Originally Posted by juan162
I was interested in this myself, so I took my Raleigh Twenty to my LBS and tried my SRAM Dual Drive with 105 STI shifters...it worked perfectly after a little adjustment. On a negative note, I have read that the internal gears don't like friction shifters, so just make sure you can get bar cons with indexed 3 speed front shifters...if they exist. I've only been able to find friction style front shifters(of the bar con variety), but what do I know?
Another thing you might be interested in is that when I climb in my "small ring", I feel like I'm losing efficiency because of the internal gearing. It may actually be only a minimal mechanical loss, but I do feel it, and that is REALLY no fun when you are climbing. I just thought you might want to know, since you are planning on touring. I'm thinking of changing over to a double crank and losing the internal gears altogether.
juan162
Hey Juan,
That is good to know. As I wrote earlier, we are interested in the Swift folder which doesn't handle a front derailer well. So a "granny" gear would be helpful for sore knees; even with the efficiency loss.
Peter Reich also stated that the Swift folder really isn't designed for a front derailer. So you can see why we are so interested in the Dual Drive.
So when you installed it on your Raleigh Twenty--I assume that you changed the rear derailer as well--what is the adjustment needed for the internal hub. I am fairly clueless to how the shifter interfaces with the hub. From what documentation I can find, it would appear that you ran the cable from the left 105 shifter to the click box. I assume that the slight adjustment was to simply tighten/loosen the cable until you could switch into all three internal gears.
If memory serves me right, I thought that the space between the rear stays on a Raleight Twenty was too narrow for modern hubs. Did you have a LBS bend them open?
That must be a neat bike ... although a bit heavy.
-Geof