You forgot to include the smiley face. 🙂

And I suppose this Kool-Aid drinking and foolish spending and bike industry scamming started the year after your last bike was made, correct? :roflmao2:

The only way to stop crotchety old men from complaining about new bike technology would have been to stop all bicycle frame and part development after the invention of the safety bicycle in 1876. I guarantee you that every advancement since that time has been hailed as an "industry scam" by someone like you.

Time travel MTB from truss forks to Honda's swanky cranky.

this thread has gone on too long for me to read everything, but I am very much ready to try a 12 rear/single front- it simplifies and the only weight it adds is where you need, it, at the rear wheel.

I am in on this-

I'd be happy with 1 x 8 speed gearing if it were properly spaced. 14 - 16 - 18 - 20 - 22 - 25 - 28 - 32. This would give me about 35 - 80 gear inches w/42T chainring. Enough to cover most hills I encounter with enough top end to cruise comfortably on my comfort bike. I'm not the least bit concerned about spinning out down hill, at that point (35 kph @ 90 rpm) I coast. Unfortunately I couldn't find such a bike with that, So I have 3 x 7 speeds on my Giant Sedona that gives me the same reasonably spaced ratio's from 30 - 90 gear inches. Mostly I can stay on the middle ring anyway. As a bonus, I have 21 gear inch sprockets for that one steep loose stone and soft gravel hill I like to climb from time to time with the 50mm wide tires.

There so many variables to consider, and some complexity in determining what the best drivetrain is for any particular rider, bike and terrain.

Today's 12s cassettes offer such close cog spacing so as to give a lot of gear choices within limits of a nice, straight chainline.

And when we consider bikes using wider tires, 1x improves Q-factor while allowing the chain to stay clear of the tire.

What we haven't seen is a bike using advantageous narrower cog spacing but with not so many cogs fitted to the rear wheel, which sort of shows how a good thing maybe always has to be marketed as "more is better". A lone exception here would be ultra-specialized downhill bikes using a smaller number of narrowly-spaced cogs.

Freewheels are still used on a lot of bikes, even those being made today. But the 10s freewheel that offers greater gear selection within reasonable chainline angle limits is only sold as a 10s freewheel. So I am working on taking the 11t cog off of SunRace's 10s 11-36t freewheel and cutting down the body length. I'll post what happens after I receive the freewheel, whether there is perhaps still enough internal threading depth for the lockring to perhaps clamp down on just nine of the narrowly-spaced cogs(?).

Also, 12s chains further narrow the limits of chainring spacing, as does using closer-ratio chainrings, reducing the width burden when fitting multiple chainrings adjacent to decent-width tires.
Frame design having an intended chainring setup can also help greatly to optimize all of the structural and clearance considerations that exist near the chainstay, chainrings and rear tire.
1x is the rage for now, perhaps mainly because it makes things easier for the designers. But with recognition of efficiency improvements resulting from better chainline, it seems like only a matter of time before some newer approaches using multiple chainrings appear.

All I wanna know is, what happens when "they" come out with 13 cog cassettes? Are they called that, or do we skip it altogether like I've heard they do in some very tall buildings? Wouldn't it be, like, bad luck to ride a 13? Especially on a carbon bike! Are you nuts? Like ridin' a powder keg!

13 speeds is old news (2018)


road tested:

:eek:
God help those riders!

"fulcrum" is what you're looking for

I'll go in reverse order:

1-I always liked Kool-Aid. I used to buy the pitcher and 4 cups for each of my nieces and nephews when they were born. I don't drink it frantically. I drink it steadily and savor the sugary fruity flavor.

2-I don't ride the TdF and don't really care about 2 mph. This garbage does matter to people who are actually in shape. I'm in pretty good shape, too, but it's not the greatest thing that ever happened.

3-My 1x setup has practical value to me. I've built and ridden 100+ bikes, from 1x10, 1x11, to 2x's and 3x's. I'm not missing an arm or any brain material.

4-I'm glad some of your bikes have 12 speeds. Some of mine do, too. One of them has 1, one has 3, one has 5, several have 10, one has 11, some have 12, 14, 16, 18, 20, 22, and some have 21, 24, 27 and even 30! OMFG! I did hill repeats today on my 1x11, and it's simple, quiet, and works. OMFG!

Tomorrow, I'm riding 50+. On an '85 Colnago. It has 20 speeds. I hope to use 4 of them. OMFG!

I’m on my second 1x11 bike and I’m sold. For me it isn’t about the gear range. It’s about shifting. Rear shifting is just better... it was even without indexing. I don’t drop the chain and bind it in the BB any more, either.

I do think they’re ugly. That’s just the style right now. It’s not the engineering. Maybe someday pebbly insets in the forging or 1980s soap bar styling will return. The range is still a little short with 11-42 but I’d be hard pressed to invent a complaint about 10-50. If I wanted to think up another knock on it, it’s that they are saving it for the higher groups when it’d be even better for cheaper bikes. 11-46 with a 40 front would be great on a hybrid but they’re still out there with 28-38-48 cranksets that MTB’s abandoned when freewheels died, and “24 speed” drivetrains where no person likely to ride it can manage the 120” top gear and only 4 or 5 speeds aren’t overlaps.

The 3x8 drivetrain on my gravel bike offers about 18 unique useful ratios. And I do sometimes find practical use for the 48-11 top gear, when in spirited groups on pavement.

@nlerner I love your BMC posted above.

I'm definitely in for one of these when Mike gets it sorted and available for sale.

I've thought about switching out my Stigmata and this one would check more boxes for the riding i"m doing nowadays.

https://cimg2.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...a4e3f26b89.jpg
Prototype from Mike at Black Mountain Cycles.

I really, really like that! I am not a fan of most 1 x 11 aesthetics, but that combo isn't too bad.

That's great, but your bike is not very likely the kind I was writing about, a sort that does not join spirited groups. Specialized seems to have gotten the memo this year, though. This model and many of its friends are now 1x9x11-40

https://s7d5.scene7.com/is/image/Spe...hybris-xlarge$

gomango What a way to turn the thread positive. That is one fantastic looking machine!

I've been Jonesing for one of those.

https://cimg0.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...58f9e6815.jpeg
40 up front with an 11-42 in the rear and it's DI2.
1x might not be for everyone or every bike. My road bike is 2x11 Dura Ace 9100 and my gravel and mountain bikes are all 1x10 and 1x11.

I'm probably the wrong person to ask about this. My newest bike is probably older than most of the people reading this, and I bought it new. I never saw anything wrong with friction shifters. I still ride my Shogun 500 with friction shifters (12-speeds).

I also still ride my Raleigh Wayfairer with a 3-speed Sturmey Archer internal hub gear system.

I am not crazy about most of the new-fangled stuff, like indexed shifters and systems. Before, you could match a Shimano rear derailleur with a Campagnolo front derailleur, and Sun Tour shifters. Now, you can only replace a part with one for that particular system, and in some cases, one failed part may require you to install a whole new system. Brakes are another point of contention. There was nothing wrong with caliper brakes, especially cantilevered ones. Easy to adjust and repair. Now, with the new systems, you almost have to put the bike in the shop for a simple adjustment. And al these new systems have greatly increased the cost of buying and maintaining a bike. And I don't really see that much of an improvement in performance, at least as far as an average rider is concerned.

Just my opinion, for what it's worth. I'm over 60, and still riding (although a lot slower than I used to..) :)

The ones that get me are the new "Fat Bikes" like this one https://www.trekbikes.com/us/en_US/b...orCode=reddark

I bike on local trails & you can hear these "Harley sized snow tires" droning a mile away. Imagine if all the energy going into that noise instead went to moving forward...

But, at least it's only the price of a decent used car.

They make loads of sense here in Minnesota.

During the snow season, which seems like half the year, they are a blast.

Now that the snow is retreating, I see folks riding these on MUPs and it doesn't work as well for me.

At least they are out riding!

As for the price of the pictured Farley, buy last year's model and save a grand.

I saved $650 on my Salsa Blackborow, which runs about $3,000 less than the Farley.

just my 2 cents.

My son has a carbon phattie; carbon wheels, a single speed. He coasts; he climbs. I told him if he was going to run 10 lbs of tires, get at least front shocks. He said that's what 8 psi is for.

Anything with 2 wheels is fine, IMO.

He does need a decent used car, though

.

For 3 years I’ve been riding with a SRAM PG-1130, 11-46, 1x11. My complaint was the narrow range, so I replaced the stock 42 with the 46 for easier climbing. I love the simplicity, reliability, low maintenance, and easy shifting. No issues, mechanical or esthetic.
Really interesting thread, even though some of the mechanical discussion is over my head.

T-Mar has made clear he is of the belief that the cambio corsa was invented in 1948, not 1933 when it was actually invented. He is also of the belief the nationalistic Italians used something other than the Vittoria Margherita. He doesn't think that Bianchi making the cambio corsa standard on their top-end race bike in 1940 counts. He doesn't think that the Italian pro peloton using the cambio corsa no later than 1938 counts. Other than Super Champion, a French ripoff of VM, there was no other competition.

As someone who uses VM and CC I will say the CC is superior to the VM, hands down.