your in San diego, Derailleurs all the way. I don't have experience with IGH but I have experience with commuting. Also, if your not dead set on steel, consider the Nashbar touring frame. for under $100 it's awfully hard to go wrong with it. I'm 90% done with my commuter, just need to get my rear wheel finished, i'm using a backup wheel while it gets built.

I also like being able to swap out wheels as needed. The nashbar frame has 132.5 dropouts. I've got 700x37 tires on it for comfort since i'm 245lbs but i like haveing the option of throwing another wheel set on with narrower road tires should I plan to take it on a long group ride or having a set of wheels with knobby 29'er tires on it for really bad weather or if I'm taking a trip somewhere that is going to have dirt trails. the regular route I commute is TERRIBLY potholed but group rides that I would do are on relatively nicely paved roads so its nice to make a simple swap of a wheelset rather.

I think the problem of removing the rear wheel with IGH hubs is exaggerated. Each has a very specific but simple way to disconnect the cable or cables, it just has to be learned. You do need to carry a wrench in your kit since they're not QR. I could do it when I was 8 with an SA 3spd,and now that I am...ah...more mature,I can do it with a Nexus or Nuvinci hub. They're just not QR.

Marc

perhaps it is, but to me the problem is that IGH hubs are expensive so if you want multiple wheelsets you would need multiple IGH. Those of us with deraileurs can just get different sets of regular wheels.

+1

IMHO, IGH are enjoyed mostly by geeks that like dorking around. They take some unique care and feeding, they can make a riders life difficult when things go wrong. I spent over 18 months figuring out how to make my im9 run correctly. It runs like a top...now. If I required an LBS to sort it out I doubt I would have ever got it running right.

For actual bike recs...

I've got an older Breezer Villager. I think the equivalent model in Breezer's current lineup would be an Uptown 7. It's got about 5000 miles on it, and I still love it to death. It'll cheerfully handle rear loads in the 40-55lb range. I keep it to 55 as a maximum because I can't manhandle the bike when it gets heavier than that. For me, it's a comfortable bike for 50-60 mile rides. It's not a perfect bike for all the things I do, but it does an astonishingly good job handling a wide range of activities. (racing is absolutely not on the menu tho)

A friend has a similar vintage Novara Transfer. I dunno that he's using it for the same kind of distance I use my Breezer for... while we both tend to bike everywhere, he does have a car, and he's a lot less obsessive about getting things done by bike. He's also got both a kiddie trailer (for his toddler) and a cargo trailer (for groceries), so he's probably not maxxed out the cargo as much as I do. Still, he's perfectly happy using it for a 15-20 mile ride, and he gleefully got it a present of studded tires this year.

Both Breezer and Novara have "higher end" versions that are a little bit nicer. They don't offer belt drive models... belt drives are sufficiently new that 3-4 year old bikes are too old to have them. Drop bars also weren't an option when I bought, and at least with my hub, they still might not be an option without a fair bit of mechanical fiddling. Somewhat annoying, since I slightly prefer drop bars, but not the end of the world. It's still a perfectly good distance bike.

I'd tend to argue for IGH if you have a lot of stops (I use a lot of routes that have 6-10 stops per mile), problems with your leg joints (I have arthritis in pretty much all of 'em, and a bunch of bone deformities), snow (yup, Madison gets a lot of snow), and frequent need for emergency stops (live within walking distance of 2 college campuses and 3 different hospital ERs). I pretty much am never *out* of a situation where an internally geared hub is an advantage. But in San Diego... your situation is pretty different. For starters, no snow. And it's pretty much impossible to have 10 stops per mile in San Diego... So unless you're rather arthritic and live near UCSD, it seems to me that IGH might not be the best choice. Shifting while stopped is life-changing for me. But I would pay for a missed downshift for a couple days to a week, depending on how much load I was carrying.

Living here I am seeing more and more people who want 3 speed and IGH hubs for winter riding... they are excellent for our climate.

Also enjoy my fair weather igh equipped bikes a great deal... have a 1954 road bike with an igh and a folder with an igh that are very nice bicycles to ride.

And I run just as many derailleur equipped bikes as they too have their place.

I have a Hub-Bub to go with my im9 gripshifter on drops:

My Milano came stock with an internal hub. I'm not sure what unique or difficult maintenance to expect, I've only had it three years now, so far it's been dramatically lower maintenance than any derailleur bike I've owned. Other than oiling the chain a few times a year and greasing the brake once or twice, it's been maintenance-free, 100+ miles/week.

This sounds suspiciously similar to a "steel vs. aluminum" debate. I have both steel- and aluminum-framed bikes. I prefer steel. I have both IGH and derailleur-shifted bikes. I prefer IGH. Simple as that. That does not mean, however, that after a test ride I wouldn't fall in love with an aluminum-framed, derailleur-shifted bike. It's all a matter of perspective.

These bikes made by a company called Linus are the only IGH bikes that have really looked appealing to me. I think the emphasis on practicality/ comfort goes well with the IGH. Or maybe I just like their aesthetics. https://www.linusbike.com/models/

Part of why I picked my bike is so that I don't have to do mechanical screwing around. I need another hobby like I need another hole in my head! There are a bunch of solutions if you're willing to fiddle, but I'm not. The OP said right up front that he's not willing to fiddle either.

(I'm not because I know where that leads... and there's no way my landlady will let me have enough power tools to really be happy.)

Apart from wearing out a rapid-fire shifter with overuse, my Alfine has never required any sort of special care or feeding. Once in a while I squint at the little window on the hub to make sure the marks are lined up, that's it apart from oiling the chain. I've ridden to work at -22 C here in Saskatoon, through drifting snow, and never had a problem. My own tolerance for cold is the only limiting factor.
For a long highway ride I'll use my road bike with derailleur gears. For lugging potatoes home from the farmer's market, the IGH bike is a much easier ride.

- Lots of users hate removing the Alfine/Nexus hub from the frame to do rear wheel maintainance like tire changes and fixing flats.

- When you have your hub serviced (oil dipped) it can be difficult to find an LBS that can do it without making the hub work worse. Adjusting the bearing clearence on an IGH takes some knowledge/skill that seems to be lacking at some LBS based on posts here on this forum.

I didn't say "difficult maintainence", I did say "unique care and feeding". BTW, 15K miles without servicing is a little long.

One man's "mechanical screwing around" is another man's hobby. I agree with your sentiments which is why I've avoiding becoming an IGH prophet to my friends. Lots of people ride derailliuers bikes and don't mind it, LBS service is routine. IGHs are still in the cult mode, moving out slowly.

I guess I've had experience now with 3 systems, SA, Shimano Nexus and now Nuvinci. I like them all for city bikes but prefer derailler systems for any road or touring uses.
The Nuvinci seems to be the best value right now with, at least in practical terms, an unlimited gear selection within it's range and a $300 price tag.The manufacturer claims it is permanently sealed and maintenance free for "the life of the unit." Unfortunately we don't know what that means yet.
The Nexus provides a great range of gears and works smoothly but I have worn worn out a tapfire shifter,a shifter cassette and now the right hand seal has come loose and made it unusable until I can take it apart. All this in less than 4 years.
Sturmey Archer-well they seem to be bulletproof. Tried and true quality,easy,diy maintenance and they never seem to wear out. If I replace the Nexus unit I will use an SA 3 speed.

After the apocalypse there will only be Keith Richards herding cockroaches on an old Raleigh.

Marc

Interesting. I'm getting an IGH for reduced winter time maintenance, but the "hobby" factor makes it more fun for me. My thought is that once it's installed there would be less "mechanical screwing around" than with a derailleur. I suppose it's like an automatic vs. manual in a car. The automatic is way easier to use and the maintenance is pretty low, but when it breaks, - ouch. It's going to cost you.

I think an IGH would be great for my wife. Even though she's ridden with a fair amount of frequency in the past, she really doesn't get how front and rear shifting work together. Just one shifter labeled from 1 to 8 (or whatever) would be much more straight forward.

To the OP. I looked back at your original thread and I suggest another alternative, a trailer. I like this one. It handles well and won't slow you down much on the commute when not loaded but actually handles quite well under load (better than loaded panniers). There should be no problem using it with your current bike.

For my IGH bike I use a Rohloff with dropped bars. I like this mounting solution for the shifter very much but, alas, it will only work with a wishbone stem.

I originally had my shifter mounted on the stem but didn't like it and had it moved it to the bar-end.

Mittelmeyer, in Germany, makes a drop bar shifter, for Rohloff hubs.
it is bigger so as to slide around the curves
and includes an eccentric like piece to clamp around the bar via setscrews ,
It's ID the OD of a road bar, and leaves a gap to run the brake cable thru .

May be imported from the Manufacturer, direct, see:
https://www.mittelmeyer.de/html/rennlenker.htm

Got one 2nd hand, that's what he did, yet to build it onto a bike..

Just curious about those handlebars. What are they? I'm looking for something I can set up to have flat ramps AND drops with campy shifters. Those look pretty good from the pictures.

FSA K-Force Compact.

I can't imagine (though I'm no expert) using a single speed for a bike that sometimes carries groceries and sometimes does not. The gears you would use with 20 pounds of food on the bike are different than the gears you would use with no food on the bike. And then there's hills, the more weight you have on the bike the more helpful gears are. So I would go with gears, myself.

I own both an IGH bike (a Civia Highland) and several derailler bikes.

My advice to the OP is to stick with a regular derailler bike.

There are disadvantages to an IGH -
1. IGH is more expensive
2. Harder to find a bike with one
3. Harder to find a shop to work on an IGH that has any idea what they're doing
3. Makes the rear hub noticeably heavier.
4. May or may not be less efficient - all I really know is that even with summer tires my IGH bike is slower than my road bike
5. Taking the rear wheel off is more annoying, as people have mentioned. The biggest problem is just that it's different, so you have to learn different steps. Civia has some videos on how to do it -
https://civiacycles.com/resources/tech/
Watch "Alfine Shift Cable Removal", then "Rear Wheel Removal", both are needed. It looks easier in the video than I found it in real life, frankly.
6. Gear range has been fine, but the bigger gaps between each level of gears is annoying.
7. I've found the supposed maintenance benefits when you have an IGH + chain (without a full chaincase, at least) to be very, very overated. The chain is still the source of most of the maintenance, and you're still stuck with it. So in my opinion if I got another IGH bike I'd go with a belt drive...though obviously they're even more expensive.

It's mostly that I find a lack of benefits with an IGH + chain. As I said, I find maintenance stuff highly, highly overated since most of the maintenance is with the chain. Maybe the chain last longer if you put on the right chain - but is it an overall savings? The other stuff seems like a bunch of tradeoffs to me.
- Can shift while stopped, but shifting time is unpredictable when shifting under load. My Alfine will shift under load, but it suddenly takes longer. This is not a problem with my derailler bikes. When you combine a stoplight + igh + hill right after the light, it can be pretty annoying.
- Both systems need adjustments in the first 100-200 miles because the cables stretch. In my experience with decent components (Shimano Sora and Tiagra), neither develops any serious shifting issues after that.

I don't know - for Minnesota winter riding, if you got a belt drive, I think it would probably be worth it. But for San Diego I don't think, in my opinion, that it's worth the extra hassle and cost.

P.S. Adjusting the derailler in the back is a matter of turning a little knob on the back of the derailler to increase or decrease tension. Doesn't require special tools or anything.

Great. After I'm halfway through my IGH conversion purchases you go and post this.

My derailleurs don't come through the winter very well and always require a really thorough cleaning in the spring. I also have periodic shifting problems that I know is partly due to cable freezing. I suppose an IGH doesn't necessarily cure that but I'm really hoping for fewer shifting issues and less cleaning with the IGH next winter.

A belt drive would be awesome. Maybe someday, but for now I am looking forward to being able to use my cache of KMC "Rust Buster" chains again. You can't get them for 8 speed or higher, - at least not in the U.S. as far as I can tell, but they do stay cleaner looking. They don't necessarily last any longer.

I have very limited experience with modern IGHes. The 3 speed Nexus Hubs on the local bike-share bikes definitely don't shift on a dime. I'm hoping for better with the Red Band.

As far as the OP goes I agree with you. If this was San Diego I wouldn't even be considering an IGH. I took my road bike out for the first time since mid November (it's been a loooooong winter). The shifting was great. No adjustment required after months of riding followed by several months of just sitting. It's not like I baby that bike.

IGHes do have a loyal following though and part of the reason I'm getting one is curiosity. I'm going to weigh the bike before and after to figure out how much of a penalty there is after you get rid of the derailleurs and extra chainrings. I'm also going to do some tests with the computer and HRM to see if there's any real speed difference. It's not the bike I take when I want to go fast anyway, but like I said, I'm curious.

haha, well my main point was that since OP *isn't* biking through a Minnesota winter an IGH wasn't worth it. :-)

If the problem is that the bike isn't shifting, then an IGH might help. 'course the reason it might help is because you put some decent shifting cables on the bike - might make a big improvement no matter what you used.

If someone asked me if it was worth it to use an IGH + Chain in a Minnesota winter, the answer isn't quite as clear. While I think the maintenance benefits are overblown, and while the time to shift can become unpredictable, it's also true that the bike doesn't "not" shift or anything. It's never stopped shifting no matter how cold it's gotten, it just doesn't shift in a predictable amount of time (let's say it's a random amount of time somewhere between 2 seconds and 6 seconds). And it's never frozen up and refused to shift altogether - something I've heard sometimes happens with derailler's in the winter. And as other people have said, if you want to nudge the bike into shifting sooner you mostly just ease up on your pedalling for a second. And while the majority of the maintenance work seems to be with the chain, it sounds like there's some with the derailler that you might not have to worry about with an IGH. Biking through the salt, sand, and freezing temps really puts the bike through different conditions than biking through above-freezing conditions.