Originally Posted by centexwoody
A question about your barend shifters: you said in another post that ALL your bikes have barends (or so I seem to remember). Why do you use them? My MTB has the shifters on the flat bar & are pretty convenient to me. I've had my LBS talk up the new brake/shifter combos known as 'brifters'. I understand some of the reasoning behind barends from reading Cyclocross postings that (at least for cyclocross) barend shifters are much less vulnerable to destruction in crashes, that they are less expensive initially & to replace than brifters, etc.
But when I think about actually using them on my own bike, their positioning doesn't seem to be 'near' anything. Of course I've not ridden a bike with drops in decades and Uncle Duke has Nitto moustache bars. Do you shift with your pinkie or 4th fingers on both hands? Does this mean you sort of let go of the handlebars to shift or shift your hands almost off the ends to work them? I guess I'm asking about the actual ergonomic mechanics of the barends & how you work them and why you like them so much?
Sorry to ask such a newbie question but curiosity has the better of me on this and I AM getting close to ordering my new bike frame & putting a component list together...
Tom
I have bar end shifters on all my road bikes. My MTB currently has bar top thumb shifters. I definitely see the need to have the shifters right at your fingers on a MTB.
The perception of convenience in using bar end shifters on drop (or moustache) bars depends on what you are comparing it to. My '92 Bridgestone came new with bar ends and they were much more convenient than the down tube shifters I had been using before that. Being able to stay in contact with the bar while shifting was a big improvement over reaching all the way down to the down tube. I can see how someone who has never needed to move their hands at all to shift might see it differently. Friction (non-indexed) shifting is especially easy with bar ends. I just seem to have a lot better feel and control compared to down tube shifting. I slide my hand to the end of the bar. Moving the lever down (that's an upshift on the right/rear or a downshift on the left/front) can be done either with the heel of the hand or with the two smallest fingers or with the thumb and index fingers. I do whichever feels right at the time. Pulling the lever up I usually do with my first two fingers with my thumb resting on top of the bar just ahead of the shifter pod.
I'm not a big fan of the combination shift/brake levers. I find them too expensive, lacking in feedback and limited in application. There is no friction option on them. You have to have compatible drivetrain components to use them. With friction shifting, I can use whatever derailleurs andwhatever freewheels or cassettes I have and everything works together. On my Bridgestone, it means I can keep using my wonderful Phil Wood hubs with a 7 speed freewheel. I don't have to worry about getting the cable position just right for the shifting to work and I don't have to adjust the cables when they stretch. I also get to use a skill I developed as a kid. With quality components, frictiion shifting is easier than you might think if you have always used indexing or if your memories are of crappy cheap junk that never worked right.
Nothing wrong with the new stuff, but the good old stuff works great.