breadbin

hi all, i have a road bike and have had it with flat bars for a while now. took the drops handlebars off it. the road components are ultegra 10 speed and i put xt 10 speed shifters on there. the shifters have never been great but used to give me 3 or 4 gears that worked. i know the 10 speed shimano mtb and road dont work together cos one pulls more cable than the other but i didn't use the bike enough to warrant a new derailleur. i find when i setup the limit screws on the ultegra derailleur i only have 7 clicks and about 4 of them land on a sprocket! its grand for going down to the shops but its time to set it right.

i am just wondering though, is a derailleur all i need? i was planning on getting a 10 speed xt derailleur and popping it on. same with the front mech. the crankset is ultegra and the cassette is along the same lines too. will these need to be replaced? will the xt rear mech work well with the wheel, cassette, crankset combo? i've a feeling the 10 speed mtb groupset are gonna have to be completely swapped i.e. new cassette, crankset, chain etc, for it to work but i'm hoping it wont come to that or else the road bars might have to go back on!

Wordbiker

Shimano's SL-R780 shifters may do the trick. They're pricey, but probably less than swapping the other drivetrain components.

jimc101

This is the way to go if you want to keep the same gears ratios as you currently have, have been using the previous version of the R780, the R770 for the last 5 years of so, and they have performed flawlessly.

If you were looking at crank, cassette etc replacement, then you would have the 68/73mm BB issue (going that you have said you have 10 speed Ultegra , which is HT2, and MTB cranks have a different BB spec to road, and even in the touring ratios, you will have a big change in ratios.

FBinNY 

You can either swap derailleurs to match the levers, or swap levers to match the derailleurs. You have to do one or the other, and they also have to match the cassette (number of speeds).

I don't track company offerings,but I believe that Shimano now offere flat bar levers for road derailleurs.

Another option, is to use a cable travel adaptor if one exists for Shimano mtn lever to road RD.

breadbin

would i have to swap the crank and cassette jim? would i get away with the front and rear mechs only? the flat bar shifters seem the way to go but probably more expensive than xt front and rear mech together. i can get them for 27 and 61 euro free postage compared to the 120 euro for the others and they are not triple shifters anyway. i'd rather not change the crankset or cassette if i could help it

jimc101

You mentioned the crankset, and I was pointing out that changing this could have issues that you may not have been aware of.

Would still go with the suggestion of #wordbiker in just using the correct Shimano road bike flat bar shifters, as the XT ones you are currently using will be DynaSys, which aren't compatible with road derailleurs.

Burton

Unless you plan on replacing the complete drive train - suggest you swap out the shifters. Most XT mountain front derailleurs aren't designed to handle chainrings larger than 44T and touring XT front derailleurs, 48T. So even if you got pull ratio issues worked out - the chainring sizes and lack of trim functionality will still give you issues. The flatbar road shifters are designed to address all those issues.

thedevilisbad

Swap the shifters. I would buy down tube shifters and mount them to the handlebars using paul thumbies.

cobba

https://www.bike-discount.de/shop/k42...r.html?mfid=43
https://www.bike-discount.de/shop/k42...r.html?mfid=43
https://www.bike-discount.de/shop/k42...r.html?mfid=43

https://www.bike-discount.de/shop/k42...k.html?mfid=43
https://www.bike-discount.de/shop/k42...r.html?mfid=43

https://www.bike-discount.de/shop/k42...k.html?mfid=43
https://www.bike-discount.de/shop/k42...r.html?mfid=43

breadbin

thanks all for the suggestion, its pretty unanimous that them shifters are the way to go so i just ordered a set off the german site in the last links there posted! i'll let ye know how i get on with them