Originally Posted by Jose Cuervo
a couple more questions -
how do you figure out gear inches? and when the gear inches get higher, is it easier or harder to pedal?
thanks again for any help.
The quick math to compute
gear inches is: front chainring over rear cog times 27. It's based on the size of your wheel if you were riding an old time highwheeler.
If you're riding a 42 front and a 16 rear on a nominally 700c rear wheel, you'd have (42/16)*27=70.875.
A higher number will be harder to push; a lower number, easier.