Bicycle Mechanics - shifters are "backwards"?

I bought the Mercier Galaxy from Bikes Direct; the web site says that it comes with Shimano 8-speed STI shifters. (Is STI the model name or simply some generic term for the type of shifters?)

On the shifters they say Shimano Sora Flight Deck. They don't have a visual indicator to tell you what gear you're in.

My other bike, a Trek, which also has Shimano Sora shifters, but they have a visual indicator. With those shifters, pushing the brake lever sideways shifts to larger gears, closer to the spokes, and pushing the little thumb lever shifts to the smaller gears, away from the spokes.

But with the Mercier Galaxy it's the opposite; the thumb lever shifts to larger gears and the brake lever shifts to smaller gears. Has anyone else seen this; is this normal?

Some derailleurs are set up this way, with the spring pulling towards the lower (larger cogs) gears. I forget what these are called, or what the supposed advantage is, but they are not uncommon.

I had an older (02 maybe??) Trek 1000 w/ Sora on it. No shift indicators & the thumb button shifted (dropped the gear)to the next smaller sprocket as well. The brake lever shifted in to the next largest. I can't imagine putting the strain of retracting or climbing the derailleur on those little thumb bars.

With high-normal derailers, the derailer spring moves the chain to larger cogs and the shift lever pulls it to smaller cogs. There is no additional strain on the thumb lever as it is just releasing tension like it would on low-normal derailers.

Bikewer and CACycling got it; pushing the brake lever sideways is increasing the cable tension, but it's moving the derailleur in the opposite direction from the way it works on my Trek. It never occurred to me that things could be different like that. It will definitely be confusing having two bikes with different shifting behavior. I will also miss the visual display of the gear I'm in. But I bought the Mercier intentionally as a "budget" bike so I'm not complaining.

Thanks for the responses.

Shimano called this "rapid rise" and it is another case of Shimano inventing something that was not needed or wanted but was used as a sales tool. Roger

With LOW-normal derailers, the derailer spring moves the chain to larger cogs and the shift lever pulls it to smaller cogs. There is no additional strain on the thumb lever as it is just releasing tension like it would on HIGH-normal derailers.
Fixed. You had it backwards.

I wish the high normal front derailleur was still made and in a decent quality,
having the cable pull the cage towards the
low gear was a boon for late down shifters on a climb.
then spring would pull both front and rear into the highest ratio.

STI = Shimano Total Intergration. what that mean is that starting in about 1990 shimano started to do everything they could to ensure bike makers had to use complete shimano 'kits' on a bike.

they mounted the MTB shifters on the brake levers, so you could not have shimano shiftin and Dia Compe brakes.

they also lightened the sring in the road calipers (this was also part of SLR) and put a spring in the brake lever to return the lever to the starting point and pull the cable back. rather than rely on the caliper spring to this. result shimano calipers did not work as well with a non SLR or STI brake lever.

for the road STI/SLR finally morphed into the integrated shifter/brakelever AKA "Brifter"

Fixed. You had it backwards.

Thanks. I do that a lot.

I assume it is only the rear that shifts this way (haven't seen FDs like this lately). If that is the case, swapping out the RD with a standard one would be pretty cheap and a lot less confusing. Sell the old RD to offset the cost.

I assume it is only the rear that shifts this way (haven't seen FDs like this lately). If that is the case, swapping out the RD with a standard one would be pretty cheap and a lot less confusing. Sell the old RD to offset the cost.

If I remember correctly the front one is similar; pushing sideways on the brake lever shifts shifts "backwards" to how it is on my other bike. But I like your suggestion of changing the derailleur(s).

Summary:

STI = Shimano Total Integration, a product design of integrating brakes and shifters into a single pod or brifter

In a traditional (Also called: High-Normal, Bottom-Normal) rear derailleur, a movement of the Sora brifter's thumb release would decrease cable tension and move the chain to a smaller rear cog. A movement of the brake lever arm would increase tension and move the chain to a larger rear cog.

In a Low-Normal (also called Top-Normal) RD, the thumb release would decrease cable tension and move the chain to a larger rear cog. Moving the lever arm would increase tension and move the chain to a smaller rear cog.

For the follow up question about the front, it takes a lot of torque to move a chain from a small chainring to a big one, so all front derailleurs would move to the larger ring when cable tension was increased by moving the lever arm.