Touring - Thumbies and Cross Brake Levers

I am getting close to owning an LHT. I have found an LBS with 54 & 56
cm completes on order. They'll hold them both for a ride. Also said
they'd be willing to swap the blue frame for a red frame at minimal
cost.

I test rode an LHT with bar-end shifters and I didn't like it. I live
on a mountainous island, so I shift gears a lot. Too much of a reach.

I have also accepted the idea the brifters are not reliable enough for
a touring bike.

I saw another LHT build today that had Dura-Ace bar-ends, Paul
thumbies and cyclocross brake levels in addition to the normal drop
bar brake levers.

It was very appealing but the thumbies and brake levers seemed to
interfere with each other. Anyone with this setup? How well does it
work? What you you do next time?

I have the thumbies on my bike with regular brakes but on a flat bar not drop bars and have not yet had a problem with the arrangement. I dont have the intermediate brake handles so don't know if they would interfer with the set up. On the lbs front let me guess OBC on Fort?

The LBS I've been talking to is North Park. They seems to do the most LHTs and are very close to my office.

Where are they? I'm down in the little pile of rocks city regularly and need to find new places to pass the time away at dreaming about being rich.Can't keep going to all the same places it get's to be a hassle hearing "roving wet clean-up" for my drool when I walk thrugh the door! :lol: :roflmao:

I've used thumbies on my mountain bike and they're great. I have some cross levers on my commuter/tourer bike and they're great. But I don't know that I would want to give up that much real estate to run both while touring. It would take up space you might need for a handlebar bag, computer, etc. But, do whatever you think you'll like. I was a little uncertain about bar-ends, but have gotten to like them too. ANd I really don't think that STI's are all that fragile.

To each their own -I'm also not sure that I'd like the bar end shifters either, judging by the amount of time I (don't) spend in the drops, and the fact -at least to me -it seems like you have less control based on your hand position you assume to shift over other shifting systems.

I think if price were no object I'd go with the Paul's thumbies -easy, simple, reliable and your hands are in a good position to retain control. The problem is that Paul's thumbies are expensive (~$60?), plus you have to buy the shifters as well (~$60?). Other alternatives are to go with mtb bars with barends or trekking bars -these will allow you to use Rapidfire or gripshift rather than road bike specific controls. I have trekking bars with 9-speed NOS Centera gripshifts I bought on ebay for about $12. I really like the setup, and I've never had problems with gripshifts; again, I like the idea of retaining good control while I shift. There is also the other option of using -and I can't remember the name -of a piece of hardware that is similar to the thumbies, but goes near the hoods. I think the company went out of business, but I know someone on this group has them as I remember seeing a photo of them. They looked promising too.

By the way, why do you think brifters are unreliable for touring? I used STIs (new Tiagra for around $80 shipped off Ebay -and even though I would have preferred Pauls Thumbies, I was short on the money side of things so went for the STIs) before I went the trekking bar route after a realization they could work. Yes, I'm sure brifters are inherently less reliable than DTs/Bar ends/Thumbies/Gripshift, but they are still very very reliable. I've got thousands of miles on Tiagra STIs with no problems at all.

I have trekking bars w/thumbies and mtb type levers and i've not had a single problem. as someone said above, "I dont have the intermediate brake handles so don't know if they would interfer with the set up."