SHIFTERS FOR SPORT TOURING, TOURING AND UTILITY RIDING ====================================================== SHORT SUMMARY ------------- There are 3 basic choices for shifter locations for drop bars. They are: a) integrated brake/shift levers (a.k.a. brifters), b) bar end shifters and c) down tube shifters. Here is a very brief summary of my opinions on their differences. If you would like to read a longer discussion of their differences along with a few other less popular shifter positions, you can find that in the sections that follow. BRIFTERS: WHO - Best for racers, beginners and some commuters. PROS - You can shift, brake and steer without moving your hands. The quickest shifting, since you don't have to move your hands. Racers and some commuters need to shift quickly, but do you? CONS - They wear out and then won't shift. Shimano brifters can't really be repaired. Repairs or replacements are costly. THE LOOK - Most "modern" looking. BAR ENDS: WHO - Best for sport touring and touring with modern range gearing, since most shifts are matter of just reaching down with your right hand. PROS - Next quickest shifting, since you don't have to move your hand far. Keeps hands on bars for better control with loads. Very durable to the point of being almost fail proof. CONS - On rare occasions, some riders can hit their knees on the shifters. This is really, really rare. THE LOOK - Makes you look like a Fred. Generates constant "old fashion" comments and questions - pity even. DOWN TUBE SHIFTERS: WHO - Best for tourers using half-step/granny gearing, devoted weight-weenies and retro minimalists. PROS - Allows for easy one-handed double shifts (needed for half- step/granny gearing). Very durable to the point of being almost fail proof. CONS - Slowest shifting due to the amount of time needed to move your arm. Don't let the location fool you though, it's actually very natural to reach. THE LOOK - Minimalist. Generates confusion and disbelief among "modern" riders who just don't get it. If you have to explain it, they won't. INTRODUCTION ------------ What is the best place to have your gear shifters? For racers, there's only one answer - integrated brake and shift levers (often referred to as "brifters"). But what if you don't race? I think that for sport touring, loaded touring and other styles of riding, there other options to consider - options that may even be better for you. Most notably, there are bar end shifters and down tube shifters. And there are even more choices and variations. As with any aspect of the bike/rider interface, the answer to which is best for any given rider is a highly personal judgement. Personal preference and comfort trump all other concerns or opinions coming from others. Still, I think some generalities can be made. I think different shifter types are better for different kinds of riding. The following are my thoughts on the matter, with a very strong bias towards sport touring, load touring and utility riding. BRIFTERS -------- Brifters are by far the most common style of shifters and for good reason. They allow you to steer, shift and brake without needing to move your hands. When I used to sell bikes long before there were brifters, we would gets lots of people for whom it was a bit of a struggle to control a "10-speed" bike. Reaching down to find the down tube shifters would cause them to veer in the parking lot as they took their shaky first test ride. Brifters help with this problem immensely. For this reason, I almost always suggest road bikes with brifters to friends who are just getting into road riding. Another place where I think brifters make sense is for commuting in heavy traffic areas. Riding with your hands on the hoods of the brake levers offers the best view of the road and being able to steer, shift and brake all from this position is a good thing. Closely related to this, brifters allow you to shift while you are standing out of the saddle. Most people ride on the hoods when standing - just where you need to be if you're using brifters. Practically speaking, you can't ride out of the saddle with only one hand on the bars. Every other shifter requires that you move your hands, unless you can climb while holding the ends of the bars where bar end shifters are mounted. Brifters are simply better if you need to shift while standing. There is one other place where brifters are the best choice. This may come off sounding like an insult but it really isn't meant to be. Over the years I've come to believe that a rider should love his or her bike. A bike that a rider feels good about is a bike that is more likely to ridden. Brifters are standard equipment on racing bikes in the pro peloton and on racing bikes sold to the general public. If you ride or hang out with people who ride racing bikes and choose to use something other than brifters, you can expect to get questions or even pity about why you are riding a bike with inferior, old-fashion shifters. These comments may be well intentioned, but they can be outright wrong if your needs are better met with other shifter types. So, if the comments from your friends matter to you, you may end up feeling worse about your bike if you don't have brifters mounted on it. I don't mean to sound shallow or to imply that some cyclists are shallow. But, I've come to accept that we cyclists form deep emotional connections with their bike and the look and aesthetic of the bike can be a very big part of that. Brifters are an essential part of the modern race bike aesthetic. Let me be very, very clear. There is nothing wrong with this in the slightest and it cuts both ways. Many people will choose other shifters for aesthetic reasons too. Nothing wrong with that either. Looks count and brifters are what you need if you are going for a modern look. I've had bikes with brifters before and I wouldn't reject a free bike if it had them on it. But, I choose not to use them any more. And I would never use them for long distance touring. The reasons why have to do with some technical issues. FIRST, they are very complex and they wear out over time. With the Shimano models, once they are worn out they can't really be rebuilt. Some claim good luck rebuilding Campy brifters. But either way, at some point you're going to be looking at an expensive repair or replacement. The other aspect of the failure is that when they fail, you can't shift. There's no back up mode and no way to jury rig things effectively. This is why I would never commit to a long distance tour with them. Bar end and down shifters can be put into friction shifting mode if/when the indexing system fails and both are fairly easy to jury rig with none standard cables if the need arises. SECOND, brifters are heavy. I'm no weight-weenie ounce counter and you shouldn't be either. But, the extra weight *can* effect the handling of some bikes. If you're motivated to reduce weight to the utmost, you should be looking at down tube shifters. If you're experiencing odd handling and are using brifters, they may be a contributing factor. THIRD, Shimano style brifters route the shifter cables out into the space in front of the steerer tube, just where a handlebar bag goes. If you plan on using a handlebar bag, the brifter cables will almost certainly interfere. BAR END SHIFTERS ---------------- Bar end shifters are shift levers mounted to the end of a road bar. They're somewhat associated with touring bikes and are still stock equipment on a few touring rigs sold today. I rather suspect that the touring market isn't big enough to justify the continued production of bar ends. Fortunately, bar ends are also used on time trial and triathalon bikes. They get mounted at the front end of the aero bars so that the racer can shift without getting out of the aerodynamic tuck position. What this means is that we can still get indexing bar end shifters that are compatible with modern 8, 9 and 10 speed drive systems. Modern bar ends offer index shifting for the rear gears and friction shifting for the front. So, they need to matched with number of gears in the back. Generally, the Shimano 8-speed barcons will work with both 7 and 8 speed Shimano systems. Older bar ends are friction based and will work with almost any derailleur system. In my opinion, bar ends are second only to brifters in terms of ease of use. Yes, compared to brifters, you do need to move your hands a bit, but their position makes them very easy to reach. I think they are particularly well suited to bikes that are set up with 8 - 10 speed indexing systems, since most shifting is done on the rear. So, shifting is just a matter of moving one hand and *click* you're in a new gear. There are reasons why tourist and long distance cyclists often gravitate towards bar ends. First and foremost, they are very durable and field repairable, especially compared to brifters. Modern indexing bar ends like those from Shimano *can* fail in that the indexing mechanism can wear out and stop clicking. But in practical terms, it almost never happens. And if it does, the bar ends are still usable in friction mode, so they'll still shift gears. On the other hand, when brifters fail, they really fail and can't shift. For this reason, I think bar ends (and down tube shifters) are much batter suited to touring and endurance riding. Another reason why many tourers prefer them over down tube shifters is that, like brifters, your hand stays on the bars while you are shifting. This can give you an extra measure of control when dealing with rough roads and heavy loads. There is a possible downside to bar ends that should be mentioned. Occasionally you'll find riders who hit their knees on the bar ends when climbing out of the saddle. I find that surprising, but not shocking. It's comment I've heard on rare occasion, so it's worth me mentioning but it's probably not worth you worrying about it. If brifters say, "I'm a racer (wannabe)", then bar end shifters say, "I'm a Fred." I've found that there are few components you can add to bike that will generate as many comments of disbelief. "Oh, you use *those*?", usually said with eyebrows raised and sometimes with eyes rolling. DOWN TUBE SHIFTERS ------------------ The fall of down tube shifters has been sudden and complete. In the pre-brifter days, this was *the* location for shifters on quality bikes. Today, they are almost never seen on new bikes - even less popular than bar end shifters, which is saying a lot since bar ends themselves are pretty rare compared to brifters. At the time of this writing, I have 3 bikes and 2 of them are set up With down tube shifters. Given the near universal abandonment of down tube shifters, I can assume that you won't pick them. Still, I'll try to not only describe them, but why I prefer them. Down tube shifters go on the down tube. On most (but not all) modern bikes the location is the same as where the brifter cable stops are. Functionally, down tube shifters are exactly like bar end shifters. Actually, it's the other way around, since bar ends were derived from down tube shifters. In fact, they often share the same inner workings and they work the same way. Modern down tube shifters index on the rear and friction shift on the front. Older down tube shifters are purely friction. It should noted that older friction shifters come in two flavors. The newer variety, typically associated with SunTour and Shimano 6 and 7-speed systems from the late 70s and early 80s, pull more cable to shift across wider freewheels. These shifters will work with today's 8 and 9 speed cassettes. The older style friction shifters are from the 5 speed era and are often associated with European brand shifters of that era such as Huret and Simplex. They have a smaller circular curve which pulls less cable. I find this actually to be an advantage, provided the shifter pulls enough cable to span the freewheel. I find it much easier to fine tune a shift, since a large movement of the shifter only moves the derailleur a small amount. [NOTE: Shimano and SunTour produced older 5-speed style shifters and European makers produced 6 and 7-speed shifters. But, European makers were more popular when 5-speed gearing was the norm while the Japanese makers gained popularity as the standards moved to 6 and then 7-speed gearing.] As I begin to discuss the pros and cons of down tube shifters, I should address their position first off. They are *not* hard to reach. They take *longer* to reach, due to the extra distance your hand needs to travel, something I'll talk about more latter on. But once your hand is on the shifter, you'll find that despite it's appearance, it's a very natural position. Back in the 70's and 80's, the 2 choices for shifters on the show room floor were down tube shifters and stem shifters. Stem shifters were mounted on the handle bar stem and they were common on lower end bikes targeted to less experienced riders. Here's how we used to to help riders get used to the reach. We would hold a bike upright and would have them get in a comfortable position. Then we would have them practice reaching to both the location of down tube shifters and to the handlebar stem. As they practiced this, we pointed out that when they touched the down tube shifters, their arm was bent just about the same amount as when they were in a riding position. But, when they reached for the stem, they had to awkwardly pull their arm in next to their torso. Once they felt the difference, we would tell them that advanced riders preferred the down tube shifter position because it was a more natural and stable position. Everything I've just recounted is still true. You can try it for yourself. While the reach to down tube shifters is much easier than it looks, the amount of time it takes to move your arm to that position is much, much longer. If you're committed to reducing the time between thought and shift to the absolute minimum, you'll be happier with brifters, to be sure. If you're racing, riding regularly in fast club rides or commuting in busy traffic, the quick shifting advantage of brifters may be a real, honest to goodness advantage. But, if you're not doing one of those things, why would you consciously chose a slower shifting method? Let me work my way around that question and try to come up on it from the rear, instead of tackling it straight on. In his book "The Complete Walker", Colin Fletcher discusses the pros and cons of white gas stoves (which burn hot and fast but are very loud) and alcohol stoves (which are not as hot nor as fast but are very quiet). As he discusses the stoves, he asks, what's the hurry? In normal backpacking situations, there is no rush. While you wait for the water to boil, you can do another camp chore or better listen to the birds. More than likely, you've told yourself and others that you hike to relax, so why does it matter if it takes 6 minutes to boil your water or 4 minutes? The same is true for sport riding. Does shifting more quickly offer any advantage other than just being faster? Let's work our way even further behind the issue. The advocates of fixed gear bikes correctly point out that riding fixed helps to develop a pedaling style that can deliver power across a wide range of cadences; from fast to slow. But even this pedaling style is not enough to deal with all situations. So, some fixed gear riders use what is called a flip-flop hub, which has a different sized cog on each side of the rear hub. If the rider wants to use a different gear for a ride, this allows them to change gears by removing the rear wheel and flipping it over to use the other cog. This is easier than removing and replacing the existing cog, which is an even more involved process. You can even find hip bottle openers with a 15mm wrench cut out in the handle so you can make the change on the road if you need to (or open a bottle on the road, if you need to). If you ponder the austere and demanding simplicity of fixed gear bikes, it provides a new perspective on derailleur systems. Just imagine... The derailleur system allows the rider to literally change cogs while on the fly. You don't need to stop. You don't need to remove the wheel or retension the chain. The derailleur moves the chain from one cog to the next and takes up the slack for you. It really is quite marvellous - changing gears while riding. For me, using down tube shifters is a something of a step towards riding a fixed gear bike. I tend to think of my down tube shifting bikes as something like multi-speed single speeds. By this I mean shifting happens less frequently compared to shifting with brifters. I find I stay in the same gear for longer on both ends of my body's power range. I tend to work the gear more fully. When shifting happens, it is deliberate, unrushed and unhurried. I participate in the shifting more consciously. I think more about when and where I want to shift. If I'm in a rush to shift, something else has gone wrong. I didn't think far enough ahead, or worse, my mindset has become impatient and rushed. Is it a stretch to suggest down tube shifters as a help to meditative riding? There is a situation where I strongly prefer down tube shifting and that is when using half-step/granny gearing. Half-step/granny gearing used to be popular gearing strategy for loaded touring. The basic idea is to use closely (half-step) spaced chainrings for the outer and middle chainrings so that the gears are perfectly interleaved as you move across the rear freewheel. That is, it gives very closely spaced gearing in the mid range gears while using 5, 6 or 7 speed gearing. Modern 8, 9 and 10 speed cassettes have largely made half-step/granny gearing a thing of the past. Modern cassettes can give you the same tightly spaced gear runs with a simple shift on the rear. In contrast, with half-step/granny gearing, the only way you get the close small steps between gears is to commit to constant double shifts that involve a shift of both the front and rear derailleurs at the same time. It should be noted that it's hard to set up half-step/granny gearing with modern brifters. The issue is that half-step gearing requires chainrings that are 5, 4 or 3 teeth apart. It can be hard or very, very expensive to find suitable chainrings that have the ramps and pins needed for indexed shifting on the front with brifters. In contrast, the correct sized chain rings are much less expensive and more readily available if you look at non-indexed rings. So, as a practical matter, you can generally assume that if you are going to use half-step/granny gearing, you are going to be shifting it with either bar ends or down tube shifters so that you can use friction shifting in the front. I find it's much easier to shift a half-step/granny gearing system with down tube shifters compared to bar ends. The reason is this. When I shift either bar ends or down tube shifters, I tend to unweight the shifting hand from the handlebar. This is obviously true of down tube shifters since your hand has to leave the bar entirely. But, it is also true for bar end shifters, despite the fact that my hand is still on the bar to some extent. While my hand is on the bar end shift lever, it is largely unweighted. I may be able to provide some steering input while shifting a bar end and I can certainly regain full control quickly if needed. But, the shifting hand is not bearing my full weight. And that's the problem for me to double shift with bar ends. I can't unweight both hands at the same time. A double shift on bar ends is really 2 single shifts - the first with 1 hand and the second with the other. In contrast, with down tube shifters I can easily double shift with the same hand. For me, this is the right hand. Steer with the left, shift with the left. Now, at last count there are exactly 47 people left in the world who actually use half-step/granny gearing, so I realize that this observation has really limited appeal. I'll add to this that I'm in the minority on this point it would seem. Many people I talk to who use half-step gearing prefer bar end shifters. Still, I find down tube shifters more suitable for this kind of gearing. It's hard to comment on the aesthetics of down tube shifters. Racers and racer wanna-bes have all gone with brifters which are "obviously" superior due to their quicker shifting (no time delay due to moving your hand). Iconoclast tourers were using bar end before brifters and still use them despite brifters being available. So, who uses down tube shifters these days other than people saddled with old bikes that they haven't yet "upgraded"? I'm not sure and I'm one of them. My sense is that down tube shifters are the most minimalist form of a derailleur system. There is nothing left to remove, to paraphrase the famous St. Expury quote on minimalist design. In particular, I think the handlebars on bikes with down tube shifters look less cluttered since they have no shift cables sprouting out of them. The bottom line on down tube shifters is that it's very hard to convince people to try them. A few people, like myself, like them. But we're in a very small minority. STEM SHIFTERS ------------- Stem shifters used to be the most common location for shifters among low end bikes. The idea, in theory, was that this location was easier to reach than down tube shifters, which were the norm back then. In practice, the location is not all that easy to reach, since it requires you to pull your elbow in close to your chest. There are still scads of these shifters kicking around in parts bins, so they're still worth some discussion. Personally, I can't recommend stem shifters for use with drop bars. Not only are they awkward to reach, they are very easy to bump with your knees when climbing out of the saddle. More to the point, I think the other options of brifters, bar ends or down tube shifters are all preferable to stem shifters in every way for use with drop bars. The one place where I think stem shifters make sense is on bikes set up for an upright riding position. If you're already sitting upright, the reach to the stem is much less akward. There are plenty of other shifter location options for upright positions such as thumb shifters and GripShifts. But, if you're setting up a bike for upright riding, stem shifters remain a viable option. OTHER OPTIONS - Brifters, bar ends, down tube shifters and stem shifters are the most common positions for use with drop bars, but there are a handful of other options that are worth mentioning. Over the years there have been products designed to allow you to shift while your hands are on the hoods. Kelly Take-Offs were one such product. Essentially they were mounts for down tube shifters that put the shifters just inside of the brake levers. There may have been other products in the past that have attempted to do the same thing too. However, at the time of this writing, I am not aware of any such product. In my opinion, products of this sort never really die completely. There is always the used market and we've repeatedly seen various product designs reintroduced by other manufacturers. So, who knows. Perhaps you can find such a thing. The last two options are bath borrowed from flat bar mountain bikes. First, there are thumb shifters which come in both indexing and friction shifting styles. This can be mounted on the top of the bar next to stem, provided that the road bars are thin enough. Mountain bike bars are generally thinner than road bars but you can usually get them to fit if you are using either 25.4mm or 26.0mm bars by doing a bit of filing on the thumb shifter mounts. The second option is to mount GripShifts to the end of the road bar. I've only seen this done a few times and don't know what the fit and compatibility issues are. If you've done this, I would love to hear how. Copyright by David Mann, 2008