Originally Posted by
Jonathandavid
- Bar end shifters are cheap and reliable. If you read the threads in this forum, these qualities are important for many tourers.
- They allow for friction shifting of the front derailleur. This is important, especially with the big cassettes that so many people use. Touring bikes tend to get less well tuned during a tour and friction shifting allows you to remedy a chain rattling against the cage quickly. I consider this a huge blessing. Campagnolo brifters have something similar to friction shifting as I understand, so I expect they are more helpful than Shimano brifters. Repeating Sheldon Brown again: "Rear indexing good, front indexing bad".
All shifters are relatively cheap and rugged. Yes, STI levers are more expensive than barend shifters but they aren't any less durable. I've owned 31 personal bikes over the years and, between my wife and kids and myself, we've owned around 50 bikes. And I tinker all the time so I've owned many more shifters than bikes. Of all those bike and all those shifters...from friction to STI levers...I've had 2 shifters fail on me. And none of them were all that expensive, relatively speaking.
I currently on 7 bikes (4 mountain type and 3 road type) and all of them have indexed front shifting. It's not a problem to keep them shifting nor is it a problem to set up. The shifting actually works quite well, including the touring bike with 105 STI that I used to just finish a 4 week tour in the South. All you have to do is know how to adjust the cable to the proper tension which isn't all that hard to do.
Originally Posted by
Jonathandavid
- If you put your bike against a wall and it is very heavy, pressure against the brake lever might cause a shimano brifter to shift. This is less likely to happen with a bar end shifter (or campagnolo).
Nope. Never happened and likely can't happen. The amount of throw and pressure that is needed to make the large part of the lever shift is too great. The small inner tab might shift when bumped but the large outer part of the lever keeps that from happening. Barends, on the other hand, are quite easy to shift with a small bump.
Originally Posted by
Jonathandavid
- I find that being able to shift many gears is an advantage that pays off for tourers. If you're in the completely wrong gear at the foot of the climb, it is easier to correct this with bar end shifters.
My 105s will sweep three gears on a downshift. If you find that you are more than 3 gears too high at the bottom of a climb, you haven't been paying attention to the terrain. And that hardly matters because the rear gears will pop off with an STI under load.
Originally Posted by
Jonathandavid
On the other hand, a lot of the advantages of brifters are reduced when touring because you're leisurely riding a very heavy bike. Brifters are made for racing, to respond quickly and dextrously. If you find yourself having to shift five gears quickly, it's your racing that is the problem, not the equipment. Brifters look good on racing bikes, but touring bikes are rarely beautiful as a whole. You're much more likely to find yourself having to shift while keeping a tight turn during a race than during a loaded tour. Deep in a peloton, a slight wobble can send the whole bunch sprawling, making the ability to shift while keeping your hands on the handlebar much more useful.
Try sliding your hands back to grab a lower gear on the handlebars vs just pushing the lever at a more natural position on the hoods when climbing the steep hills of eastern Tennessee or southern West Virginia. A slight wobble on a loading touring bike on US 60 from Gauley Bridge to Charleston could be more disastrous as a wobble in a peloton. At least in the peloton, you'll just get clobbered by other cyclists. On US60 a slight wobble could put you under a truck!
Originally Posted by
Jonathandavid
But for all these reasons, I consider brifters to be an acquired taste rather than offering a real net advantage. They are certainly not useless and I can readily see why someone would prefer them; coolness factor plays perhaps a stronger role than some are willing to admit. And why not? Having a bike I love is of utmost importance to me, so I would certainly spend the money for brifters if I simply felt I wanted them. A tourer spends a lot of time on the bike; feeling good about that bike, for whatever reason, should be an important factor.
Bar ends are an equally acquired taste as well.