Gadgets4grls

This post is just because it’s fun to share and it might help someone else out. I got the seed of my idea off of here so I thought I’d give back what grew out of it.

So I’ve been at odds with my handlebars for a while now, but I think I finally have them where I want.
The “ISSUES”. I prefer road to mountain bars, wrist turn and shoulder position. I love “hoods” but hate “drops”, no matter how high I put them. I like aerobars but the angle between elbow and wrists on the extension has been wrong.

Like so many, my problems have been wrist pain, carpal tunnel, and numb hands. I know nothing really new.
First solution, I’ve did the professional bike fitting with angle gauges on legs and arms and everything was correct. I went through multiple stems swaps trying to get into a position that is comfortable and while it got better I would still get numb hands after an hour or so.

I’ve looked at most of the “Alt” bars but nothing I could find was a combination that I wanted. I wanted “hoods”, “Aero” and “comfort” but while I could get a compromise with something like a VO “Crazy” or a Jones “Loop” each one would be a sacrifice of one of the positions I wanted.


Here’s where the fun starts, when you start thinking outside the box.

First solution running dual stems. I’ve seen post where member have added a second stem for accessories but not for an actual second handlebar. I end up putting a second full handlebar on my stem below the road/aero bar combo. This was a VO “Tourist” bar. This gives me a full upright position. I still have my Salsa Cowbell for my “hoods”. Finally I ended up switching out the extension on my aerobars to Profile Design “Jammers GT” which I modified. I have the positions I want, but now I have to get them to play nice with each other. I can't use the drops but I never did anyway.

The Profile Design “Jammer GT” extension don’t have the slots cut in them to run TT brakes. That’s the reason I went with the T1+ but the angle on those is aggressive and caused me wrist pain. It was bad enough that I stopped using them because the wrist pain was worse than the numb hands. I found a pair of Jammer’s on sale cheap so I went ahead and picked them up. If I screwed them up I wasn’t out much. I figured out the position I wanted and then cut a slot so I could run my brake cable from my TT shifters.

I’m running Shimano Di2 electronic shifters so checking “The Chart” it says I can run six controls from the “Shifter” group so that’s what I’m doing. I’m pretty sure that this isn’t what Shimano had in mind but it works great! I have standard road “STI”, aerobar TT, and mountain trigger shifters.

So I can shift from any of three positions. Now onto braking, which I think is even more important than shifting.
I’d already been running one set of Jtek control doublers, for road/aerobar brakes, so I got another set to add in the mountain bar brake levers. I ran into a problem here. The brakes I’m using, TRP Hy/Rds have always been a little weak on the piston release/reset. It wasn’t a huge problem with just one brake lever. It showed up a little with the control doubler inline. When I added a second doubler it didn’t have enough “return” force to completely release at least on the rear. The front didn’t have this problem because of the shorter housing run. While I could manually force a reset, in my case using my STI shifters because they were primary, I didn’t want to have to do this every time. The solution was to add a “helper” spring at the caliper itself. With this spring in place now my brakes work perfectly in any of the three places.

So I guess part of this post is bragging because I got it working. The other part is that if you really want, or need something different; don’t let others tell you it won’t work just because it hadn't been done before.

Please try and keep the laughs to a minimum.

Gadgets

Without further ado I present you with “Squid Bar”

mstateglfr 

Wow, that is the busiest cockpit Ive ever seen. But its darn impressive that you have engineered a setup which works.

Gadgets4grls

Thanks

It's priceless the expression people get when they see it.
The only thing better is after I answer the number one question "What doesn't your bike have." "A MOTOR!"

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veganbikes

Don't get me wrong I love multiple hand positions and lots of mounting space but this is crazy. Though I am glad it works for you. I am certainly interested in all the gadgets you are running and how you got everything to work and all of the crazy cable routing.

BigAura

No dis but that is:

manapua_man

Honestly, if it wasn't for the fact that I have to bag and take my bikes on trains a lot, I'd run something similar.

I'd probably have a small radio running for weather broadcasts, my mobile hotspot, phablet, a couple lights, and other random junk up front.

Gadgets4grls

Hi veganbikes,

I love my "gadgets".

I was just typing "It's really not that complicated" and than had to stop until I could get my laughter under control. Yes I'll admit it's complicated when taken as a whole but when I was putting it together it was small steps so as to not feel overwhelming.

The Shimano Di2, shifting cabling was actually the easiest part, it was pretty much plug and play.

So the hard part was getting the rear brake working right. I'd already had the front working just fine, only took me about 30 minutes with cutting the housing and tuning all three levers. The rear wouldn't release and of course this is 8:00 pm and Ace hardware was already closed. This really sucked because I'd already figure out the fix but the store was closed. All I needed was a "Spring". The torture of it all. I actually ended up adding springs to both front and rear so the levers have the same "feel."

The electrical center, ie white box in the middle, is what I most proud of actually. Compared to the Di2 and multiple brake levers that is the complex part.

Going to geek out for a minute here.
Other than the control head, ie white box with switches, everything else is mounted in the front trunk and frame bag. This has a LiFePo4 battery which charges/runs everything else on the bike. I have hookups to charge either via a solar panel, located on my Bob trailer, or via a single AC connection. Right now it simple switch/relay with an lcd to monitor voltage/current load but I plan on replacing that with an Arduino, microcontroller board in the near future if I can ever make the time. So from my perspective that's when it going to get "Complicated"

Thanks for the replay and glad you enjoyed a look into my insanity.

Gadgets

Gadgets4grls

I love it!!!!
You've summed up my brain in a single picture.

Gadgets

Gadgets4grls

Actually I do you just can't see it in these pictures.
I have an 18 watt led light attached to the front rack under the rack bag. A 6 watt flashing tail light. For the radio I have a Yaesu VX-8DR, Ham Radio. Which does not only weather / FM receive but also acts as two way communication when you either don't need cell phone or have no cell phone reception, but you have to have the license to use it.

You're right commercial travel with my bike would take some reworking and would never be "FUN". It's not something that I'd want to have to do on a daily basis that's for sure!

If I were to ever consider this I'd definitely have a custom set of handlebars made combining the road/comfort into a single piece while losing the lower part of the drops. Who knows I might end up doing that anyways but this route was cheaper for testing purposes.

I'd also rework the brakes just a little. I envision I would have two brake cable splitters, like you see on SS coupler equipped bikes, with all of the brake doublers right at the handlebars for the front like I already do for the rear. The front is doubled once at the handlebars, road/TT, and than again at the caliper for the mountain. The rear is doubled twice right at the handlebars. I'd also lose the lower "fangs" out front. I could probably get total height down to something like 8-10 inches for just the bars.

So prep for travel would be. Split the brake cables, pull one Di2 cable and remove the stem, bars and all as one unit. I imagine the bars would end up being something like 24X10X20.

Rest of bike prep wouldn't be much different. Remove pedals,pull rear derailleur. I'm undecided about the rotors I could remove them pretty quickly but they are 6 bolt. If I were to do this as a travel bike I'd have done centerlock instead. So while it could be done, it wouldn't be simple or stress free unless I just wanted to "Crate" the bike and ship via commercial freight carrier. Which now that I think about it would probably be the better choice all around.

On the other hand she travels great on her own two wheels which is my preferred method of travel.
She'll even travels reasonable well via car racks just not as much fun.

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BobG

My next bicycle handlebar will look like this...

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped..._wheel-jpg.jpg

When was the last time you heard somebody complain about steering comfort on their Chevy?

revcp 

Wow. Just wow. There's a lot going on there. I'm not sure whether to commend your ingenuity or impugn your lack of any aesthetic sense.

veganbikes

I know it is basically plug and play but with everything going on it had to have been a bit harder getting cables to go just right. Maybe not I guess. Brakes are always hard to get just so when you are running multiple levers because. I had a tougher time because I decided compressionless housing was the way to go and while it does seem to be good it is a pain to work with.

I am interested to see where the project goes with even fancier gadgetry.

Miele Man

Shades of Saint Sheldon may he R.I.P.!

Can you actually use the hooks and drops on the dropbar?

Cheers

Gadgets4grls

Actually in my case it I'm pretty sure it would look more like this.




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Gadgets4grls

Why not both at the same time? That's why I named it "Squid Bar"

The head turns are priceless

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seeker333

As you might guess, it's not a new idea. Heinz Stucke used two flat bars on his touring bike 40 years ago:

https://www.heinzstucke.com/index.php...s&rIDF=6&cID=4

https://www.heinzstucke.com/index.php...&rIDF=9&cID=70

https://www.heinzstucke.com/index.php...IDF=31&cID=450

Gadgets4grls

I'm actually running Yokozuna compressionless on all the runs except one. The rear aerobar brake which I'm still planning on switching out. Love the stuff but cable cutters are worthless on it. I just used a dremel with a cutoff wheel.

The brakes actually weren't that hard once I went with the JTek control doublers. I originally tired the Problem Solvers and they suck!. Way too complicated to setup and even worse to adjust.

As for the Di2, since I'm used to electronics, computer and ham radios those were nothing at all. My only complaint is that Shimano actually has three E-tube ports on each of the Road STI shifters but one of them is dedicated to "Sprint Shifter" buttons so I ended up having to run double B junctions up front. It would have been easier if I could have just ran both the TT and mountain shifters into the Road and then to the A junction, in my case the display. It work out just fine just had to add one more B junction.

Gadgets

Here is a quick diagram on how the wires are connect.

Gadgets4grls

Actually no but I never rode the drops because I didn't like my hands away from the brakes and I'd rather ride aero than hook.

This came about because I wanted hoods, aerobar and comfort.
I considered trying some of the other alt bars but nothing I couldn't find any that gave me these three options. The closest I found was the Velo Orange "Crazy" bar but that really didn't give me the hood position. It was more of a comfort and a sorta TT outer bar and it would have been harder to mount the aerobars onto those.

The other problem that I never could find out whether Shimano would allow two of the exact same controls on a Di2 network. I already had the road STI shifter and didn't want to find out the hard way that I couldn't run two full sets of TT shifters. Since I don't know the details of their one wire network protocol I went the safer route of three different control type rather than duplicates and it works. Rather than deal with

Once I'm fully committed to this setup I'm consider having the comfort bar position welded onto the road bar and than chopping the road bar off at about the bottom of the arch.

My work does aluminum welding all the time so I pretty sure I could get it done without to much trouble. Just not going that route until I'm positive this is going to be the forever keeper.

Gadgets.

Gadgets4grls

I figured someone had to have done something similar just never seen my combination before.
I'm pretty sure I'm one of the first to have three full functional sets of shifting controls, or at least this combination of them.

I've seen double controls for mechanical derailleurs but they didn't work as well. You'd have to shift all the on one set to release all cable tension before the other control would fully work. The cool thing about the Di2 is I can just switch position and everything work just like it did from the last.

Gadgets

Miele Man

With all that stuff on how's the steering? How about if you need to swerve suddenly, does the weight make the bike wnt to keep going into the turn when you want to pull it back on line?

Cheers

Gadgets4grls

It depends on which position I'm in.
I would have to say that the comfort feels the least stable, not unsafe,I think the best description is twitchy. The thing is I'm also going the slowest in this position so not as much of an issue. I imagine this is because my own center of gravity is so far back and I'm not using my own weight to steer. I'm pulling more than pushing.

The hood are the most agile position and I've never felt like the bike was steering me rather than the other way around. This is my usual riding position around town. The thing is that comfortable on the hoods for me actually has a significant amount of weight on my palms, thus the numb hand issue.

In aero I feel like I'm locked to the road, between the weight of the bike and own weight push down on the front wheel. This is definitely the least agile position but I've never had an issue avoiding road obstacles, glass rocks or such. On the other hand a near 90 degree turn isn't going to happen from them. Everything has to be arcs.

On the other hand I almost always ride with this weight. Even just on my commute to work each day I leave all of the bags on and normally don't bother to take stuff out. I'm not carrying a heavy touring load but I would have to guess that on an average day I'm still toting at least 30# plus the bike itself. I figure that if I ride with it all the time it just feels normal.

The thing that I really like about it is that I'm not forced to chose one position over another for control. I can stop or shift just as well in any of them and so chose my position base upon comfort not whether I can grab the brakes or have to slog away in a gear rather than just going ahead and shifting. A couple of examples. I really like aerobars but before I had the brake lever up there I wouldn't dare use them in town for fear of a car pulling out or turning in front of me and me not being able to stop. The other thing for pretty much anyone that ridden aerobars you know that as soon as you drop down into them you invariably end up want to shift into a higher gear. Not an issue anymore.

A funny bit I had the comfort bar mounted with all the control on but didn't have the brakes hooked up yet. I was still waiting for the doublers to come in. So I'm riding along and needed to slow down. Instinctively I grabbed the brake lever and nothing happened. So it was a tenth of a second scramble to grab the road brake levers. I wasn't racing and was only doing maybe 8 mph so it wasn't really dangerous. It just proved to me that I REALLY like have control where my hands are rather than having to worry about moving my hands.

Gadget

Mr IGH

I wouldn't call it Squid, I'd call it Squidward:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Squidward_Tentacles

Cool set-up, esp the ham radio.

DropBarFan

Awesome setup, really does look like a squid. There's lots of stock handlebar types available but really the designs are fairly limited. Even pro racers experiment to find comfiest bars.

I recently passed by TechShop location: TechShop is the 1st International Open-Access Workshop -- TechShop DC-Arlington

They have equipment & teachers to help individuals actually make their cool gadget ideas. IIRC they have CAD/CAM, machine tools, probably 3D printers too. It's not free though.

You've probably read about Aussie road racer Adam Hansen who learned to make CF shoes after his favorite stock shoe was discontinued. Eventually his shoes got better than any stock shoe, he sold some for astronomical prices.

Gadgets4grls

But Squidward only has 6 arms, Squid Bar has eight. I suppose I could call it Octo bar but Squid Bar sounded better.

Do I by change hear the call of another Ham operator?

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Gadgets4grls

Wish I had a place like TechShop in my area but than it's probably a good thing I don't. I get into enough trouble without it. The mind boggles at what I would get myself into with.

Actually I hadn't heard of Hansen,but than I don't follow the racing circuit much. It is very cool though what he did. I just did a quick search.

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