
and heavier weight of STI and its clones, I don't think it's a terrible
choice.

Me, I like bar ends - a sort of middle ground, in my view.

And friction had all of its problems with missed shifts and shifters that would loosen and ghost shift. And I couldn't imagine friction shifting a modern 11sp cassette, but I'm sure more than five gears is somehow wrong or unnecessary.

You've changed the subject. Downtube does not preclude index - or at
least, it once didn't. (I don't diligently follow the market.)

About more than five gears - well, I agree with Tom (!!!) that eight was
about optimum. Yes, in my view, more are unnecessary. Again, those kid
racers climbing on old bikes posted times indicating that _only_ the
bike weight made a difference. There was no apparent benefit from
micro-adjusting cadence. Lab data shows the same thing. The curve for
power output vs. cadence is very flat.

I used to do a local hill climb TT on a fixed gear because it was light. If you have the right gear for the grade, you don't need ten others. An abundance of gears is great for rides with mixed terrain where you are trying to maintain speed. If you don't care about speed and have no need to keep up, you can live your life in a 68" gear.

...I'm planning to put some Simplex Retrofriction downtube levers on
my next bike...

I'm buying a musket for hunting!

I have two good friends who hunt using black powder, and one friend who
is a bowhunter. You may not understand their choices, but they probably
don't care.

I don't care either, but at least with bows and muzzleloaders, you get access to different seasons and game than you might with a modern rifle. Bow versus rifle is also bike versus unicycle and not DT versus brifter.

-- Jay Beattie.

On Thursday, June 4, 2020 at 7:30:16 PM UTC+2, Rolf Mantel wrote:
Am 04.06.2020 um 18:48 schrieb :

By the way yesterday was a glorious day: after multiple f*ck ups my
gravel bike frame arrived at the LBS just (a couple of days) within
half a year from the initial order (december 7 2019)! The last f*ck
up was that they didn't include the right documents so the frame
couldn't clear customs and was stuck at the Fedex depot for more than
a week 18 km from the LBS. Unbelievable...

I've also just bought a gravel bike, due to an injured tailbone.
I haven't been able to ride my recumbent since before my home office
days (and the beater bike was stolen at the railway station); used the
kids' bikes occasionally (and the tandem my daughter got for her birthday).

Last week, while waiting in town for my wife having a laser operation on
her eye I went into a bike shop and bought whatever €1000 gravel bike
with fitted fenders and lights they had available (rather the 52cm frame
now than the 55cm frame in a month), exchanged the standard 40mm tires
by 32mm tires, and wow:

First 12km round (with 3km though suburb 'yield-to-the-right') clocked
me a 24.9 km/h average, a few days later 26.1 km/h, after three months
of no bicycling!
On my recumbent, the way home from work is 11km with next to no suburb
riding, and it's 22 km/h in winter and 24 - 26 km/h in summer with good
training.

My 14-year old son immediately borrowed the bike for a two-day trip with
his friend camping in grandma's garden, he is immediately in love with
the bike, and he'll borrow it again next week for a week-long tour with
his friend's family.

Maybe I should get a €1500 gravel bike in July when they reduce the
sales tax to boost the economy?

Let's see whether I switch back to the recumbent next season or stay on
the road bike!

Good for you. Congratulations. I was at the bike shop yesterday to bring some parts to be fitted on the gravelbike and talked to the owner. It was crazy on repairs, every bike in the showroom they could sell to other bike shop because they were out of stock and they have trouble to get parts.

Lou

On Thursday, June 4, 2020 at 9:48:34 AM UTC-7, wrote:
On Thursday, June 4, 2020 at 4:31:19 PM UTC+2, jbeattie wrote:
On Thursday, June 4, 2020 at 12:30:27 AM UTC-7, Dennis Davis wrote:
In article ,
jbeattie wrote:

...

I think that the curmudgeon handbook, chapter six, has a lengthy
discussion of the benefits of DT friction shifters. IIRC,
they a (1) slow and imprecise shifting, (2) missed shifts,
(3) conspicuous contrarianism, (4) longevity like an incurable
skin condition, (5) inconvenient location, and (6) conspicuous
contrarianism. Clearly superior to any STI/Ergo like system.

A double dose of "conspicuous contrarianism" ("3" and "6"). Isn't
that overkill?

Perhaps (6) is better replaced by:

(6) Requires levels of skill not present in modern cyclists.

Really? So one should buy DT shifters to develop a useless skill? At least that should translate into some performance advantage, which it doesn't.

I raced for decades on DT shifters along with my cohorts -- who then ****-canned them because they were clearly inferior to STI. No more pack wobble going into or out of high speed corners on a rolling course as riders reached down for gears, no more sitting to shift while climbing out of the saddle, no wrong gear when sprinting because riders could just shift -- and shift a lot. And friction had all of its problems with missed shifts and shifters that would loosen and ghost shift. And I couldn't imagine friction shifting a modern 11sp cassette, but I'm sure more than five gears is somehow wrong or unnecessary.



...I'm planning to put some Simplex Retrofriction downtube levers on
my next bike...

I'm buying a musket for hunting!

I had Simplex DT shifters on my '69 PX10 which is thankfully long gone along with all of its odd-ball French metric components. My 26.6 Simplex seat post was heavy enough to use for home defense. And the bike came with the AVA death stem -- ah, the good old days.

-- Jay Beattie.

Gee Jay you still bother to respond? That is admirable but useless.
By the way yesterday was a glorious day: after multiple f*ck ups my gravel bike frame arrived at the LBS just (a couple of days) within half a year from the initial order (december 7 2019)! The last f*ck up was that they didn't include the right documents so the frame couldn't clear customs and was stuck at the Fedex depot for more than a week 18 km from the LBS. Unbelievable...

Woohoo! I hope it rides well. Are you going with Simplex DT friction shifters and a reliable 5 speed drive train? The Prestige is an awesome RD. I have Cambio Corsa on my gravel bike because it is super reliable and is a more authentic riding experience. Cables are an unnecessary modern invention.


-- Jay Beattie.

On 6/4/2020 12:52 PM, wrote:
On Thursday, June 4, 2020 at 6:34:48 PM UTC+2, Frank Krygowski wrote:
On 6/4/2020 10:31 AM, jbeattie wrote:
On Thursday, June 4, 2020 at 12:30:27 AM UTC-7, Dennis Davis wrote:


Perhaps (6) is better replaced by:

(6) Requires levels of skill not present in modern cyclists.

Really? So one should buy DT shifters to develop a useless skill? At least that should translate into some performance advantage, which it doesn't.

Perhaps the "useless skill" is the ability to ride with (gasp!) only one
hand on the bars?


No you stubborn dinosaur. There are situations (traffic, road conditions or riding in a pack) even you don't want to take one hand of the handlebar and in that case you can't shift with down tube shifters period. That is the deal.

Whoa! Traffic and road conditions? Is that why I had so many crashes in
my ~33 years of bike commuting? And pack riding - like my 30 years of
club riding?

No, wait - I didn't crash. Heck, I even rode some in the Netherlands
with one or two hands off the bars. So what's the source of this fear
mongering?

I remember someone here once saying pedals older than some certain age
were a safety hazard. You're beginning to sound like him, Lou. It's not
that scary out there.

--
- Frank Krygowski

On 6/4/2020 1:48 PM, jbeattie wrote:
On Thursday, June 4, 2020 at 9:34:48 AM UTC-7, Frank Krygowski wrote:
On 6/4/2020 10:31 AM, jbeattie wrote:
On Thursday, June 4, 2020 at 12:30:27 AM UTC-7, Dennis Davis wrote:


Perhaps (6) is better replaced by:

(6) Requires levels of skill not present in modern cyclists.

Really? So one should buy DT shifters to develop a useless skill? At least that should translate into some performance advantage, which it doesn't.

Perhaps the "useless skill" is the ability to ride with (gasp!) only one
hand on the bars?

I do know several cyclists who hate taking a hand off the bars. They
stop every time they want to swig from a water bottle.

My son has never touched DT shifters, and he was going 40mph down Mirror Lake Highway no-hands, waiving his arms like a bird. Freaked me out. Sagan has probably never touched DT shifters and he wheelies up hill, waiving an arm ala rodeo cowboy. Are you saying DT shifts are necessary for learning other skills -- like typing is necessary to learn piano? BTW, great ride: https://bbrelje.wordpress.com/2013/0...ghway-cycling/


I ride with many younger, skilled riders who have never been in the same room as a DT shifter. They can ride one-hand, no hands, bunny hop, wheelie and do single track on a road bike at incredible speeds. All race CX and would laugh at DT shifting. I doubt anyone in the pro peleton has used DT shifters.

Dopes who can't handle a water bottle won't be saved by DT shifters. They just won't shift.

Right, but that's not the point. A certain percentage of STI fans tout
the safety advantage of always having both hands on the handlebars. They
must be terrified about signaling a turn, let alone scratching their nose.

And I recall the article linked here a few years ago, where several
young racers did a comparison test, riding a long climb on current bikes
vs. vintage (1980s?) racing bikes. At least one complained about feeling
insecure having to move a hand to shift - poor baby!

Well he could certain drink from a bottle and climb, so that's either misremembered or perhaps more nuanced.

I don't remember the water bottle remark in that article; and I'm afraid
it might take a ton of digging to find it again.

The testers were racers and capable of riding no hands up hill at speeds we could not attain.

No doubt they were faster than me. But that wasn't the point. At least
one of them was insecure about taking his hands off the bars to shift.
That amazed me. I always sought to be competent on the bike.

FWIW, I'm able to remove a jacket while riding, ghost-ride another bike,
push another person up a hill, etc. On occasion I've taken off a sweater
or other garment that had to be pulled over my head. Back when we lived
where dogs were a real problem, I was pretty good at throwing rocks and
hitting dogs while riding. Now we worry about moving a hand to shift??

I raced for decades on DT shifters along with my cohorts -- who then ****-canned them because they were clearly inferior to STI. No more pack wobble going into or out of high speed corners on a rolling course as riders reached down for gears, no more sitting to shift while climbing out of the saddle, no wrong gear when sprinting because riders could just shift -- and shift a lot.

Yes, if I were racing, I'd want STI. But bicycling =/= racing; there are
other ways to ride. If someone prefers the simplicity or light weight of
downtube shifters over the convenience, complexity, non-repairability
and heavier weight of STI and its clones, I don't think it's a terrible
choice.

Me, I like bar ends - a sort of middle ground, in my view.

And friction had all of its problems with missed shifts and shifters that would loosen and ghost shift. And I couldn't imagine friction shifting a modern 11sp cassette, but I'm sure more than five gears is somehow wrong or unnecessary.

You've changed the subject. Downtube does not preclude index - or at
least, it once didn't. (I don't diligently follow the market.)

About more than five gears - well, I agree with Tom (!!!) that eight was
about optimum. Yes, in my view, more are unnecessary. Again, those kid
racers climbing on old bikes posted times indicating that _only_ the
bike weight made a difference. There was no apparent benefit from
micro-adjusting cadence. Lab data shows the same thing. The curve for
power output vs. cadence is very flat.

I used to do a local hill climb TT on a fixed gear because it was light. If you have the right gear for the grade, you don't need ten others. An abundance of gears is great for rides with mixed terrain where you are trying to maintain speed. If you don't care about speed and have no need to keep up, you can live your life in a 68" gear.

I don't disagree on any of that. I think our disagreement is one of
degree - that is, what qualifies as "an abundance of gears"? Personally,
I like six (in back) better than five, but I still ride five on some
bikes. I don't like nine better than eight. The differences are too
small. I see no need for 11.

Then there's the new trend of one front sprocket, cutting one's
"abundance of gears" in half or in thirds.

Fashion is weird and powerful.


--
- Frank Krygowski

On Thursday, June 4, 2020 at 8:17:24 PM UTC+2, Frank Krygowski wrote:
On 6/4/2020 12:52 PM, wrote:
On Thursday, June 4, 2020 at 6:34:48 PM UTC+2, Frank Krygowski wrote:
On 6/4/2020 10:31 AM, jbeattie wrote:
On Thursday, June 4, 2020 at 12:30:27 AM UTC-7, Dennis Davis wrote:


Perhaps (6) is better replaced by:

(6) Requires levels of skill not present in modern cyclists.

Really? So one should buy DT shifters to develop a useless skill? At least that should translate into some performance advantage, which it doesn't.

Perhaps the "useless skill" is the ability to ride with (gasp!) only one
hand on the bars?


No you stubborn dinosaur. There are situations (traffic, road conditions or riding in a pack) even you don't want to take one hand of the handlebar and in that case you can't shift with down tube shifters period. That is the deal.

Whoa! Traffic and road conditions? Is that why I had so many crashes in
my ~33 years of bike commuting? And pack riding - like my 30 years of
club riding?

No, wait - I didn't crash. Heck, I even rode some in the Netherlands
with one or two hands off the bars. So what's the source of this fear
mongering?

That is not I said. You just choose when to ride one hand or no hands. That is not the same.


I remember someone here once saying pedals older than some certain age
were a safety hazard. You're beginning to sound like him, Lou. It's not
that scary out there.


If you are comfortable to ride no hands or with one hand cornering at speed on coblestones Paris Roubaix style than hat off.

Lou

On 6/4/2020 11:34 AM, Frank Krygowski wrote:
On 6/4/2020 10:31 AM, jbeattie wrote:
On Thursday, June 4, 2020 at 12:30:27 AM UTC-7, Dennis
Davis wrote:


Perhaps (6) is better replaced by:

(6) Requires levels of skill not present in modern cyclists.

Really? So one should buy DT shifters to develop a
useless skill? At least that should translate into some
performance advantage, which it doesn't.

Perhaps the "useless skill" is the ability to ride with
(gasp!) only one hand on the bars?

I do know several cyclists who hate taking a hand off the
bars. They stop every time they want to swig from a water
bottle.

And I recall the article linked here a few years ago, where
several young racers did a comparison test, riding a long
climb on current bikes vs. vintage (1980s?) racing bikes. At
least one complained about feeling insecure having to move a
hand to shift - poor baby!

I raced for decades on DT shifters along with my cohorts
-- who then ****-canned them because they were clearly
inferior to STI. No more pack wobble going into or out of
high speed corners on a rolling course as riders reached
down for gears, no more sitting to shift while climbing
out of the saddle, no wrong gear when sprinting because
riders could just shift -- and shift a lot.

Yes, if I were racing, I'd want STI. But bicycling =/=
racing; there are other ways to ride. If someone prefers the
simplicity or light weight of downtube shifters over the
convenience, complexity, non-repairability and heavier
weight of STI and its clones, I don't think it's a terrible
choice.

Me, I like bar ends - a sort of middle ground, in my view.

And friction had all of its problems with missed shifts
and shifters that would loosen and ghost shift. And I
couldn't imagine friction shifting a modern 11sp cassette,
but I'm sure more than five gears is somehow wrong or
unnecessary.

You've changed the subject. Downtube does not preclude index
- or at least, it once didn't. (I don't diligently follow
the market.)

About more than five gears - well, I agree with Tom (!!!)
that eight was about optimum. Yes, in my view, more are
unnecessary. Again, those kid racers climbing on old bikes
posted times indicating that _only_ the bike weight made a
difference. There was no apparent benefit from
micro-adjusting cadence. Lab data shows the same thing. The
curve for power output vs. cadence is very flat.

...I'm planning to put some Simplex Retrofriction
downtube levers on
my next bike...

I'm buying a musket for hunting!

I have two good friends who hunt using black powder, and one
friend who is a bowhunter. You may not understand their
choices, but they probably don't care.


It's nice to have the skill to shift a straight cut gearbox
but synchromesh is really an improvement all around. It's
nice to have the skill to shift DT or BC friction levers
while noting that modern click shift systems really do work
better.

In neither case is shift response the limiting factor for me.

The world's a big place, use what you like.

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

On 6/4/2020 11:43 AM, Frank Krygowski wrote:
On 6/4/2020 10:48 AM, jbeattie wrote:
On Wednesday, June 3, 2020 at 7:12:54 PM UTC-7, Frank
Krygowski wrote:

Adjusting pads is sort of a side issue, since I was
talking only about
force on the controls. Although to me, not needing to
adjust hydraulic
disc pads is kind of balanced by needing to prissily
clean things with
cotton swabs when replacing pads.

I don't clean my disc calipers with cotton swabs. I just
drop in a set of pads.

Admittedly, I haven't done it because I don't use those
brakes. But these guys
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vQXFFgRButo seem to say
it's important to get the Q-tips out. See about 2:20 and
about 3:20 onward.

Is that only for super grungy brakes?


No Q-tips on shop time. We use auto disc brake cleaner
(which is dirt cheap) in refillable sprayers with a clean
wiper, compressed air to finish.

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

On 6/4/2020 2:59 PM, AMuzi wrote:
On 6/4/2020 11:34 AM, Frank Krygowski wrote:
On 6/4/2020 10:31 AM, jbeattie wrote:
On Thursday, June 4, 2020 at 12:30:27 AM UTC-7, Dennis
Davis wrote:


Perhaps (6) is better replaced by:

(6) Requires levels of skill not present in modern cyclists.

Really?Â* So one should buy DT shifters to develop a
useless skill?Â* At least that should translate into some
performance advantage, which it doesn't.

Perhaps the "useless skill" is the ability to ride with
(gasp!) only one hand on the bars?

I do know several cyclists who hate taking a hand off the
bars. They stop every time they want to swig from a water
bottle.

And I recall the article linked here a few years ago, where
several young racers did a comparison test, riding a long
climb on current bikes vs. vintage (1980s?) racing bikes. At
least one complained about feeling insecure having to move a
hand to shift - poor baby!

I raced for decades on DT shifters along with my cohorts
-- who then ****-canned them because they were clearly
inferior to STI. No more pack wobble going into or out of
high speed corners on a rolling course as riders reached
down for gears, no more sitting to shift while climbing
out of the saddle, no wrong gear when sprinting because
riders could just shift -- and shift a lot.

Yes, if I were racing, I'd want STI. But bicycling =/=
racing; there are other ways to ride. If someone prefers the
simplicity or light weight of downtube shifters over the
convenience, complexity, non-repairability and heavier
weight of STI and its clones, I don't think it's a terrible
choice.

Me, I like bar ends - a sort of middle ground, in my view.

And friction had all of its problems with missed shifts
and shifters that would loosen and ghost shift.Â* And I
couldn't imagine friction shifting a modern 11sp cassette,
but I'm sure more than five gears is somehow wrong or
unnecessary.

You've changed the subject. Downtube does not preclude index
- or at least, it once didn't. (I don't diligently follow
the market.)

About more than five gears - well, I agree with Tom (!!!)
that eight was about optimum. Yes, in my view, more are
unnecessary. Again, those kid racers climbing on old bikes
posted times indicating that _only_ the bike weight made a
difference. There was no apparent benefit from
micro-adjusting cadence. Lab data shows the same thing. The
curve for power output vs. cadence is very flat.

...I'm planning to put some Simplex Retrofriction
downtube levers on
my next bike...

I'm buying a musket for hunting!

I have two good friends who hunt using black powder, and one
friend who is a bowhunter. You may not understand their
choices, but they probably don't care.


It's nice to have the skill to shift a straight cut gearbox but
synchromesh is really an improvement all around. It's nice to have the
skill to shift DT or BC friction levers while noting that modern click
shift systems really do work better.

In neither case is shift response the limiting factor for me.

The world's a big place, use what you like.

Yep. But discussion groups are places we're supposed to discuss
advantages and disadvantages.

The first car I had was a goofy little 1960 Fiat sedan, four speed on
the column, non-synchro first gear. I amazed my friends with my double
clutching.

But I wouldn't want to go back to that. The advantage in those days
might have been $10 lower retail price. I'd pay way more for synchromesh.

But AFAIK, no car has a synchromesh reverse gear. So not every technical
possibility is worth adopting.


--
- Frank Krygowski