Originally Posted by
T-Mar
I don't know when SunTour switched the operation of their front derailleurs, but I can guess why. Even though their approach made more technical sense, it wasn't the normal operation and it was confusing people. Shimano's Rapid Rise rear derailleurs also used the spring to facilitate shifts onto larger cogs and they didn't catch on either. IIRC correctly both the SunTour Spirt and SunTour Compe V were the reverse action front derailleurs, though I don't know if they have sufficient travel for a triple.
A top normal FD makes sense if you're running straight crossover gearing, where you never have to double shift. But if you're running gearing that does require double shifts--especially half-step gearing, where every other shift is a double shift--it makes no sense, because it's very inconvenient to have to move the levers in opposite directions when double shifting. With a low-normal FD, you move both levers in the same direction to double shift.