saddlesores

does it slice? does it dice?

BigAura

@XShifter First off good luck with your product.

For me personally that kinda tech is antithetical to what touring is about.

BUT F CURSE: If you could come with a self-driving touring-bike that would be a different story

edthesped

So do you not carry any electronics or modern conveniences with you while on tour? Or your argument could be extended to say that gears in general are antithetical to what touring is about.

Then again 20 years ago most couldn't see why anyone would want to purchase books online vs going to Borders... Or even worse be dumb enough to invest in such a company!

This is one of the few attempts that appear to be more of a solution to a problem than a solution looking for a problem as there aren't many other options to run mountain triples on drop bars. I'm not big on the idea of electronic shifting but if I put together a new bike and my choice is bar ends or electronic shifting to get the gear range I want I'll go electronic shifting every time.

fietsbob

On my bike tour I brought a radio, and earbuds to be quiet in my tent. and those computers that tell you miles
by counting wheel rotations.

alan s 

And will the village smithy be able to fix it?

spinnaker

Didn't Shimano roll down this road several years back and pretty much give up on the idea immediately? I want to know what this tiny startup thinks they are going to do any better.

XShifter

Comments 3 years from now: "Why do I need that new fangled 3D laser guided chain manipulator, when my XShifter has served me so well".

fietsbob

Paying the promotional fees to this forum, since you are selling these?

edthesped

In all fairness, I started the thread and have no association other than curiosity with XShifter. I did not expect him to join in the discussion but am glad he did.

DropBarFan

Yeah, why snort at folks trying to improve things? I like the reliability of my bar-end shifters but they're not ideal. When shifting one only has about 2 fingers + thumb grasping the handlebar which is not very secure. Cresting hills I find myself up-shifting earlier than optimal so I won't have shift later on a possibly bumpy stretch. Pros crash after hitting bumps--don't any bar-end tourists crash when shifting?

Bar-end shifting involves some upper-body/arm effort...not punishing but on a long difficult ride easier Xshifting could help reduce fatigue, also by encouraging optimal cadence. I've seen many pre-brifter pro road races, quite common to see riders muscling thru a short stretch vs reaching to down-tube shifters. Dutch pro Hennie Kuiper was a time-trial ace--his coach said much of his success was due to timely shifting.

ModeratedUser17082018

Yes I know about the "enter site without coupon" .

I think if you're trying to sell a product, your website should show the product first and fast. It appears that gathering sign-ups is more important than putting the product first.

Ad-blockers were invented for good reason. Please just show the product and if I'm truly interested in signing up I'll do it.

BigAura

Well in my vision I'll be sitting in the backseat of my solar-powered-robot-driven-rickshaw. I'll just tell the robot to follow trans-am bicycle route while I watch a curated list of movies and maybe tweet-out here and there how I'm riding my bicycle across the continent.



The robot will be a scaled-up version of this:

Of course it'll have AI and no need of a human operator.

DropBarFan

I'm gonna grab the rental concession for Yellowstone! Heh, some of the local riders could use some AI to prevent rude behavior--like the Clyde geezer who insisted on passing me (on 2-lane road) at exactly the same time a car was passing us, I had to veer over onto the gravelly shoulder.

3speed

Agreed. Any time I go to a site and am stopped by a big ad popping up in front of the page, I immediately close the page and move on. It's annoying, and if you're more concerned about ads or subscriptions or whatever than the product, etc, then I'll find somewhere less annoying to buy/read what I'm looking for.

saddlesores

yeah, sorta like that new banner/popup/whateveryoucallit "ask a question"
on bike forums?

gotta log in or it shows on every thread you open. how annoying.
but then when you ask a question like "how do i get rid of this?",
you gotta log in or register to submit the question. screw that!

if the next mozilla or adaware software update doesn't clear this up,
time to move on to another bicycle forum.

DropBarFan

Takes 5 seconds or less to click thru the pop-up plus signing up for email list gives 25% discount, not so bad IMO. Quite logical that a small company developing a new product would want to keep in touch with potential customers who might forget about the product otherwise.

3speed

I'm not aware of the new popup since my laptop just logs me in automatically, but yeah, if a big thing pops up on the page that you have to close every time before you use the site, I wouldn't have ever started using bike forums. I would have indeed found a less annoying bike forum. I'm a member of a couple. There are lots of other forums out there...