luxlumis

Long-time reader, first-time poster: I have found a lot of useful info in this forum over the past couple of years, thanks a lot. I now have a touring specific question that I couldn't answer myself, and would like to avoid the trial and error method this time, because it would be a bit more expensive, not to mention time-consuming.

I recently started getting into touring after commuting for years. I have a decent touring bike and I'm generally very happy with it. However, when my last tour led me through a very hilly area, I found that my lowest gear was not low enough. At least for a pretty steep climb that went on for around 10 km. I already have a Shimano Megarange 11-34 cassette ordered, which is just about within the capacity of my rear derrailleur. However, I'm worried that this won't be enough, especially since I'm planning to do extensive loaded touring through more mountainous terrain.

This is my current set-up:

Crankset: Sugino XD-600 triple 48/36/26 - 165mm cranks
Cassette: SRAM 8speed 11-32 (11-12-14-16-18-21-26-32)
[to be exchanged for a 11-34 (11-13-15-17-20-23-26-34) cassette]
Front Derrailleur: Shimano LX FD-M560
(26t capacity front)
Rear Derrailleur: Shimano XT SGS RD-M761
(11-34 capacity back, 22t capacity front, total capacity 45t)
The bike has 26" wheels.

Ideally, what I'd like to do is exchange 26 chainring for a 22, or at least a 24. The front derrailleur seems to have a 26teeth capacity, which would allow 48/26/22; but according to Shimano, the rear derailleur can only handle a front chainwheel tooth difference of 22.

So what would be the best solution; find a new rear derrailleur that can handle 11-34 and 48-22? Is there something like that anyway? Any rear derailleur I saw had a 22t capacity.

Or should I exchange the biggest chainring to be able to use a smaller granny ring - e.g. 46/26/24? I think I don't want to go down to 44; I have shortly used that in the past with a 700c commuter (with 170mm cranks) and thought it was too low on gentle descents.

With the current set-up, I have used the following gears most of the time:
* 36/14 - most of the time when fresh and the roads are not too bad and close to level
* 36/12 - some of the time when fresh and the roads are not too bad and close to level
* 36/18 - most of the time when tired and the roads are not too bad and close to level
* 48/12 - some of the time, but only when going downhill; liked this gear to make up time on long and gentle descents
* altering between 26/32 and 26/26 on climbs of varied difficulty.

I think I would like to keep the equivalent of the 48/12 gear, if possible - I could probably get over losing 48/11, although I have used it now and then.

Would there be potentially a problem with shifting when I exchange the chainrings on my Sugino to 46/26/24? I would love to get the smallest chainring down to 22, but I don't want to break anything - and I don't trust myself to never to use the big/big or small/small combination. It's easy to forget when you're tired after a long day of cycling.

Shimagnolo

Ultegra 9s triple shifters and FD.
XT crankset 22/32/48 (48 ring from "trekking" set)
XT 9s 11-34 cassette
XT RD

https://www.dim.com/~ryoder/SomaPhotos/IMGP0014.jpg

And yes, the chainwrap is beyond the specs for the RD but it works.

Yan 

Road triple cranks with 74BCD have a minimum inner ring size of 24T. You can get down to 22 by swapping for a mountain crank set. I'm uncertain whether you can effectively use your current short cage dérailleur by avoiding small-small cross chaining. Gear ratio overlap between inner and middle chainrings will be limited by rear dérailleur capacity; however no damage is possible, so I would swap out the cassette first and give it a try. If this is not enough, swap the crank set for a mountain model.

For the lowest gearing currently available, you can get up to 36 in the rear with a 11-36 10 speed cassette, but you would need a new LX or XT Shadow dérailleur and 10 speed shifter.

I have never used my 48-11 high gear while touring. When I'm riding downhill that fast on a loaded bike I'm usually unweighing the saddle for safety.

fietsbob

in order to have a wide range of gear ratios you will have a large differences in the size of the cogs, so you must have a
large difference the length of chain to be taken up, hence the need for a long cage rear derailleur..


the only exception Schlumpf Mountain Drive , because the low gear is a planetary reduction gear, not an actual 2nd chain ring..
But at 250% it's like you have a 50 and a 20 tooth crankset,
they are great when combined with another internal geared hub ..
the crankarms turn faster than the chainring.

or its alternative.. products from the same Swiss Machine shop.
overdrive for the planetary gears,[1.6x 0r 2.5x] and are fitted with the small physical chainrings for the lower gears. the chainring for higher gears, turns faster than the crankarms then.

the latter is recommended for Rohloff's hubs since they already are,10 out of 14 gears,
a multi stage reduction gear set.
there, it's a 7 speed IG hub, with a mountain drive low range shift
, inside the rear hub.

fietsbob

FWIW, my 26" wheel Rohloff bike with a 38/16 gear set, and my Brompton with a 3 speed hub, with a 15t cog ,
16-1 3/8" wheel,
and a 54t chain-ring , on the Mountain drive crank (equivalent to a 21.6t chainring in low),,
have the same low gear , equivalent to about a 17" wheel, if a unicycle..

djb

when I went to tour in the Pyrenees, I previously had a 50-40-28, 12or13-30 rear. Changed the 28 to a 24 (shifters on downtubes, frictionless front derailleur shifter) and the 24/30 combo ended up being fine for the weight I was carrying.

I cant comment on the limits on the front chainrings limits due to the derailleur (as I dont know this stuff) but what I would recommend or comment on is that when loaded, I very very rarely used the 50 tooth chainring except for finding inbetween gears more in the middle range.

Yes, there were downhill sections, but in the big scheme of things having higher gearing wasnt really a need for me. What was more useful was having more options of gear inches to find an "inbetween" gear with a headwind, or whatever.

as for the low gears, your present low 26/32 is about a 21 gear inch, which is pretty much the 24/30 on my old touring bike. You have already stated that you want lower gearing, and I realize that the weight of stuff on your bike is the real kicker here. I am slight (140 max) and I learned touring to be very minimalist, despite having a tent (heavy-7 lbs), campstove etc etc etc and for me the change from the 28 granny (was about a 24 or 25 gear inch combo) to the 24/30 combo was great. Didnt have to use the "new" gear often,but it was nice when it was needed--and essentially it was "one lower gear" than I had before.

a 24/34 is 18 gear inches, pretty darn low. I wish I had weighed the stuff I used to carry on my bike (2 rear bags, 2 small front ones, handlebar bad and tent) but I honestly dont know how much it was--perhaps 40lbs min I would say. I guess what I mean by this is to really look at what you can reduce in your packing. I learned my having too much what to reduce, and less weight would mean less low gearing to have to set up.

hope my touring experience vis a vis gearing is of help. I am not a strong rider, probably fairly average, so I think my gearing recommendations are alright. (I used the 24/30 in the Pyrenees, American west coast--I would say that San Fransisco steep hills were where I was very grateful for the low low)

balindamood

Couple of thoughts.

1). The derailuer capacity as you have calculated assumes that you will be running small ring to small cog and large ring to large cog (cross-chaining). I don't usually worry about the chain going slightly slack on small chian-ring cross-chaining becasue you ought not be doing that anyway. The opposite, large ring to large cog is also bad, but I make sure that it will at least get there so the rear derailuer does not break if I forget.

2). Front derailuer capacities, especially newer ones, are highly suspect. The newer ones have bent cages to work with specific sizes of chainrings in each location. These suck if you want to re-gear. The BEST front derailuer I have ever used is a cheap mid-70's Falcon. If you have a bike co-op near by, you can probably get 10 for $10. Regardless, you are going to have to try what ever you have before you know if it is going to work. Again, chain rubbing on the bottom of the cage in small ring to small cog cross chaining is not something I really care about.

3). As someone mentioned, you are limited to 24T on the front. Shimano now has a 12-36T 9-speed cluster, but you are in 8-speed land. You might be able to build your own if you are technically savvy enough, or switch to 9-speed (need new shifters). Some have noted trouble getting their Shimano derailluers to swallow the 36T cog. again, you will not know if you need to swap until you try it. Regardless, if you cannot push 24:34 up a hill, it would be faster walking.

4). I HATE Mega range, prefering a more consistant ratio between gears, but that is your call. I noted that you are spending alot of time at the bottom end of your cassette (the little cogs). I might suggest that you might go with a larger middle ring to keep your avaerage more towards the middle of the cassette. It will wear better and give you a bit more selection up or down as you dial in you cadence.

akohekohe

Another possibility is to add an SRAM Dual Drive to the rear wheel. This adds an internal three speed hub to the mix. Of course this adds quite a bit of expense since the hub isn't cheap and you've got to rebuild the rear wheel with a new set of spokes and then there is the issue of having another shifter to contend with. I did this to extend the gearing range of my Alex Moulton Double Pylon because that frame will not accomodate a triple or a Mountain Drive. I solved the shift lever problem by using a Shimano bar-end shifter combined with a travel agent to the internal hub (my other shifters are brifters). If you really want a wide range you can combine the dual drive with a mountain drive. I did this on a bike I built up from spare parts and it has a 12" low and a 169" high ...

For the OP, if he has the funds, I think the best bet is to go with the Mountain Drive - this will allow you to get the range and be able to keep the gaps between gears reasonable (of course you have a huge gap when you engage it, but we will ignore that).

andrewjl

on my 29er I use a xt crankset with 20t/32t/44t chainrings ( want to replace the 44t with a 42t)
the 20t is made by actiontec it took some filing on the crankarms to get the chain to sit right and I had to take some links out of the chain to keep the derailleur working right
the 20t-32t and 32t-20t shifts are a little rough but with barcons that wouldn't be an issue
shimano als0 has a 12-36 cassette and you can get aftermarket cogs that go on the back of your cassette in 36t,38t and 39t sizes
https://www.actiontec.us/ti&steel.htm

badamsjr

Short of completely changing to 9spd (to use 12-36 cassette), I think your best bet is the 11-34 cassette, with a 24t small ring in place of your 26t. The 24t ring to 34t cog will give you a low gear good for most hills. I was using this same combo on my touring bike with trailer, and hauling 50lbs of gear (33lbs bike-27lbs trailer, 170lbs-me). I switched cranks to be able to use a 22t small gear, but ONLY because I want to have the ability to haul more weight, if necessary. For racks/panniers and a normal load, the 24/24 combo should work very well. As far as the 'capacity' of the FD and RD, Shimano is VERY conservative with their numbers. I use a 24/34/52 crank with an 11-34 9spd-XTR RD and XT FD. No problems with their shifting.

LHT in Madison

Balindamood (above) had good comments, make sure you have enough chain so that if you cross chain, nothing binds or breaks. If your derailleur won't take up all of the slack when you are on the smallest chainring and smallest couple of rear sprockets, don't use those gears.

I also was searching for a lower gear but concluded that I could not pedal fast enough to keep upright if I was much lower than my gearing offered. Thus, I ended my search for a lower lowest gear.

Some people in the search for one lower gear end up with a lot of redundant gears or a combination of gears that is not very convenient. When you really need a lower gear, you certainly must have it. But when you will spend the vast majority of time in a different range of gears (for me that range is 60 to 90 gear inches) you want to make sure that you have a nice set of gears in that range too.

I use a 52/42/24 front and 11/32 Sram eight speed rear, I found that to work quite well and provides a reasonably lowest low gear. I do not use several gears to avoid premature wear on components, but I made sure that if I accidentally use those gears that nothing breaks. I described my gearing in detail in post number nine here:
https://www.bikeforums.net/showthread...rs-for-touring

sehsuan

i haven't done anything major yet, but i got myself a set of 44/33/24 Rotor Q-Rings that work with my XT M760 cranksets. as i use my mountain bike as a do-it-all, it made sense for me to put these rings on as well - but i don't like the price much

SBinNYC

26 teeth in the front and 32 on the rear - that comes out to 22 inches for 27/700c wheels. You'll have trouble gaining enough forward speed to balance the bike, if you go any lower. You may want to invest in more training before contemplating changing gears.

djb

all very good opinions from experienced tourers. Your present 26/32, soon to be 26/34 should be realistically low for loaded touring, as my and others can relate to vis a vis our experiences and bike set ups.

As I stated before, you may want to look at the weight you are carrying--perhaps look up previous thread discussions to see if you are more than other people. Remember, on my first fully loaded tour I had too much stuff and with really hard hills it was murder. I learned the hard way.

Ditto on the training side, if you can train on hills, it makes such a difference for prepping your legs and knees for a trip. Its always hard for anyone at any fitness level to be suddenly schlepping umpteem lbs on a touring bike, especially with hills, so make it easier on yhourself and go out of your way to do hills, it will pay off. Even a daily commute with some hills works great, doesnt have to be big hills either.

ps, ditto for never "cross-chaining", granny-smallest cog, or biggest chainring-biggest rear cog---it just aint good for chain, derailleurs, wear. This should be an instinct for all bikers.
I too avoid using the smallest rear cog nearly all the time (unless on a big downhill in top gear) just because I know it works the chain more etc.

Fizzaly

balindamood is right on the money with the falcon derailleur i just picked one up, from some advice i got from a buddy to deal with my problems ive been having i switched to a 50 39 24 in front but i run a top pull steel frame which makes it really hard to find a derailleur, i found an old falcon at a bike co-op for three bucks it works wonderfully, mind you i till need to shim it, it says 28.6 on it but i dont think its right. Its worth a try, also i packed about 55lbs on my rig and climbed the mountians here in idaho just fine with my 24/32 combo, i run 175 crank arms i dont know how much of diff that will make though

Shimagnolo

Oh?
My mtn bike has a bottom gear of 15 " and I have no trouble balancing.
(26x1.25" tires, 22T chainring, 36T cog.)

dscheidt

You might want to work on your bike handling skills, yourself, if you think it's impossible to ride at less than 5 mph uphill.

nun

+1 go to a 24t ring and the an 11 or 12-34 cassette you might also look at the 13-34 and 12-34 cassettes offered by Harris as you don't need really high gears.

However, you really have a range of gears that is good now. I feel that people worry too much about gearing on touring bikes because they are afraid of riding in the mountains with a lot of gear and they figure that lower gears are the answer. There's a limit to just how slow you can go and how fast you can spin on a bike. There's no shame to getting off the bike and pushing if things get tough. I'd also look at your gear list and reduce its weight and improve your fitness by getting a single speed bike and riding lots of hills. That way gearing will become less of a factor in your climbing

rodar y rodar

Confused yet? Switching from 26t to 24t little ring is cheap and simple. Pair that change with going to the 11-34 megarange and you might likely find that you`ve gotten low enough. I don`t care for those cassettes either because of the big jump on the last shift, but some folks don`t mind. A somewhat expensive alternative to Megarange would be the custom 8 speed 13-34 that Harris offers. Switching to a 22t mtb crankset would give even more granny and could probably be done for about $100 including derailler if you can`t get your current derailler to work with the new rings. If you want to see how much difference any or all of those changes makes (good idea), plug your numbers into an online gear calculator like this one:
https://www.sheldonbrown.com/gears/
One solution that hasn`t been mentioned yet is a Mountain Tamer setup which can give you ungodly low granny for a lot less money than geared BBs or DualDrive. Google them up if you`re interrested.
And for what it`s worth, I can manage about 3MPH on dirt roads, a little less on pavement if I don`t have to pay attention to keeping in a straight line. YMMV.

djb

I have plonked along at 7kph often enough, which is 4.5mph, entirely doable, and personally I will take pedalling over walking anytime, its easier I find, not banging shins etc.

luxlumis

Thanks for the suggestions. A couple of comments:

• I use straight bars, not drops.
• The bike is an 8speed.
• The derrailleur I currently use *is* a long cage derrailleur, not as some mentioned a short cage.
• I don't have a free choice of chainsets because I need 165mm cranks.
• My load on the climb was around 10-15kg (2 panniers, 20 l backpack). There are one or two items that I could have left at home, but that wouldn't have made a big difference. For my big tour, I'm going to need to take more - so reducing weight is not an option.
• I wasn't aware that I'm unfit. I have been cycling 60-80km per day through varied terrain with an average speed of 12-14 km/h, although rarely any steep climbs. On the tour in question, I climbed around 700m over ~15km with almost no level sections.

After reading all posts, I think I'm going to switch to a 24-36-46 chainset, in addition to the 11-34 cassette.

If 24-34 gear should prove still to high for my taste, I will give the Mountain Tamer a chance. Interesting concept. Just not sure how this is supposed to work with a non-friction shifter, though...

Leebo

The standard mountain bike gearing is 22-32-44 and a 11-34 or 12-32 out back. That's for 9sp, you should find 8 sp likewise. My low is 28-30 for 9sp on 26" wheels. Eastern MA hills not too long or steep. YRMV.

fietsbob

Avid used to make a triple adapter to bolt onto a 74 BCD crank, and then bolt a 56 or a 58 BCD (2 models uses suntour microdrive, chainring [TA for their Zephyr triple, also had a 56bcd 3rd ring] and shimano had a 58bcd.)

I have a Mountain tamer quad , with a 16t cog, and a 26t dished stainless 74mm bcd ring .
I'm not using it now, havent for a long time , it was a old experiment .. if it appeals to anyone .. PM
Trike tourists? 16/34=0.47:1

so much easier on 2 wheels to just get off and walk ..

rodar y rodar

Bummer about the crank lengths available for mtb at reasonable prices. Road selection isn`t that much better, though- I sure wish a variety of lengths were available outside of BMX, track, and unobtanium.

You don`t need to buy the whole chainset- just one ring.

I doubt you could make the Mountain Tamer work with indexed front shifting. There are friction options for flat bars if it comes to that, but hopefully you`ll have it licked with the chainring and cassette. Good luck.

djb

hi again, first of all, so you have a 20 litre backpack on? I havent ridden with a backpack or knapsack on for over 30 years, so I dont really remember how it was, but I do know I never liked it and when I got my first bike with a rack, I have never ever looked back. I realize that bigger rear panniers and/or front ones will not change the weight, but I would strongly recommend ditching the backpack. Sweaty, harder on your back, maybe even neck and shoulders. One would think that it is working against you. Your choice but I sure wouldnt go with it.

as for your fitness, doing that number of klicks per day must mean you are in pretty good shape leg wise and otherwise. In reading your oringinal post, it was hard to know what sort of shape you are in, hence the comments by myself and others. I dont mind climbing, perhaps cuz I am light, but again, its pretty much impossible to get an idea of how someone rides by a forum thread.

My touring average speed was pretty consistant over the years, somewhere around 16-17 kph ( a smidge better on good roads, only flat stuff, tailwinds etc) so not much different than you. Another factor or perhaps diff, I was on a 700 wheeled, 28 tires at 105psi all the time, which roll faster by nature than 26 wheels, even iwth slicks. I have commuted for years on a mtn bike with 80 psi slicks, and my touring bike is a number of kph faster with the same effort (and my lighter cyclocross is a bit faster still with 28 tires also, shifts faster, 9 speed vs 7 speed for my tourer, so closer ratios etc)

no matter what wheels and tires, max tire pressures really really makes a difference, especially with weight. Keep an eye on em!!

hope you take into consideration nixxing the backback. Is your bike able to take a front rack? Anyway, some more food for thought.

all the best