I didn't realize that the Blaze accepted smaller than 24T. So yes I agree that you might as well go to a 22.

Only if the granny gear is on a smaller than 74 mm bolt circle..
like a M56 or 58 ..
TA Zephyr, now out of production, was drilled twice for the 3rd chainring.
a 56 and a 74.
the large chainring is for a 110. TA makes a 33t for 110.

Apparently he has a Truvativ Blaze 3 that does.

I'm also sure your calculations are spot on, but--
The way I understand it, you are assuming that you can maintain an RPM that will give you that extra speed, and that you don't build up enough lactic acid to have a detrimental affect on the rest of the day's performance.

I'm only basing my opinion on my experience, but I have used a 26, 24, and 22 tooth granny gears on various tours. With the 22/34 combination I can climb at about the same speed as the 24 or 26, maintain a higher RPM, and get up the hills easier and without the telltale thigh "burn" -- well at least most of the time;)

If it takes the same amount of work to get a given weight up an incline (I did not do well in physics class) it is the same ammount of effort regardless of gearing. It is like bench pressing 200 pounds 3 times or bench pressing 100 pounds 6 times. Which one seems easier?

I want a really low gear available for steep, long hills when I'm carrying a load. I put a Sugino crankset on my LHT that had a 26-tooth granny. I changed it out for a 24-tooth and I like it better. The crankset won't accept anything smaller; I might have tried a 22. The switch was relatively easy and I did it myself.

Riding slowly uphill with a big load takes a little concentration to keep from swerving, but if I maintain that small amount of concentration it's easy. I'm very glad I changed.

I think I used Sheldon Brown's website to help know what was compatible. If you don't want to do it yourself, go to your local mechanic. He/she should be able to find a good chainring and install it for you cheaply.

have a Quad adapter , 2 more chainrings, 26 & a 16.. its in a bin,
the gearing can be quite low, towing a trailer in a trike,
you could use the low, otoh,
the development on the ground, with each pedal stroke,
is so short, a 2 wheel bike on a hill would lose momentum
before clipping in the other foot.

Tried it, thats why it went into storage.

have about a 17~18 GI, that seems OK,
though spinning it Vs walking is often a toss up. :rolleyes:

The difference between 26T and 24T is small, but when I made the switch 20 years ago, I noticed an immediate improvement in the ease of climbing. And I was stronger and fitter in those days!

Now, my lowest gear is 36T in back and 22T in front. I have NO PROBLEM staying upright or balancing, even on extremely steep hills. My knees are happy. When I ride with friends who have "standard" gearing setups, they often struggle up hills when I am barely breaking a sweat.

To be precise, I'm recommending that you build a bit more strength and/or mental toughness so that you can climb the hills a small amount faster. I'm hardly suggesting you take every hill at 15 mph.

I'm also pointing out that there is a trade-off. With the lower gearing you will not work quite as hard, but you'll work for a longer period of time. When you get to the point of adding nearly two extra hours of climbing to a full touring day, does the trade-off still make sense?

Lowering your gearing is not a free lunch.


This is an almost completely incorrect understanding of the physiology.

Lactic acid is not a caustic agent that causes fatigue; it is a fuel for your muscles. In the early days of sports physiology, a researcher detected the presence of lactic acid during a period of intense exercise and presumed it was a cause of fatigue. It turns out its presence was correlative but not causative. I.e. lactic acid doesn't cause fatigue.

The only problems from using higher gears might be from too much stress on the knees or if you go anaerobic during the climb. This seems rather unlikely given the speeds and already low gearing under discussion.

What do you recommend for building a "bit more strength/or mental toughness"? I've ran 50mile ultra marathons, over 2 dozen marathons, and placed in the top ten (9th:rolleyes:) in the National 50km Men's Open Championships. I've also raced bikes. Apparently my approach has not worked, because I still choose to use lower gearing.

"Originally posted by Bacciagalupe
To be precise, I'm recommending that you build a bit more strength and/or mental toughness so that you can climb the hills a small amount faster. I'm hardly suggesting you take every hill at 15 mph.

I'm also pointing out that there is a trade-off. With the lower gearing you will not work quite as hard, but you'll work for a longer period of time. When you get to the point of adding nearly two extra hours of climbing to a full touring day, does the trade-off still make sense?

Lowering your gearing is not a free lunch."

A bit of a straw man here, I'd suggest. I don't think anyone is suggesting that lower gearing is a free lunch. Of course it involves tradeoffs.

Certainly if higher gearing works for you, then that's great. If, say, 35 gear inches works well for someone as their low, then it works for them.

For those of us who lack the requisite "mental toughness" or strength to use higher gearing (that's me), or for those of us who have balky knees (that's me), or for those of us who may be less concerned about achieving a particular distance in a day (that's me), lower gearing works well.

Again, I'm not suggesting that you use a 54-39 + 11-25 on tour. I'm more specifically suggesting that going below ~20 gear inches is likely to be counter-productive.

Hill repeats at higher gears ought to help. Running ultramarathons definitely makes for mental toughness -- when it comes to running. :D There's also a lot of activity-specific elements in play though. E.g. I can cycle 75 miles with 5000 feet of incline at a halfway decent clip, and still feel wiped out by a 2-mile run. Some of that is physical, some is mental.

I'm old, And don't have the Butt that looked OK in spandex, 30 years ago.

So even my Road bike, has a granny gear now. the Campag Race triple. 50-40-24t

My folding Brompton, AW3 got a Swiss Mountain Drive crank..
planetary gears front and back .. still no derailleurs. a fine setup.

low range takes up where high range low, ends .. 17-77 GI range in 6 ratios.

The last ride I did through hills I was using a 22/25 low combo, on 26" wheels. I was lightly loaded with only rear panniers, and if I were going to do it again with more gear (or for longer climbs) I would need at least a 22/28. If your lowest gear is too low, you don't have to use it, but if it's not low enough, you will loathe every hill that you wish you had it for. With current 9-speed cassettes, there's no reason not to have a low gear just in case.

I do much like imi suggests, I stand and sit and shift until I get over the hill. I just do whatever it takes.

Uh, no. I have never seen anyone point out that lower gearing, which are almost always accompanied by lower climbing speeds, is going to produce any sort of adverse effect at all.

Look at this very thread. Who, besides me, has mentioned any sort of tradeoffs or disadvantages for using lower gears?


Again: I'm not talking about mashing up hills at 15mph, referencing performance issues, "saving time" or covering a set mileage. My example was climbing at 4mph instead of 3mph -- hardly knee-crunching speeds. I'm specifically pointing out that the slower you go, the longer you're fighting gravity, and as such you're really not saving yourself from any effort when the gearing gets too low.

You are talking about 'saving time'.

Knee crunching doesn't depend on speed but on effort. You can certainly crunch knees at 4 mph or even 3 mph if you are trying to lift a heavy load with a bike that is geared too high. You could, for example, climb a hill in a 53/11 at 4 mph (at about 4 rpm). Certainly a knee crunching effort. Or you could climb the same hill in a 20/34 at 3 mph (at about 70 rpm). Which is going to take less effort? Both will get you to the top of the hill but one is guaranteed to leave you with bone fragments where you knees used to be.

Well said.

I used to tour on a double, stood up on the pedals to get up the hills. Worked great. Now I'm a bit older and rebuilt with a triple a couple of years ago. I now sit down with lower gears, but shift up and stand for variation.
I'm sure I climb slower with lower gears as Bacciagalupe pointed out.
I'm not convinced standing up with heavier gears is as dangerous for knees as is often commented. The action is more like running without ground impact.
My cassette is 9 speed 11-28, close gears so I can fine tune
Varying the position and gearing helps me get up the hills :) but miles and knees vary...

I had a similar need and solved it with a rear cassette with a 36 tooth sprocket. A very easy change out. Lots of good suggestions here. You might want to check your gearing changes first with Sheldon Brown's Gear Inch calculator first. Also, my first solo tour was with nearly fifty pounds of stuff. I am now down to 25 or less even on a ten day trip. That made more difference than adding two teeth in the rear! Now if I can drop twenty more off of my middles I will be like a rocket on the hills.

At my age I appreciate low gearing. I prefer 94/58 cranks so I can put a 20 low gear on them. I get them on Ebay for $25, then I build a 20-32-42 crankset and put it with a 12-34 for my 26” wheeled touring bike and 12-36 on my 700c bike. When you are hot, tired and near the end of your limit, low gears can be a savior. The nice thing with 9 spd. clusters is, you aren’t sacrificing middle gears to get the low gear, and if you don’t need them you don’t have to use them.

I put a 20 tooth on the front(46-34-20) to build my mental strenght and practice balancing.....At my age,I could run a 20-30-40 and be happy,I could take the outer ring off,I really wouldn't miss it.It would have a 40 on it now but I would have to change the derailer to a short cage,it almost hits the chainstays now.

Bacciagalupe nailed it square on the head. Not only do you work LESS on the 20t granny....but you work much LONGER - amen. I have used a 20t granny for two years' scaling the steepest hills(18-22% grade) on my MTB and I'll be honest, I can easily hike faster than that! Going to 20t is counter-productive, because your comfort level suddenly skyrockets and you become SLOWER....which is the straight-up cost of that comfort. Lastly, the crazy high chain tension a 20t chainring exerts leads to guaranteed, chain and frame-demolishing CHAINSUCK, once moisture/water and dirt touch the chain.

If you think a 20t granny will make biking funner....you're wrong. The human body thrives on IMPROVEMENT and adapts only when conditions get HARDER....which is actually a temporary setback. I'm 47 and I thought a 20t would help...but it made things SLOWER, and I'm not ready to drop speed just yet. Over time, a 20t ring will backslide your skills and endurance. Nothing improves and people with 22t + rings will repeatedly drop you.

As I write this - I am retiring my XTR M960 2x9 20-32 crankset, running a 11-34 cassette. Yes, I scaled some steep stuff...but it kicked my ass every single time. I'm through fooling myself. Hello SRAM XX 26-39 crankset....

On my LHT I plan to switch to a MTB crankset with a 20T granny and 11/34 cog. I like lower gears on a touring bike.

My LHT had a 26,36,48t chainring I change it out for a MTB crankset with a 22,32,44t running with the stock 11-34t cassette.I lost a lot of speed or it seemed that way to me and it got to be hard on me always spinning more than I wanted to.So I put my stock crankset back on but went with a 26,36,46t with a 11-32 cassette and I find it a lot better on my legs I don't spin out as much either.The 26,36t chainring is the stock part of the stock crankset I took off the 48t and put on a 46t it works great for me now.But I am building a BD and I am going to run a stock LHT crank but with a 24,34,46t chainring and run it with a 11-32t cassette it should give me a good ride.Or I hope it does anyway lol.A MTB crankset is just to low for me.

I'm going to build up a LHT. This is the best gear thread I've seen so far.

I don't accept the premise that higher gears are a free ticket to climbing faster. I haves noticed, surprisingly, that I climb at about the same rate within a gear or two. What's not surprising is that it takes the same amount of power to climb at the same rate regardless of gearing. The difference is in the pressure on the knees.

There are two limits to consider: Your cardiovascular system's ability to output power; and The maximum torque your legs can repeatedly impress on the cranks.

Give the 24 a go. It is equivalnet to about one gear lower than you have now. Get the 22 if you can.