staehpj1 

Yep.

I used to say I liked to be able to pedal lightly against light resistance when descending at speed to keep the leg muscles warmed up and engaged on long descents. I have given up on that. I found that 100 inches is plenty and less is okay. Going quite a bit lower proved to be way less of an inconvenience than I might have guessed. I was concerned that with a too low high gear I might have trouble keeping up with others, but even when I went with the 87.8 gear inch top gear setup I found that I could spin up to speed at the top of a descent and wind up getting down pretty fast. I was with a strong young guy on the Southern Tier and wound up descending faster than him despite the sub 90 inch high gear. Tall top gears are just not a necessity for touring.

There probably isn't any good reason to for most people to do so, but you really won't suffer the loss of a evn a 100" top gear much. So if someone wants to go 1x or 2x and it necessitates a lower high gear I'd say go for it.

BTW, I first realized some of this on a tour when I realized that I was a week into the tour on my old school touring bike and had never left the middle ring. I then decided to see if I needed either the big or little ring and rode the tremainder on the middle ring I found that I didn't miss them at all on that tour that included one day that had a fairly major mountain pass and at least 4200' of climbing that day. None of it was super steep, but I was still in my fully loaded packing days with 4 panniers and a handlebar bag. The range was 30.4-88.4 gear inches. If there had been steeper grades I may have wished for a bit lower low, but it was fine and with a lighter load it would have been fine for quite a bit steeper grades.

Cyclist0105

Have had this bike for nearly 20-years, all components currently installed are OEM from factory including the 9-speed chain.(I do not ascribe to Leaner! Stronger! Faster!

The following components are on order to complete the conversion to a light road bike touring set up. Here in Texas all land is private unless it is government or private conservancy.

I fall into the category of straggling at the back of a local party ride Shimano Altus Front Gevenalle Front Left Drop Bar Shifter/Brake Friction Lever SHIMANO ALTUS - FD-M2000-DS3/6 Front Derailleur Shimano Altus M2000 9-speed 175mm 22/30/40 Square Chainring with Chainguard Shimano BB-UN300 Bottom Bracket English 68 x 122.5 Spindle, Square Tapered microShift Advent Rear microShift Lever SB-M090-R 1x9 ADVENT Right Drop Bar Shifter microShift RD-619L Advent Rear Derailleur 9-Speed Long Cage

nun

I realized that gearing was not as big an issue as I though when I rode from London to North Yorkshire on two gears; 68" for the flats and 39" for the hills. I'll admit that the hills weren't that steep or long, but I just didn't need lots of gears. I now find that the stock gearing on many gravel and endurance bikes is excellent for light weight touring and some off road scrambling. eg the Specialized Diverge comes with 46/30 x 11/34, so that's 113" to 24"...I don't often use that top end, but the low is fine and the straight chain line on the 46t ring is close to 73" or 65" so that's perfect for doing mid teens mph at around 70 or 80 rpm.

JaccoW

While I rarely use the 122 GI gear on my bike I do use it, especially on the flats or with a tailwind. But I am a taller guy, living close to the sea, with thick legs so just cruising at 35 kph (~22 mph) in a high gear and a mild tailwind is really nice.
I often end up missing taller gears on my commuter bike that tops out just below 100 gear inches. I have moved to spinning faster but I'm still a slow spinner. So for me anything below 110 gear inches feels like I'm missing out.

I do remember riding in Germany a couple of years ago along the Rhine and just constantly going up and down small hills. Never leaving the 42T middle ring which meant a 107 g.i. max with a 9-speed 11-34 cassette.

/RambleModeOn/
For my uses a 42/26T x 11-36T 11-speed setup would work really well with a 20.2 - 107 gear inches range and close enough steps. The Dura Ace FD-R9100-F front derailleur + Shimano Deore RD-M5120-SGS rear derailleur works exceptionally well (but can be combined with a Deore XT RD-M8000-SGS and possibly XTR RD-M9000-GS if you want higher-end parts) and offers smooth shifting, even with unramped/unpinned chainrings.

JWK

Oh, please tell me how I can get a 12-36 9 speed cassette.

staehpj1 

Google "12-36 9 speed cassette". There are some for sale. I think the 11-36 is probably more common though.

That reminds me... Way back in the day I remember my Dad had me help make him a Frankenstein freewheel that was something like 14-36 (5 speed maybe, but I forget. It could have been 6 or 7 speed). Basically he asked me to weld a ~36T chainring to a cog so he had a huge bailout gear. It was a long time ago so I may be remembering the size wrong, but it seemed absurdly large at the time.

JWK

Thanks so much! I had stopped looking a number of years ago for a lower gear solution for my 9 speed. That HG-400 cassette didn't exist then. This is really going to extend the use of 9 speed components for me.

Tourist in MSN

Half a century ago the standard five speed cluster for low to mid range bikes was 14, 17, 20, 24, 28. So, 36 would have been huge. You probably could have dropped the 24 and had 20, 28 and 36 for your bigger cogs.

I built up a 14, 15, 17, 21, 28, as I almost never used the 24. Up front had a 52 & 40 double. I do not recall if you could buy anything bigger than 28 at that time, but I think my Suntour GT would not take anything bigger. I think the Simplex plastic derailleurs and Huret Allvit also were limited to about 28.

staehpj1 

I don't recall what derailleur he used or whether he modified it. He was inclined to use clever modifications to make things work. If the RD wrapped enogh links he may have just hung it lower. That seems like something he'd do.

cyccommute 

Perhaps 50 years ago. But 40 year ago (this year) Suntour introduced the AG (alpine gear) line of components. That included a 14-38 5 speed freewheel. Perhaps that is what staehpj1 is recalling. They came in handy for mountain biking. The Suntour VxGT was capable of handling a 34 tooth cog and those were readily available before the AG came out.

danders

https://www.bikebling.com/Shimano-CS...shoppingengine

They seem to have 12-36 in stock.

Rick

I currently have a Rohloff on 26" wheels. My low gear puts me at around 3.8mph up the steeper hills I go up. I have no problem keeping my bicycle going in a straight line at this speed. My high gear at normal cadence is around 25mph. I am going to purchase a cargo bike for shopping and intend to put a Schlumpf Mountain drive on it. This is a two speed crank with a 2.5/1 gear ratio. 727 percent range. you can have a 15 gear inch to a 110 gear inch. with a 11/12/14/16/18/21/24/28/32 cassette and a 48 tooth chainwheel. on 26" wheels. It can be shifted close to monotonic so you use 16 of the 18 possible combinations.

staehpj1 

I think I vaguely recall Dad maybe having a VxGT at some point, so that is a possibility. The welding job on the sproket was definitely more than 40 years ago, but probably not quite 50. 46 or 47 years ago would be my best guess,