pacificaslim

Current setup: 1985 Trek 600, Shimano 600 cranks and deraillers, 52-40 chainrings with 14-28 Suntour 6-speed freewheel. This gives me a lowest gear of 38.6. I'd like to get that down quite a bit for the massive hills around here.

What sounds like the best idea to you guys? From easiest to hardest:

1) Change the current small chainring to a 38 (I think that's the smallest possible with the 130 bcd spacing). This would get me down to 36.6.

2) Change the freewheel to one with a bigger cog and hope the rear derailler will still shift to it ok. 40-32 would be 33.8, 40-34 would be 31.2, 38-32 would be 32.1, and 38-34 would be 30.2. Do you think the derailler would shift a gap from 24 to 34 like those shimano "megarange" freewheels? Or would I need to stick with 24 to 28 to 34 jump freewhel?

3) Find a Willow Triplizer chainring so I can run an additional granny chainring on my current cranks. Still need to change bottom bracket. The Willow doesn't seem to be available anymore, but FSA makes a similar chainring (130 bcd to 74 bcd). Any problem with this new fsa chainring (made for 8,9,10 speed chains) and old 6-speed era chain?

4) Change bottom bracket and crankset to a "triple" (Did Shimano make a 600 series triple?). Any suggestions on an appropriate crankset and bottom bracket?

Clearly #3 and #4 would allow any sort of "bail out" granny gearing I wanted (with at most a front derailler swap but I think the regular 600 would work ok on a triple since i'd only use the granny on the inner two cogs.

Of course there is a 5th option: HTFU and just mash that damn 40-28 up the 19% grade like I was 20 years younger.

grinningfool

I don't have an answer for you, but I will be watching this thread closely, because I am in the same boat. My 28 year old Univega has the same gearing, and all the roads around my house are very hilly. I definitely need some granny gearing to help get my tired old carcass up those hills.

jim p

Find a junked mountain bike and transfer the triple crank and the long cage RD and the FD. Stick on a mega freewheel 34-11 and if things work out you wont even have to get a new BB. You will have to use friction mode for your shifters. Oh and you may need to redish the rear wheel.

I just got through doing this to a diamond back road bike. I do love the lower gears.

tellyho

I think the cheapest and most foolproof would be a new BB, crank and FD. You could get away with $100 for all of this (possibly less).

ParaWK4

I had one of those bikes for a while - nice bike. How about finding a Sugino crank with 110 bcd and setting it up with a 50/34 double. It should fit on the Shimano BB and it would drop your low gear to about 32. The only problem might be the rear derailleur might not have the capacity to handle 30T.

eddy m

I had a early Shimano 600 with a 40X28 as the lowest gear. I changed it out for a 38X30 and it worked fine. A 40X32 should work as well, and even a 38X32 might work.
FWIW I had a suntour 40X28 that I switched to a 34X28. The 34 to 52 shift was hard to make, but otherwise it was OK. That makes me think a 40X34 would have worked, but I never tried it.
If you need lower gears than that, you are in for a new crank and derailer.

em

pacificaslim

Ah, yet more ideas. Thanks guys. I do have an old mountain bike here with a shimano triple that i could put on as a test fit - it has 165 crank arms though so i wouldn't want to use it in the end (i'm 6' tall), but it'd be good for a test.

Changing front cranks to sugino or something with a 110 bcd is a great idea. If the 34 to 52 chainring jump is hard, I wouldn't mind swapping out my 52 for even a 48. If I can drop the rear cog to 13, it'd be nearly the same ratio as my current 52/14 anyway.

Well, now I have something to think about instead of work tomorrow, ha!

Road Fan

In your shoes what I did was change out the gearing for a Megarange 13-34 rear and put on a long-cage Huret Duopar derailleur. The freewheel is about $20 or should be, and the derailleur price is what ever you can find in the used market. This derailleur shifts those big cogs wonderfully. There was a long-cage 600 in the 6207 series, but it really doesn't work very well.

Don't trash your knees.

That's about as low a gear set as you can get without going compact or triple. The 600 in front is pretty good, but might not handle a true wide-range triple, say 52/40/24. The MTB parts will (I think), and the Campy Racing Triple system will.

anastrophe

Ha, we have the opposite problem. I'm *looking* for a triple with 165 crank arms. What model is it?

dit

I have just gone thru the same thing. I am now running a mtb crankset and my old 5 speed 14-24 and it works great. I did have to change the rd and the fd and since my old bike already had down tube friction shifters I was good to go. I did have to get a longer 4mm screw for rd large cog stop. It had too much tavel for my road 5 speed.

HillRider

Any bike shop that's been in business for a long time should have a old Suguino, SR, Sun Tour, etc. 110/74 crank lying around either gently used from an upgraded bike or NOS. It would be contemporary with your bike, low in cost and work as well as what you have now. It won't have the newer pinned and ramped chainrings but you don't have them now. A suitable Shimano cartridge bottom bracket will work with any of them.

Another possibility is to find a left-over 8-speed 105 triple crank as these were 130/74 and would take a 26 or 24T granny substituted for the 30T OEM ring. These do shift much better than the earlier designs, even with friction shifters. However, they require a 7/8-speed width chain.

Gonzo Bob

I used an old 110/74 BCD MTB triple as compact double for my 1986 road bike (was 42-53). I didn't even need to change the bottom bracket. I did get new rings and went with 34-50. I also got some loose cogs for the freewheel from www.loosescrews.com and rebuilt it as a 13-30 (was 13-21).

c_m_shooter

Switch the crank out for a compact double. 50/34

BluesDawg

What I did was get a Sugino XD600 crank with 26-36-48 rings. An older MTB or touring crank would also work. You can probably keep the front derailleur, but you may need a long cage rear to take up all the chain.With your current 14-28 freewheel, youll have a low of 25 gear inches and a high of 93. You could switch to a 7 speed freewheel with no modifications needed if you are using friction shifting. A 13-24 would give you a 29 to 100 gear inch range.

pacificaslim

Quick question: Would a campy chorus triple crankset work? it says it has square taper. Hmm... would i need a different bottom bracket than the current one used by the shimano 600 double? since it's for a ten speed rear, does that mean the chainrings are narrower and not suitable for the chain i'm running for my old 6-speed rear or a replacement 7-speed freewheel?

Allan Pollock

Or.....you could just buy another bike. No, seriously! I'd recommend something from the early 90s. There are plenty of good used bikes to be had with triples and indexed bar-end shifters for around 200-300. You can easily spend about half as much much money upgrading the drivetrain on your trek (which already has a very nice drivetrain....just no good for big hills).
So my recommendation: either sell the Trek and buy a different bike for, net, the same money as upgrading the Trek, or just expand the stable (clearly the better option)!


Cheers,
Allan Pollock

sciencemonster

I did this with my '69 Competition. Neat, simple, and cheap. Campy Veloce 50/34. $50 on eBay brand new. Doesn't look all that period correct, but it gets me up the hills.

cincy_14

I would stick with a double crankset so you can use the original bottom bracket without messing up the chainline. On my late 80s Giant I went from a 52-42 to a 48-32 and still used the original derailleur, doing something similar with your bike would be the easiest and cheapest option.

rhm

I'm 6' and use shorter crank arms than that. You'll be fine with the 165's.

Another option is to replace the larger chain ring with a 48 that's drilled for both 130 and 110; then you can get a smaller inner ring.

Road Fan

Campy triples are really great chainsets and work well with their derailleurs, the Racing T series. I'm using one from around 2000 with the matching long-cage rear mech and front changer, with a 7-speed friction shifter and a SRAM 9-speed chain. It's really slick.

Campy and Shimano shared the square drive shape, but the tapers are different, and won't in general fit right. You really should get a suitable Campy BB or Phil Woods to fit it correctly.

ogbigbird

if you can, go to the tripple chainrings, longer crank axle and wide range front deraillur solution. i've done like 6 of these double to tripple ring conversions on both 1 and 3pc crank set ups. a wider range freewheel with like a 32 or 34tooth low gear would help if you rear deraillur can handle the larger low gear cog. if it's an 85, it can use an updated drive train.

grinningfool

I found the solution to my gearing issues, I bought a used 7 speed freewheel with 11-34 sprockets. I didn't think my derailleur would work with the big jump to the 34, but it works fine, so I didn't need to switch out the derailleur.
I was going to put on a triple crankset, but I definitely would have had to buy a new front derailleur, and also I was afraid that i would have problems with alignment. So I got out of it pretty cheap.
Going from a 28 on my old freewheel to a 34 on the new one, I should be able to tackle any of the steep hills around here with ease.