shifters on road bars
 

can you put this kind of shifter on a road bar with drops?

http://www.sheldonbrown.com/harris/images/ld825.jpg

I believe mountain bike bars are typically narrower where you would attach the shifter than on a drop bar... so it probably won't reach around.

Yep: http://sheldonbrown.com/cribsheet-handlebars.html
found in: http://www.sheldonbrown.com/deakins/handlebars.html . 22.2mm for mtb bars, 23.8mm for road bars.

Those shifters also probably wouldn't slide past the bends in the drops, if they were the right diameter. You can use bar-end shifters or a shiftmate with road shifters if you need to control a mtb derailer.

Shimano's rear derailers will shift with any Shimano shifter. The cog spacing is the same on either road or MTB cassette. The only incompatibility is old 8-speed Dura-Ace, which has an odd pull ratio. At least for now that is.

But could you use a road brifter with an 8-spd Alfine internal hub?

Nope. I confused Alfine with Hone. There were MTB sized drop bars at one point. Some must still exhist, as Kent uses them on some low end road bikes sold at box stores.

WTB Dirtdrop is MTB sized. Don't know if it's still arouind or not.

No brifters for internal hubs... dang it, there goes another idea I had.. lol

Noell fahrradbau make a two piece drop bar that you could use. There's also apparently a three piece drop bar available on department store bikes in the states.

http://www.bikeforums.net/showthread...2104&highlight=

Not sure if Jtek is selling there shiftmate for nexus hubs yet. Give them a call. The last report was any day.

http://jtekengineering.com/index.html