Originally Posted by
shroni2807
Thanks for your answer.
you say that "The smaller the first number, the lower the gear ratio and the easier bit is to pedal up a hill", but as I know, the bigger the back wheel the easier bit is to pedal up a hill. you have 30 back wheel and 36 front wheel and you can climb a 13% grade but (for example) you can't climb 16% grade.
if you would have 34 back wheel and 36 front wheel, then you could have climb a 16% grade. and this ratio is bigger than 0.83, not smaller.
It's just the overall ratio of front/rear teeth that matters. The smaller this ratio, the easier it is to climb with.
So in your examples above. 36F/30R = 1.2 (not 0.83, which is actually the inverse). 36F/34R = 1.06 (which is less than 1.2 and therefore easier to climb)