Teon

Just curious. Does anyone out there have experience with 9 speed stis on a vintage bike with a 7 speed freewheel? Is it even possible? I am thinking the gear shifts wouldn't be the same....or does it mainly come down to the rear derailleur? Or is it all just wishful thinking? Just curious as a bike builder buddy and I were thinking of seeing if it would work. Comments appreciated.

And yea, I know two of the sti speeds would be worthless. Still curious. Got a cheap, beat up pair of 9 speeders that we're thinking of trying for the heck of it.

(both of us going......"I wonder if we could get these to work with that setup?").......lol...am thinking that we would at least have to get a newer cassette type of setup with the older rd.....

shoota 

I don't think so. The gear pull ratios will likely be off from what the rd needs. But more experienced guys will chime in, I just wanted to be first
It might help if you post exactly which components are involved here.

ericbaker

Nope, won't work.

8sp sti will work with 7sp... Shimano at least... And not including dura ace 7400...

rruff

If you have 9spd Shimano shifters, then you can get close with a DA 7400 rear derailleur... that actually works for 8spd really well, but 7spd is a little wider. If you wanted to use a different Shimano rear derailleur, there might be a jtek that would do it.

https://www.ctc.org.uk/cyclists-libra...gears/shimergo

I like the new Campy shifters. You can get 10spd Veloces for ~$100 from the UK. If you pair that with a regular Shimano derailleur, it shifts 8spd great. C11 shifters and a Shimano derailleur shifts S9 perfectly.

Teon

Great info, thanks!

Teon

We would be using some older 9 speed 105 stis........friend has a 7 speed freewheel.....not sure on his rd....think it might be suntour vx stuff

shoota 

Oh yeah I forgot about that. Good info.

shoota 

Getting a new 9s cassette, RD, and chain shouldn't be too expensive.. that's a possibility.

Never mind that would mean a new wheel too.. may be cost prohibitive but would be a nice upgrade nontheless.

DiegoFrogs

You could always consider pairing these shifters with a 7 speed Shimano rear derailleur, which are available new for pretty cheap with lots of options.

shoota 

You win.

Teon

Thanks for all the replies....I have some newer vintage 105 rds that might work with it. Both of them are for 7-8 speeders......

rruff

I don't think the VX was made for indexing, but someone on the net said that it would... presumably with Suntour index shifters. I'm pretty certain that Suntour and Shimano shifters pulled different amounts of cable, so the CTC charts won't help you. Let us know what you find.

Teon

I think we'll try the newer older 105 rds that I have.....we were just discussing it....and I think it should work.....shouldn't the actual movement of the 105 rd on the cable pull be similar to what the sti wants? I would think we could at least fine tune it to work.....you only have to move it enough to where the chain catches the gear.....then the chain does the rest of the work.....yes? And a thicker 7/8 speed chain wouldn't need a whole lot of fine tuning as the tolerances aren't so precise as a 9 or 10 speed chain, I would think.....if that makes sense.

In any case, will let you know what we find out......will be a fun experiment!

And just an fyi.....both of my older 105 rds came off of bikes with indexed downtube shifters.......

Teon

"You could always consider pairing these shifters with a 7 speed Shimano rear derailleur, which are available new for pretty cheap with lots of options."

Great info....thx......those would probably work perfect. But we're trying to do a super cheap gerry rigged sort of setup......it certainly might not work.....but will be fun to try. (The beat up 9 speed sti pair that I got for under 60 bucks are still very functional, but very butt ugly cosmetically....wanted to see if they would work on my buddy's older commuter bike....

rruff

A 105 derailleur with 9spd shifters will move at 9spd gear spacing... 4.35mm. 7spd gears are 5.00mm apart. No way that is going to shift all the gears worth a damn. If you use a DA 7400 derailleur (the only Shimano derailleur designed for indexing that has a different ratio) you'll get 4.8mm per click and that would probably work ok.

Try the Suntour... it *might* move farther even than the DA 7400.

frantik

the table you posted says Campy 10 speed shifters match with shimano 9 speed (using the hubub method)..?

rruff

I used to do that, but hubbub is kind of a pain to set up. C11 shifters are perfect without modification, but cost more.

jhboyy7

if you can swing 90 bucks try this

https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B007Q4...A3DZMBT0IIAXRS

DiegoFrogs

Good idea!

Chrome Molly

When is shimano going to chrome those babies...?

Mike552

A Suntour RD won't work, I think.
But many, many Shimano RDs will work with a 9spd Shimano brifter. I think that even the 6spd "light action" RD works with it. It's all a question of the design of the parallelogram. Like others have said, the 8spd Dura Ace RD is in a class of its own but it's pretty much open season on any Shimano RD from the 6spd to 9spd era. If you get yourself an inexpensive Shimano RD and a "new" back wheel and 9 spd cassette you'd be all set... Probably come in under $50 for everything on Craigslist.

Trick fall

Can you recommend a source? I'd like to give this a try. Thanks.....

peazweag

Not going to happen after Teon decided to keep his STIs////so we won't know if it works......sorry:-(

zukahn1 

As for mixed shifting setups from experiance you can go up one frome the freewheel cassette. But what the OP wants isn't going to work 9speed indexed is only compatible with 9speed indexed.

shelbyfv

I can't figure out if OP has a 7 speed freewheel or a 7 speed freehub/cassette. If it is a freehub, then 8 cogs of a 9 speed cassette will fit on the 7 speed freehub, no new wheel needed. The 9 speed shifters will work fine, with one redundant click.