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Originally Posted by Brian Ratliff
(Post 6322821)
I hear this argument all the time. That since x was different, went against the grain, and succeeded, then y will do the same thing. But let's look at some of the technology changes and how they affect bicycling.
1) Multiple gears: Shown to allow more gear options than the old wing-screw-and-turn-the-wheel-around method. Racers got beat by a girl because they were stubborn. 'nuff said. 2) Campy style rear derailleur vs. planetary gear internal hub: Allows more than three gearing options. Racers got beat by people who had better than 50%/100%/150% gear ratios. 3) Indexed shifting: Allows faster shifting. Gears don't slip. More riders got into cycling because of this little invention. Racers followed suit when those newbies became racers themselves. 4) Brifters: Allows still faster shifting from the hoods or drops. Can now shift while standing. Racers who had Shimano brifters had the edge over the Campy downtube racers. 'nuff said. 5) 6-7-8-9-10 speed rear cogsets: Each increment allows tighter gear clusters. Won't see 11 speeds, because we already have a 12-25 cogset with a corncob up to 17 teeth and a 12-23 cogset with a corncob up to 19 teeth. No racer needs more than a 25 tooth cog, most not more than 23, and until we change pitch spacing to something less than 1/2 inch, there is no need for 11 speeds. Just adds weight and gives up reliability. Telling is that there is still no 10 speed mountainbike groupset - not durable enough. 6) Electronic shifting???: Benefits are: a) Nominally faster shifting merely from being able to time the shift so the chain passes through the optimal path from one cog to the other. Shifting under load is optimized. This is the biggest advantage. But is it worth it? b) Position sensing to eliminate chain rub. Irrelevent to a racer. You cannot even hear or feel chainrub in the peloton anyway. Dis-benefits: a) Heavier by definition as you are adding parts and not taking anything away. b) More complex with the electronics. More things to go wrong with a computer involved. c) Needs a battery. Doesn't matter the capacity, if it goes flat, you are toast, and there is no good way to charge it inside a couple hours. So, where's the market? The inventions 1-5 are all revolutionary changes in cycling technology. They all offer tangible and large advantages over the then-current state of the art. Electronic shifting is different. There is no revolutionary change - all it does is make something which is already good, a little better, but at a significant cost. There is no tangible and large advantage, and there is a host of disadvantages. The successful inventions were the ones where the only disadvantage is in price. List a performance disadvantage of something like brifters. People who make the quoted argument focus on the business successes and say that the new invention will succeed because the successes succeeded. But what about those "revolutionary" inventions that didn't succeed? Remember the automatic shifting bike? Or Mavic's ill-fated attempt of it's own at an electronic groupset? How about belt and gear driven transmissions? All the internal geared racing bikes (now making a comeback, but not as racing drivetrains)? Look at the successes and why they succeeded, and look at the failures and why they failed, and I think you'll find that electronic shifting falls in the latter category. ... Of course, in a few month's time, I might be eating these words :D. Both you and the original poster make the claim over and over that e-shifting is faster, but have no explanation for it. I ask again, on what do you base your claim that e-shifting is faster? |
Originally Posted by Brian Ratliff
(Post 6322821)
Dis-benefits:
a) Heavier by definition as you are adding parts and not taking anything away.
Originally Posted by Brian Ratliff
(Post 6322821)
b) More complex with the electronics. More things to go wrong with a computer involved.
Originally Posted by Brian Ratliff
(Post 6322821)
c) Needs a battery. Doesn't matter the capacity, if it goes flat, you are toast, and there is no good way to charge it inside a couple hours.
But with a cartridge system, you could replace it in a race just as easily as you would a water bottle. If they're made small and light enough, a spare could be carried in a back pocket, much like a spare tube is usually carried by most riders today. I don't see that as being essentially different. And unlike a flat tyre, a flat battery will only prevent shifting during the battery replacement, and I can't imagine it taking more than maybe 3-5 seconds for an experienced user. |
I'm glad to see that people still remember the Mavic ZAP system. I set a few up when they were available, and they were really neat $#!+, when they worked.
The batteries/electronics were the weak link. Sometimes they'd go months, sometimes they'd die overnight. Really too bad they couldn't set it up better to protect battery life back then. A poster above mentions servos to make the chain move--the ZAP was more subtle than that. It used a bi-directional screw rotated by the upper pulley, which, when a change was desired, got poked in the right spot to engage the screw to move it to a larger or smaller cog. The effort of derailling actually went to the legs of the rider, not the battery or the hands. ZAP weighed about the same as downtube shifters and less than brifters. Similarly, the Browning mountain bike crank did not force the chain over but instead presented a different quadrant of the chainring to achieve its end. If you step back a bit from the established practice and look at what you really need to achieve, you can do some really neat stuff with minimal energy draw. I'm not a tech geek--of the list of 5 great advances (amended to 6 to include clipless) I'm only using #1 and #2, and I'm only halfway along on #5 on my bikes, but I wouldn't mind seeing a real paradigm change in my lifetime. |
Originally Posted by ScrubJ
(Post 6293944)
....I could write a book on all of this but, why not just go out and buy a motorcycle. You can have all the electronics your heart desires and not have to pedal too boot.
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Originally Posted by San Rensho
(Post 6323197)
Source? Both e-shifting and index shifting are still derailleur systems. The limiting factor on the speed of a shift is how much torque is being applied to the chain and the speed of the chain (cadence). How is a servo pushing on a chain going to be any faster than a spring (or finger pressure) pushing on a chain.
Both you and the original poster make the claim over and over that e-shifting is faster, but have no explanation for it. I ask again, on what do you base your claim that e-shifting is faster? Notice on your cassette that there are one or more "ramps" in the cog that assists shifting. The new SRAM road cassette is actually missing teeth in these ramps. When you shift, your chain doesn't move from cog to cog really fast until it hits one of these ramps, so some shifts are faster than others, depending on where the cog is in it's rotation when you hit the shift lever. If you initiate the shift just after the ramp has passed, the cog has to turn a part of a revolution before it will shift, and until this point, the chain will rattle as it tries to move from one cog to the next without the ramp assistance. Hence, the shift will be slower. On an electronic shifting group with a sensor, the computer can wait a split second until it "sees" this ramp coming up on the cogset, and ever shift will be as fast as possible every time. Also, the servo on the derailleur will make it move a consistent speed as it transitions from one cog to another. Currently, especially on downshifts, the speed the derailleur moves is dictated by the the speed the user moves the shift lever. By having a consistent speed of movement, the ramps on the cogset will be more effective at moving the chain from one cog to the other without disengaging from either until the shift is over. The servo can also change the speed the derailleur moves in accordance to the diameter cogs it is trying to wrap and the chain speed, and the speed profile doesn't have to be constant either. It might have a non-linear speed profile where starts the shift movement slowly to let the chain find the ramp and then accelerate to get the chain the transition quickly. Basically, the increase in the speed of shifting is only in making the ideal shift consistently. Modern mechanical shifters come close, but they are not there yet and can probably not get there in practice - too many variables. Some of the measures that the manufacturers make to make adjustments easier work to hinder shifting performance. Things like floating derailleur pulleys. Makes it so you don't have to adjust the derailleur so finely, but also gives up some shifting performance. With sensors to measure derailleur position in real time, you can make these pulleys more rigid and thus increase shifting performance. In the paper world, you are right, shifting is limited in speed to a chain wrapping around a cog. Electronic shifting will get you closer to this ideal speed limit. |
Originally Posted by CdCf
(Post 6323333)
But you ARE taking things away, and I've explained and quantified what earlier in this thread. Going electric would start off REMOVING almost a pound from a mid/high-range group! After that, you add back battery and actuators. The weight gain, if any, will not be the total of the new things.
Originally Posted by CdCf
It's pretty simple stuff, and I've never had a problem with any of my bike computers, or my mobile phones, or my calculators, or my radio scanner, or my HRM, or my digital cameras, or my portable radios...
Originally Posted by CdCf
Not that it would go flat quickly, but if it does, and you've forgot to charge it/swap it out, then that's obviously a problem.
But with a cartridge system, you could replace it in a race just as easily as you would a water bottle. If they're made small and light enough, a spare could be carried in a back pocket, much like a spare tube is usually carried by most riders today. I don't see that as being essentially different. And unlike a flat tyre, a flat battery will only prevent shifting during the battery replacement, and I can't imagine it taking more than maybe 3-5 seconds for an experienced user. I'll maintain that if Campy or Shimano saw a market for this, they'd have already pounced by now. Both have production ready prototypes on bikes in the pro peloton and both have been working on this for years, but neither have gone to market. That should tell you something. The marketing arm of both companies is at least as strong as their respective engineering arms. |
Originally Posted by redneckwes
(Post 6297065)
LMAO, computer shifting?? No thanks.
Just wait till Shimano decides to use a non standard battery that costs $300 and will be unobtainium in five years. Then run the whole thing under windows. Call me a Luddite, but my 23lb 6-speed, steel friction bike works flawlessly, every time, and I can repair every part blindfolded. |
Originally Posted by GlassWolf
(Post 6298621)
the only people who prefer automatic shifting in cars are soccer moms and drag racers. most avid drivers and entheusiasts still prefer a clutch and a gear shift.
Bikes aren't too different. and, I was aware of BMW motorcycles. That was my point. But back to bikes, I'm up for e-shifting. Should have the option of standard shifters and e-shifters. Agree with many of the advantages as listed by OP. |
I just read this thread and it surprised me that no one has touched on something yet: that is, that shifting varies according to terrain, conditions, physical state, purpose of ride, and the like.
Let me cite a couple of examples: You are on a tour, and you bike a lot before lunch, and start to bonk a little so decide to take a couple hours off. You stop at a diner, refuel, take a nap in the grass, and awake refreshed. Certainly, your shifting patterns will change when you get back on the road - especially if the sun is setting and you have to set up camp. Or take my commute. I work all over New York City. Sometimes I am able to take a greenway, sometimes I can ride up avenues, sometimes I have to bike through industrial areas with a lot of trucks on the road. I often bike to work in full daylight and bike home in the dark. All of my gears get a workout to compensate for this variety of experiences. Shifting patterns change if you hit a spot of rough terrain - if you are riding intervals - if you are on a recovery ride - if you hit a headwind - for a million different reasons. It's not that I think it's impossible for a computer to handle these varieties of experience, though, I wonder how it would. I just don't think I would want it. If I had it, even if it were reliable, I would probably keep it off most of the time and revert to a manual system. I don't want to futz with a piece of electronic gadgetry to let it know that I'm biking home in the dark and want my gearing higher then on my morning commute. Driving a car is different. It's not as physical. One of the things I love about bike riding is that it incorporates a variety of physical and mental capabilities to get you somewhere. I just can't see a computer being as good as my brain at telling my body how hard to pedal - or how hard I want to pedal. So - someone please tell me how electronic shifting will make cycling better? |
Why does almost everyone jump into this thread and completely misunderstand what I've written? splytz1, the basic setup of an electric shifting system would be functionally identical to a regular shifting system. Why do you go into shifting patterns and all that, like this was a discussion about some form of automatic gearbox for bicycles??? Think of it more, to stick with the car comparisons, as power steering, only for the shifter instead of the steering wheel. Instead of moving a lever, you just press a button. That's it - that's the entire difference in operating it!
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Yea... not talking about automatic shifting. Talking about electronically actuated shifting; still manually controlled.
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Originally Posted by n4zou
(Post 6320981)
I only use the dynamo on my touring bike. I'm a hardcore bike tourer, not a credit card and SAG poser. I don't use hotels, motels or "Sheldon forbid" a Bed and Breakfast where I would recharge batteries by plugging them in the wall. The electronic shift system will do fine for a week so the road bike just gets 4 disposable AAA batteries a week for the stepper motors and a 9 volt battery for the microprocessor every 6 months or so. I use my Smart phone as the display and controller for the bikes electronics so it needs to be recharged every couple of days. I just plug it into the USB port and after riding about 3 hours it's batteries are fully charged. There are still manual shifters on the bike clutched with the stepper motors so if it does quit or you allow the batteries die you can still shift gears exactly the same as down tube friction shifters would be done. As for drag from the dynamo, it's minimal and with quality hub dynamos you can forget to turn the light off and never know it as the drag is so low. Even modern bottle type dynamos have much less drag than the old vintage dynamos. A dry chain has more drag than a bottle dynamo being driven from the tires sidewall. Knobby tires on pavement produce even more drag for the rider than a dynamo.
Aren't variable speed hubs coming out soon? The owner of the LBS was telling me about them last night? |
Originally Posted by CdCf
(Post 6325113)
Instead of moving a lever, you just press a button. That's it - that's the entire difference in operating it!
So, what's the advantage of pressing a button vs. moving a lever (ducks for cover)? |
Originally Posted by Brian Ratliff
(Post 6323615)
Myself and my observations.
Notice on your cassette that there are one or more "ramps" in the cog that assists shifting. The new SRAM road cassette is actually missing teeth in these ramps. When you shift, your chain doesn't move from cog to cog really fast until it hits one of these ramps, so some shifts are faster than others, depending on where the cog is in it's rotation when you hit the shift lever. If you initiate the shift just after the ramp has passed, the cog has to turn a part of a revolution before it will shift, and until this point, the chain will rattle as it tries to move from one cog to the next without the ramp assistance. Hence, the shift will be slower. On an electronic shifting group with a sensor, the computer can wait a split second until it "sees" this ramp coming up on the cogset, and ever shift will be as fast as possible every time. Also, the servo on the derailleur will make it move a consistent speed as it transitions from one cog to another. Currently, especially on downshifts, the speed the derailleur moves is dictated by the the speed the user moves the shift lever. By having a consistent speed of movement, the ramps on the cogset will be more effective at moving the chain from one cog to the other without disengaging from either until the shift is over. The servo can also change the speed the derailleur moves in accordance to the diameter cogs it is trying to wrap and the chain speed, and the speed profile doesn't have to be constant either. It might have a non-linear speed profile where starts the shift movement slowly to let the chain find the ramp and then accelerate to get the chain the transition quickly. Basically, the increase in the speed of shifting is only in making the ideal shift consistently. Modern mechanical shifters come close, but they are not there yet and can probably not get there in practice - too many variables. Some of the measures that the manufacturers make to make adjustments easier work to hinder shifting performance. Things like floating derailleur pulleys. Makes it so you don't have to adjust the derailleur so finely, but also gives up some shifting performance. With sensors to measure derailleur position in real time, you can make these pulleys more rigid and thus increase shifting performance. In the paper world, you are right, shifting is limited in speed to a chain wrapping around a cog. Electronic shifting will get you closer to this ideal speed limit. My lowly 9spd 105 makes absolutely perfect, no hesitation upshifts and downshifts at cadences of 100+. At a cadence of around <70, I start to notice some hesitation on out of the saddle shifts in the bigger cogs, but thats because of chain speed which e-shifting cannot cure. |
Look, arguing that this is a stupid thing that will never happen is ignorant of its existence. The Trek Lime uses electronic shifting based on cadence already. It's not as sophisticated as the OP is talking about, but it works well for tooling around type riding. Instead of a derailleur, it's a Shimano Nexus 3-speed hub. Those come up to 8 speeds, I believe. I think you can sort of set a "Performance/Economy" position for the shifter to determine when it shifts. If there are criteria other than cadence (incline, for instance) are taken into account, you're on your way. It's powered by a dyno hub on the front.
We just have to see over time how well Limes last. My understanding is that they're geared for beach communitites and other flat, low-speed environments, and they apparently sell well where there's biking infrastructure and people are willing to spend $500 on a bike. If there's one segment of the population using it, the rest of the population can observe how it works and its ups and downs. Bit by bit, it will become more refined and then more and different people will use it, assuming that the refinement is in directions that those customers care about. |
Originally Posted by mp123
(Post 6321602)
Ahh yes! And this reprograming can be accomplished by buying a $129 proprietary SIM chip to tell the system what to do. I think you're on to something :)
http://www.parallax.com/tabid/441/Default.aspx http://www.parallax.com/Portals/0//I...me/H3_BSSK.jpg |
Originally Posted by Bikedued
(Post 6325272)
Wow, all that huh? And to think I just reach down and click a lever?:eek:,,,,BD
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Originally Posted by n4zou
(Post 6331139)
You also never need to look at the cog or crank to see what cog or chain ring your using.
It was noted here that the UCI minimum weight requirement for pro bikes used in international competition has had an unintended consequence. It was supposed to simplify and make pro bikes cheaper. It has done exactly the opposite. Since getting the actual bike below the minimum weight it is easy, it leaves room for far more sophisticated (and expensive) controls and power meters. |
Originally Posted by HillRider
(Post 6331327)
The prototype Shimano electronic group has an LCD display on each "brifter" lever indicating which cog/chainring the rider is in. So, you really wouldn't have to look back or down to see where you are. IIRC, Shimano had a simple OGD, a plastic in-line indicator that does the same thing with much less complexity.
PS: I am also looking forward to electronic shifting. |
Originally Posted by aesmith
(Post 6312533)
If this comes, I expect that it will follow the previous technical changes and tie you in even tighter into one manufacturer. Think how previous changes have increased tie-in
- Indexed gears - Derrailleurs/Shifters/Freewheel all need to be from same source - Freehubs - Now the hub needs to join that set - STI/Ergo shifters - now you have to go with their brake lever as well What will electronic shifting tie in? Well how about powering off an undocumented proprietary supply driven from the front hub. Now the front hub needs to be part of the "group". While we're at it, this front hub will have a different OLN spacing, and some odd spoking options to limit the choice of rims. Same with the special rear hub you'll need for the special electronic-compatible cassettes (nobody thought you be able to use existing, I hope). How about only offering the shift buttons built-into special handlebars, which then don't fit conventional stems? Most of the "integration" of bicycle systems function as standards for design, not proprietary systems. There are tons of parts compatible with Shimano drivetrains. You can run a drivetrain on Shimano standards, yet use exactly zero Shimano parts if you wish. Yes, this is because they dominate the industry, but the result has been MORE choices for cyclists, not less. Back in the day, there were multiple derailer standards competing for dominance - Campagnolo, Simplex, Huret. Campy won out. The result? Literally every single new derailer in the world can be hung on any new frame. This was not the case thirty years ago! Because of the widespread adoption of industry standards, either official or de facto, there is now an enormous proliferation of parts available that are compatible with practically any bicycle or component line that you can think of. I'm not saying that this doesn't ever go in a bad direction - just witness proprietary standards that mate frames only to the matching fork, or tapered steer tubes, or any number of proprietary standards or integrated parts that are adopted by relatively small players like single bicycle companies. What I am saying is that this trend has done more good for us than bad. My point is that it would be silly to say that e-shifting is bad because of greater system integration. As has been suggested, all it takes is a programmer, an engineer and an entrepreneur to start coming up with all manner of new products that work with the new system, expanding rather than restricting our choices. I'm definitely not sold on electronic shifting (and I really think that purely sequential shifting is of no particular benefit to most of us), but I'm not worried about it leading to greater monopolization in the industry, either. |
Originally Posted by HillRider
(Post 6331327)
It was noted here that the UCI minimum weight requirement for pro bikes used in international competition has had an unintended consequence. It was supposed to simplify and make pro bikes cheaper. It has done exactly the opposite. Since getting the actual bike below the minimum weight it is easy, it leaves room for far more sophisticated (and expensive) controls and power meters.
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There are alot of us former Shimano users that are going electric STI in 2009 for the pure aesthetics reason of not having the ugly STI cables sticking out in front of the handlebars. Yes, I know about the rumors of Shimano doing away with the STI cable sticking out in the non-electric 2009 Dura-Ace, but there is no substance to those rumors. All talk and no pictures. At least with the electrics, there has been pictures and the pros are out there testing them in the biggest races. I can't wait to try the electrics. It's all about innovation and technology.
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Figured I'd bump this thread --
Here's a video linked in another thread, done during the Tour of California: http://www.bicycling.com/article/0,6...6868-1,00.html A couple points were reiterated, including automatic FD trim. A new one to me is that the RD will automatically shift inboard during a fall, making an effort to protect itself from damage. Listen carefully at 1:33. |
Originally Posted by bellweatherman
(Post 6343096)
Yes, I know about the rumors of Shimano doing away with the STI cable sticking out in the non-electric 2009 Dura-Ace, but there is no substance to those rumors.
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