Nothing wrong with an eight speed cassette in the back. When I built up my LHT in 2004 I noticed that often the difference between an 8 speed cassette and a 9 speed cassette was very minor. They often shared most of the same sprockets. For example, I use an SRAM 8 speed cassette, 11/12/14/16/18/21/26/32. The SRAM 9 speed cassette has a 24 and 28 sprockets instead of a 26, other 7 sprockets are shared. Thus, I would have gained little with a 9 speed.

I use a road triple with an aftermarket granny gear, 52/42/24. The 24t to 42t shift is not very smooth, but otherwise I am very happy with this gearing. I only make that 24t to 42t shift when I reach the top of a steep hill, as the 24t granny gear is only used on the steepest hills. So the 24t to 42t shift it is not a common shift. That type of gearing however requires a friction front shifter, indexed unlikely to work.

My combination of front and rear gearing gives me one and a half step gearing. Thus, a shift between the 42 and 52 is one and a half times as big as one gear change on the rear. This allows me to fine tune my shifting.

Unladen, I spend the vast majority of my time in the 60 to 90 gear inch range, loaded with touring gear I am in the 50 to 80 gear inch range almost all of the time. Thus, I wanted a lot of gears in those ranges. I was happy enough with the gearing on my LHT that when I built up another touring bike a year ago, I chose identical gearing. But, I have since bought a 46t chainring to replace the 52t, that will give me half step gearing but I have not gotten around to changing components yet.



When I posted this, the formatting was jumbled, I will continue in the next post.