Kimmo 

If someone (say, maybe me) one day came out with servos to actuate your mechanical derailers, with a weatherproof battery and an arduino running open source code with an associated wiki online, how many of you folks would be into that?

Such a servo would make it possible to electronically shift any bike, not to mention syncro shift (sequential, with automatic FD shifts). Pretty sweet... I've been considering it for a while, and I have a mate who designed a similar thing for cruise control on motorbikes.

AnkleWork

Way too complicated. Electric servo shifting does not need a processor.

skimaxpower

I love that my bicycle is one of the few items in my life that does not require electricity, charging, batteries, or a radio signal.

Not interested.

kevindsingleton 

I'd be interested in the technology. Not sure I'd want to retrofit a bike with the generic servos/batteries and an Arduino with cabling and associated modules. Manipulating front and rear derailleurs by hand convinces me that the servos that would be required to move them, reliably, and the batteries to power those servos, would add too much weight to a bicycle. It's a nifty idea, but probably not practical.

squirtdad

No disrespect to your skills/abilities, but there is way to much fiddly stuff involved to get good shifting with the various combinations possible to expect your solution to work well. and getting it to be easy to install, look good and be durable.

If i ever go electronic, I want an integrated solution with no kludges.

That said it would be interesting to see with what you come up with.

(and I am still fighting getting a shield kit to work with an arduino board and homemade Triac board to blink Christmas lights to music....so I may PM you

trailflow1

You mean something like this below or would you have a different approach ?

XShifter brings wireless electronic shifting to any bike, any derailleur - Bikerumor

slimyfrog

+1
One of the reasons I ride is to get away from all those things.

AnkleWork

Lots of wires in that.


From the OP's post, I picture a big gel cell duct taped to the frame, some switches, four big solenoids bolted to rapid fire shifters on the bar, and an arduino blinking some LEDs to distract the Fred.

trailflow1

you mean like this ?
DIY Electronic Derailleur

dsbrantjr

+100, really not interested.

wphamilton

I've thought about it, but go and price the servos, some hardware to house it and driver circuit, even an Arduino implementation and it's pretty expensive.

If you can supply that setup inexpensively, open source on the Arduino so I can add sensors and other whimsical ideas, I'd go for it.

jorglueke

+2 :d

sch

Some energetic DIY person had a series of posts on BF 5 or so yrs ago showing his adaptation of servos to
modified mechanical RD/FD. Don't recall any intelligence (ie microprocessor) applied, just switches, battery
and the servos. Biggest job was carving up the RD and mounting the servo.

andr0id

I'm on DA 9000 mechanical now. IF I wanted electronic shifting, I'd go with an integrated system from Shimano because everyone I know that rides it says it works really well and they don't have to fuss with it. I don't see any way you can build a homemade DIY solution that is going to work better than what Shimano offers and that wouldn't require bolt on, kludgy looking parts.

dabac

During winters, there are enough gadgets I need to keep charged anyhow. Lights, electrically heated soles. One more item would only mean one more wall wart and one more socket occupied. I can live with that.


My self-imposed spending limit is dependent on reviews and (easily available) features. $200 is about max I'd spend based on "this looks fun". Greater certainty of function and usefulness would increase my will to spend.


Features I (think) I'd like are:
- integrated, sequential shifting for BOTH derailers, controlled by toggle switch(es). Flip the switch one way to shift up, another to shift down. The system figures out if it's a front shift, or a rear shift, or both that's needed to reach the next usefully different gear ratio.


- It should be possible to input shifting commands from more than one spot.


- a pre-set starter gear, available by maybe one extra long button push or something like that.


- Speed matching. If I'm coasting (to a stop), the system should put the bike in an appropriate starting gear automatically. Might require the location and resurrection of an old bike equipped with the Shimano FFS crankset.


I'm reasonably certain that I'd like these features, in the order listed.
I'm not so sure I'd like fully automatic shifting. But some kind of "Cruise mode" would be interesting to try.

T Stew

Sounds like a great idea. I really like the thought of electronic shifting, but they seem to come in at too high of a price. I'm happy with mechanical, and actually almost all my bikes have downtube shifters even, some friction. But still I'd love to have one setup with electronic. Being a tech/engineer over the years I love this kind of stuff and often think of ways to make the current electronic shifters better, though I admit I am not that familiar with them. Seems that most require windows (or maybe mac?) to setup and whatnot, so that puts me out since I only run Linux at home. Maybe if they could be programmed over wifi or bluetooth so that it wasn't OS specific (again maybe some now are, I'm not sure). One of my biggest pet peeves in conventional 2x or 3x setups is the out of order shifting. Having actual software running on a microprocessor/microcontroller would allow possibilites of automatic front shifting. so you just input an up or down shift and it might actually change the front and rear to get to whatever is the next gear. Also having extremely low profile shifter unit is nice, not needing giant paddles and levers. You could also have a shifter back on the bar in the thumb-shifter position and another set on the hoods/drops so you could shift from your most used positions, maybe a third module on aero bars, etc. It could also be programmed to do customizable things by doing something like a double click or a long click, etc. You could set it to drop or raise 5 gear at a time for example, or maybe initiate the auto downshift, or drop all the way to lowest gear, etc. Perhaps an auto mode you could input a desired cadence, and the system would keep it in the closest gear to achieve a preset cadence.

It is neat to think about the possibilities. Not so neat about the expense though.

texaspandj

Sounds cool to me. I enjoy my bikes as they are, still I'd buy one electronic shifter if I could justify the cost. This could be the way around it and still keep a vintage style setup.

Kimmo 

Gazumped!

That's pretty close to what I envisioned, actually. Although I was thinking a rotary actuator might be necessary to incorporate a non-linear compensation spring to minimise load on the servo.

I wouldn't consider it a goer unless it could be reasonably tidy, but I guess you're still looking at a box at least the size of a pack of smokes at the bottom of the downtube in front of the bb... Or at the top of the seat tube on a MTB.

Delmarva

I agree completely. For most riders there would be no benefit to an eletrically shifted derailleur. I doubt that it would be as reliable as a mechanical one.

noglider 

I rode my sister in law's bike with Ultegra electronic shifting, and it did work very well. But my bikes work fine. What problem does your proposal fix? I mean, it certainly is very cool, but my question stands.

gsa103

4 major players all have electronic shifting it's hard to see how any homebrew system can realistically compete. The only thing a home brew system can compete on are going to be features or price, both of which are going to be difficult to match against existing solutions.

Sequential shifting would be a nice touch, but Shimano already has it (XT/XTR), and so it likely won't matter by the time any home brew solution could be remotely ready.

ThermionicScott 

"Progress isn't possible without deviation from the norm", right @Kimmo?

One thing that I've thought would be cool would be brifters with a friction option. Say what you want about the difficulty of friction-shifting 10/11-speed cogs, but mechanical systems seem to go out of adjustment a lot more readily than older systems. But I imagine that the major manufacturers have too much pride in their indexed systems to offer that capability. An "open source" shifting system would.

Kimmo 

Not being able to afford electronic shifting, and/or not being able to use existing systems on the drivetrain of your choice.

I started thinking about it as a way to make a half-step triple (38/50/52, linked in my tag) a practical proposition.

noglider 

I don't follow. Can't a cable actuated FD shift that triple?

dbg

Hmmm. Didn't realize I was in luddite-ville here. I think it is way cool and have thought about it myself. I do appreciate the timelessness of bicycle designs but I also love cool projects. Carry on.