Icyrice

Ive been tossing around a project idea in my head for a while, a minimalist one lever road bike...

One right SRAM Rival lever and rear derailleur, but with only a front brake. Maybe the one ring in front would be 44 tooth, with a wider range rear, like 11-27.

Cheaper Lighter Faster? or am i just dreaming?

RT

Done. 44t in front, 9 speed 11-26 RD, but both brakes. This bike rocks. Do it.

cwk132

OR.... combine SRAMS double tap with shimanos brake lever to get one lever that breaks and shifts up and down!!! mind = blown

stedalus

SRAM makes a set of aero brake levers that are supposed to be shaped like the Rival hoods. Or use the left lever w/o the shifter cable.

Put on the rear brake though. Don't be an ass.

niknak

Sounds like my cyclocross bike. I use two brakes and two levers though.

Icyrice

Why is everyone so against using only front brake?

i can gut my left rival lever if thats what i was after, the idea here being simplicity. Clean-er lines n' such.

also, right/left only levers here are pretty available for under $180

hopefully this wont turn into a "which brake do we use more" argument, since emergency stops are mostly front brakes, and im sure if used properly, could be just as effective for small speed changes too.

RT

My personal opinion is that both brakes are necessary. I like the redundancy regardless of why each is used. I also think a bike with only a lever on one side would look funny.

Icyrice

Yeah, i can see that having a failsafe makes sense, but when in doubt, sneaker behind the fork stop is pretty effective!

my main worry is if itll have some goofy shifting properties with only one front ring, or maybe me forgetting and trying to rest on a hood not there!

DinoShepherd

I run my C-X bike as 1x9. The concept is not new and it has the potential to work great.

Without the front der. , there is serious potential to lose the chain. I run a bash guard on the outside and a JumpStop on the inside. Again, this is a pretty common setup with the C-X 1x9 crowd.

-Z

Icyrice

This is a road only idea, you think id be losing too much power/speed with only one ring on the road?

i have 39x11-23 on my crashin' round town bike, and it works great until i hit a big hill, then its all coasting...

would a 44 or 46 by 11-27 fix this? power AND reasonable speed, with a small-ish sacrifice from both?

DinoShepherd

What do you want to do with it?

Are you going to race at PIR?
Pound up to Skyline with the big dogs?
Alleycats?

Or just cruise around Hawthorne?

The mission (and your fitness) will decide the gears. So what is it?

-Z

RT

Anything less than 52 up top and I spin out on descents. If you don't mind that loss, the 44 is solid, the 48 trekking ring would be even better. 11-26 should be fine - you would just have to adjust to the loss on climbing.

Icyrice

48 sounds perfect, a little suffering on climbs is healthy right?

to DinoShepherd, its just an idea for now, but i have a bike to race, and a beater already, maybe its place in life would make more sense later, i dont know yet.

freeskihp

OR... 2 sram levers, 2 crosstop brake levers, and a Di2 Remote shifter.

Disk Brakes, Rim Brakes, sram rear Derailleur, shimano electronic front derailleur, front sram shifter operates an airhorn and a pinwheel

adriano 

drew2002

adriano--That's genius.