rotharpunc

OK, I came across a few different 3 speed hubs all in a short period, and only one came with a trigger shifter. I usually see these with trigger shifters or grip twist shifters( neither options of which I really love) What I want to know is can I run an internal hub with a downtube shifter or barcon? It seems like it should be ok, but I have never seen it done. Would I need indexing shifters?

tatfiend 

For most 3 speed hubs low gear is with a tight shifter chain and third is with the chain almost loose. The critical adjustment position is for second gear. Get that a bit off and you can damage the hub or, if it is an older Sturmey Archer 3 speed, have it slip into a false neutral while under load. Not a good thing.

You could adjust an indexing Barcon or downtube shifter to have the chain in the proper position for second gear at one indexed position. You would need to count clicks or memorize lever position for being in second gear. Not idiot proof however.

For the announced, but not yet available, S3X 3 speed fixed gear hub Sunrace Sturmey Archer has shown photos of a Barcon shifter which is supposed to be available for it. I would hope that it will be available separately and work with other SA 3 speed hubs. A photo of the prototype is available here:

https://sunrace-sturmeyarcher.blogspo...ed-update.html

BTW several SA 3 speed experts available at the below Yahoo Geared Hub Bikes group. They can tell you more regarding your possible shifter options.

https://groups.yahoo.com/group/Geared_hub_bikes/

cycleheimer

In the 1930s, Sturmey-Archer made shifters that mounted on the top tube. I have also seen top-tube-mounted "Hurst" style shifters on bikes from the 1960s. The "Skyway" imported from Japan by C. Itoh was styled after the English 3-speeds. It came with Shimano gears and one of those "Hurst" style shifters. You also see them on 1960s & 1970s "muscle bikes" (ha ha ha, funny term for a kid's bike).

tcs

For decades drop bar bikes used the standard Sturmey trigger mounted in various locations; one example shown here:

https://www.sheldonbrown.com/retroral...on-kohler.html

Sturmey also offers their DLS30 "push-push" (Rapid Fire style) three speed shifter.

I've been shifting a T3 hub with a low spec Shimano LH triple brifter. Works fine.

HTH,
tcs

rotharpunc

Interesting. I was thinking of using an indexed downtube shifter that had been modified so it would only go three clicks either way, probably by extending the stop inside of it. The S3X stuff looks nice, I still can't believe they are calling it that with all he people calling for a Sheldon Brown tribute, that, and it looks like "sex". Also, why does the cable on a 3 speed always seem to be run along the top tube?

cobrabyte

The old Raliegh 5 speeds had two lever shifters mounted on the top tube. Try to track one of those sets down & use the right side shift lever? Maybe?

graywolf

The SA shifter has a series of steps to hold the hub in the appropriate gear against the spring tension that pulls it into high gear. Properly adjusted with the shoulder of the spindle even with the end of the axle in low gear, the steps position the spindle in the correct position for each gear. An important reason for having that adjusted just so on an A? or F? hub is so the neutral position between the middle and high gears will not be accidently dropped into*. So a friction shifter would not be the best idea.

Strumey Archer made several different shifters over the years.

The original one was a quadrant shifter mounted on the top tube, those are from the 1930's and a nice one is now expensive.

Next were a series of trigger shifters starting with the 3-4 speed that was intended to be mounted under the left handle bar near the stem and be shifted with your thumb, which is why the lettering seems upside down to modern folks; I think they designed it to mount there so the bike could be turned upside down for servicing without damaging the shifter, but almost no one mounted it like that. Then the were several with the lettering on them to match the right hand on top of the handlebar mounting that everyone seemed to prefer, the 3 and 4 speed ones were marked differently (I am not sure they were actually different inside). Then there were the ones with the clear plastic nameplate. And finally the ones with the big plastic thumb letter.

Then they came out with the twist-grip shifters, styled after the gearshift on motor scooters.

There was also the Stingray type Stick Shifter used on kids bannana seat bike in the 60's and 70's that were designed to look like the shifter in musle cars. They reverted to the top tube mounting but the levers were real long. These were available in a single stick for 3 speeds and with 2 sticks for the 5 speeds.


* That neutral position was so the hub could be shifted to the second cluster in the 4 and 5 speed hubs. The 5 speed actually had two shifters and a second cable connected to the other end of the axle and you had to shift the one you were not using into neutral. The 4 speed just had the one lever that pulled the main cluster into neutral and the secondary cluster into low when you shifted to BL (That was what the 3-4 speed shifter on my early 50's bike was marked --BL, L, N, H. Us kides claimed it meant Bulldog Low). In the other gears the second cluster was in neutral and the primary cluster was in the appropriate gear.

tatfiend 

My track style frame with a Sachs 3 speed is set up with the cable running along the down tube and then the chain stay. This routing was shown in the original manual so that was how I installed it. I suspect that the common SA cable routing had something to do with keeping the cable out of the wet slop of English winters. It may also be due to so many of the old English bikes running full chaincases which interfered with down tube cable routing.

wahoonc

The SA cable routing also varied by year and bike model. The drop frames have the cable routed down low. From what I have seen, somewhere around the early 80's they started routing the cables down low on all the bikes. Personally I have always preferred the upper routing, if you had a balky shifter or something else sticking along the way you could grab the cable and usually break it loose

Aaron

tcs

Well, my friend, since you feel strongly about making a tribute to Sheldon:

https://sheldonbrown.com/harris/sheldonmemorial.html

I note that moving the wheel fore-and-aft in a horizontal dropout affects the overall shift cable length just a little with a top tube routing and quite a bit with a chainstay routing.

Best,
tcs

rotharpunc

hence the little Igor next to my user name


thats interesting, thanks

graywolf

Remember they started out with that top tube mounted quadrant shifter, so along the top tube was the natural way to run the cable. Also the down tube mounted cable picks up more roadspray so it tends to rust.

Mooo

Yes.

cycleheimer

There is a Sturmey Archer "Sportshift" on e-bay right now. Looks like a much later version of the quadrant shifter. Options do exist.