Originally Posted by unaesthetic
Is there really that much of an advantage to running just two gears VS. having like a 7 gear cassette or something? obviously the weight would be about the same, but you'd have over 3x as many ratios... just seems like it's a recoil from having animosity against multi geared bikes after having changed to single speed..
One thing that running single speed, as well as internally geared hubs, has convinced me of is the superior strength of a non-dished wheel. Despite what a lot of shop mechanics will tell you about how "As long as the wheel is built CORRECTLY... yada, yada, yada...", symmetrically built wheels are simply stronger and more reliable - especially when built on a 135mm MTB hub. I weigh 220 something and run some pretty bad stretches of pavement, not to mention a bit of unpaved fire road, on my commute. I thought long and hard about doing a 1 x 7 or 8, but knew that the wheel simply wouldn't last as long. Besides, I had more of the components lying aroung for my current set-up.
DanO