shifting and throttle dilemma

[izeman]

for some time now it try to find a good looking and practicable solution for my shifting and throttle dilemma.
with my last bike i removed the cassette/rear shifting to get a clean handlebar and not to block shifting or throttle operation by each other. so shifting the 3 front gears is on the the left side with a trigger shifter and thumb throttle on the right. perfect.

my next bike will be a mid drive freeride http://www.endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=28&t=55215
it has a 9 gear cassette on the rear and only a single front ring. so there is a trigger shifter on the right hand side of the handle bar. just where it conflicts with a thumb/twist throttle. especially if you want to add a 3 way switch the right side will get crowded.

there is also another issue which i want to address: trigger shifters are able to switch 3-4 gears DOWN, but shifting UP is a click-click-click-click ... for every single gear. pretty stupid if you have 2kw power. no need to shift every single gear and quite unnecessary. with a twist grip shifter you can shift up and down as many gears you wish in one twist of the shifter

so i thought i'm clever and ordered a left side sram x0 twist shifter thinking it was a REAR shifter just for ppl who prefer left hand shifting. WRONG. left is always 2/3 front gears, right is cassette. please proof me wrong!

the x0 shifter has micro clicks, so it's no 3 position shifter but a 9 click position shifter. so IF the way the cable moves is the same as with the rear shifter it would be a 1:1 replacment. but i can't try out w/o installing the shifter, and it was expensive. so if it doesn't work i will return it.

so i thought to go to left hand throttle. but i'd like to use a twist throttle and they only seem to exist for the RIGHT hand side.

A BIG DILEMMA

any ideas how to solve it? shifter one one side and twist throttle on the other?

thanks for your ideas

 

[dogman dan]

This one is simple as hell to solve.

Put your twist shifter for the rear on the left side. Yeah, it's upside down. Works fine that way. If it bothers you that much that the numbers are upside down, you are just looking too close and sweating the little stuff. In a way, it works more intuitively on the wrong side, since you roll it back to get more speed, in a higher gear.

I have always felt they had it backwards with twist shifters. They should be the rear on the right, and the front on the left.

 

[NeilP]

a Friction shifter on the LHS ? no clicks just as many positions as you need

 

[izeman]

thanks. both are good ideas. numbers upside down do look a bit weird. but that's just cosmetics. i never knew what does indicators are good for. who has time to read those numbers. you KNOW if it's too hard to pedal and you shift down. it's that easy.

but i don't agree that it's intuitive to roll it BACK to gain speed. you want to go faster, you roll it forward. but you may get used to it.

a friction shifter? brilliant. but who sells those? haven't seen any made by shimano or sram at least.

 

[izeman]

...They should be the rear on the right, and the front on the left.

aehhhm. that's how it IS. or was this a typo?

 

[NeilP]

http://www.ebay.com/bhp/friction-thumb-shifter

http://www.amazon.com/s?rh=n%3A3404951%2Cp_n_feature_keywords_browse-bin%3A2774050011

 

[Qwiksand]

You're running a SRAM rear derailleur? With their standard 1:1 actuation?

If yes, try running a front shifter (left hand side, usually shifts the front derailleur/chainrings) to the rear derailleur. The front shifter will move the rear derailleur two cogs for each position on standard 8 and 9 speed cassettes (I've used both the 3.0mm spacers from the 8 speed cassettes as well as the 2.xx spacers from a 9 speed cassette and both work just fine). This will give you 3 gears on the rear, which I find is perfect for my mid-drive set-up (build log in signature) and another pedal-only bike I've been using as a test mule.

You can reconfigure the cassette for optimal gearing. On my kona, I'm using 34t, 26t and 16t cogs as my primary drive gears with a 30t between the 34-26 cogs and a 21t between the 26-16t cogs to enable smoother shifting. With this set-up, you only need 5 cogs. I kept the 11t locking cog on my set-up , but this cog does not see drive.

Does that make sense typed out? It's really simple when you see it, but conveying this idea without graphics is a challenge 8)

 

[heavymetalthunder]

In the beginning I use to shift, but as I gained experience and learned the way local traffic flows I don't even shift, I just leave it in high gear and peddle with motor assist to get it up to speed.

 

[dogman dan]

More like brain damage than a typo. Roll back the shifter to go fast would be intuitive to motorcycle riders, even on the left. It's the same motion you are doing on the right with the throttle. I sometimes forget not everybody rode motorcycles from near infancy.

My favorite is trigger shifters in the brake handles, and a half twist throttle. But yeah, if you shift a lot, moving that lower trigger repeatedly gets tiresome.

Solution, more power and leave it in high gear. But that's how we do it in the USA.

 

[izeman]

In the beginning I use to shift, but as I gained experience and learned the way local traffic flows I don't even shift, I just leave it in high gear and peddle with motor assist to get it up to speed.

you are right. for a hub motor. but i'm building a geared bike ON PURPOSE. i want the gears to ride more efficiently and to run the motor in it's healthy zone. this bike is for mountain/hill climbing and sometime hard to ride very slow passages. you MUST shift down.
for a commuter you may be right. but for a commuter i don't think of gearing at all.

 

[izeman]

More like brain damage than a typo. Roll back the shifter to go fast would be intuitive to motorcycle riders, even on the left. It's the same motion you are doing on the right with the throttle. I sometimes forget not everybody rode motorcycles from near infancy.

My favorite is trigger shifters in the brake handles, and a half twist throttle. But yeah, if you shift a lot, moving that lower trigger repeatedly gets tiresome.

Solution, more power and leave it in high gear. But that's how we do it in the USA.

from a motorcylce perspective you are right. i've been riding motorcycles for over 20 years now and never thought about it. and turning the twist throttle backwards to gain speed feels "natural". awkwardly it's different for a twist shifter though i guess i'll just try using a 9x on the left hand upside down, and we'll see.

 

[izeman]

... On my kona, I'm using 34t, 26t and 16t cogs as my primary drive gears with a 30t between the 34-26 cogs and a 21t between the 26-16t cogs to enable smoother shifting. With this set-up, you only need 5 cogs. I kept the 11t locking cog on my set-up , but this cog does not see drive...

yes. it's quite clear, and your thread is impressive. now i know what they mean when speaking of "internet of things".
unfortunately 16-34t is no really a lot spread. i was hoping for 14-42t to get really the best of both worlds. will try 14-36t first and see how it runs.

i guess mounting the 9x upside down on the left hand side will work for me, and installing the very same short grip over a half twist throttle with clamping 80mm grips will give a nice look.

View attachment 1

 

[jateureka]

so i thought to go to left hand throttle. but i'd like to use a twist throttle and they only seem to exist for the RIGHT hand side.

thanks for your ideas

Ezee uses a left hand twist throttle, available in both full length and half length and with a switch. Works well with Shimano IGH that have the shifter on the RHS.

 

[izeman]

thanks. but throttle on the left looks totally strange to me it's like breaking with your left foot in your car if you got manual transmission and normally only hit the clutch with it.

 

[dogman dan]

Ah. Now I get it. This hubmotor dope was not thinking of a through the gears drive. That you'd want to shift all the time.

I think you will get used to the upside down shifter very fast. I rode old school lever shifter bikes so long, then stopped riding for too long. When I got a twist shifter MTB, I got all confused constantly which way to twist to go up or down. I think I never really got used to it. But the upside down one one the left seemed perfectly natural to me. Roll it back for more. I never rode the twist shifter in the normal configuration long enough to get used to it.

Shifting a lot less with hubmotors, I came to prefer the trigger shifters a lot more, and have those on all my ebikes except one that has a friction thumb shifter. That solution is very awkward, but that bike nearly never shifts out of high gear.

 

[dannyboyohyeah]

Here's a different twist on the subject maybe. I've only thought about this in my mind, and haven't done it yet, by the way.
Many bar-end grips (bullhorn type) have the same diameter as the handlebars. If you get a slightly long one and mount the typical throttle on it, near the top, I can envision my thumb working the throttle easily, having that comfortable and wide gripping place on the bars, and having everything perfectly normal on the handlebar setup. It's not a long journey for the hand to make it to the brake-lever and you've got your front brakes for the other hand anyway, but your not going to accidentally still be on the throttle when you need to stop or slow down. I'm not sure where this would put the throttle cable, as far as neatly tucking it into the forward bundle, without some big loop hanging outbound in a dangerous way. (I've never used a thumb-throttle yet). Anyone tried this yet??

 

[izeman]

maybe you could post a little sketch? can't really imagine what you're proposing.

 

[teklektik]

...so there is a trigger shifter on the right hand side of the handle bar. just where it conflicts with a thumb/twist throttle. especially if you want to add a 3 way switch the right side will get crowded.

any ideas how to solve it? shifter one one side and twist throttle on the other?

I use an SRM X-3 and Magura throttle. A very minor trim with a file to the inside of the shifter lever is required to clear the Magura body. The lever is located in a natural place for the thumb to rest - very comfy and convenient. The X-3 is not a tiny shifter, though...

I also put the 3-pos switch on the left to give the other hand something to do - I can flip it without letting up on the throttle. The only other control on the right is the kill switch.

This is a 7-speed shifter so not the best for the 9-spd setup you have in hand, but...

 

[dannyboyohyeah]

I'm not sure how to post a sketch, as I have no printer. However, looking at these..... http://www.ebay.com/itm/New-Tranz-X-MTB-Bicycle-Bike-Adjustable-Long-Handle-Bar-Ends-Black-1-Pair/360723726894?rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.m1851&_trkparms=aid%3D222002%26algo%3DSIC.FIT%26ao%3D1%26asc%3D163%26meid%3D3064812574572659531%26pid%3D100005%26prg%3D1088%26rk%3D3%26rkt%3D4%26sd%3D281201575538%26 ..... you of course install these on the ends of your handlebars. You can even remove the endplugs, cut to most desired length and reinstall the endplugs. If you then install your thumbthottle to the uppermost end of the barends, you've got an uncontested place for it that is not blocking your shifting mechanism. If you placed the thumbthrottle to the LEFT barend, the cable would be pointed downward and could be slid beneath a foam grip. The thumbtoggle, best placed inbound (I would imgaine). This leaves your right hand free for rear shifter and brake (which I use more often and apply rear brake first). If you installed it (thumbthrottle) on the right barend, you'de have the cable sticking up into the air and your rear shifter could only be used when off the throttle. But in either case, your thumbthottle has a place of it's own that is comfortable for your hands. Again,I've not tested this out myself yet, but plan to. I use a half twist throttle now. I'm wondering if anyone has already tried this. Barend diameter is 7/8".