Originally Posted by
ElTejon
Yeah, MTB drivetrains seem like a good way to go. You would not have brifters, though, right? Mountain levers and trigger shifters of some kind? And so upright bars instead of drops right? I was thinking maybe Jones H bars ...
If you want to use drops and brifters with MTB gearing, you can use 10-speed Shimano brifters with a 9-speed MTB RD; they'll work perfectly together to index 10 gears across a wide-range cassette.
You have to use a road FD, though, MTB FDs have different cable pull than brifters. Using a road FD works with a 46-48t or larger big ring, but not much smaller.
10 and 11 speed MTB and 11 speed road aren't cross-compatible; just 7-10 speed road and 7-9 speed MTB.
I currently have a 3 x 10 setup on my Rivendell, shifting an 11-34 cassette with a RD-M772. Huge gearing range.
If you want to use flat/MTB/trekking bars, I highly recommend the Jones Loop bars. Some folks really like the butterfly/trekking bars, but I've never tried them.