axelwik

I'm assuming that this will work, but want to be sure before shelling out the cash.

I'm planning on running a Deore XT 9-speed shifter and an Ultegra 9-speed rear deraileur and cogs. (I want to run a mountain bar on a road bike.) For brake levers I'll probably use the Shimano BL-R550 or something similar.

For the front I'll use an old-school thumb shifter.

Will it work?

bellweatherman

For your road bike, are you using also using an Ultegra front derailler? This might be an issue, but I'm not totally sure. Perhaps a more experienced mechanic will chime in here.

mike

It should work. The reason for the long arm on a mountain bike derailure is to take up the chain when you ride with the small granny gear up front. Otherwise, they are pretty much the same. Of course, that assumes you have the same lateral distance to cover over your rear cassette ie, the side-to-side lateral range of the derailure has to be enough to cover the whole cassette. OF course, that is true whether the derailure is for a road bike or a mountain bike. In layman's terms, if you have a seven speed cassette, the derailure has to be right for it.

HillRider

Shimano MTB and road rear shifters and rear derailleurs and interchangable and can be mixed-and-matched at will. Your plan to use a friction thumb shifter for the front shifting also makes the front derailleur choice unimportant.

Whether Shimano road and MTB front shifters and derailleurs can be mixed is still not clear. Some report they will work together and some (including me) haven't had success.

Al1943

From what I've seen the typical mountain style shifters won't work with a typical road crankset and front derailleur. But there is a type of flat bar shifters made to work with certain touring cranksets. But I don't have any experience with that. Suggest you try the touring forum.

Al

wooljersey

Yes, as was posted before the road/mountain rears are interchangeable. I am running an Deore XT M 737 8 speed rear derailleur with Ultegra 7 speed downtube levers.

You would essentially be doing the opposite.

DieselDan

If you are using an old school friction front shifter, there shouldn't be a problem. Pull ratios only apply to indexed shifting. Rear shifters and derailers are interchangeable.

suhinaffy

it worked for me ! i just put some flat bars on my road bike and had to change the shifters .

[IMG][/IMG]

Retro Grouch 

From what you've seen or from what you've read? From what I've read it isn't supposed to work. From what I've seen it works just fine.

This is a fairly common thread. Every time that it comes up I think about my wife's hybrid bike with LX shifters and a Tiagra front derailleur. That's the way that it came from Specialized. It worked fine when it was new and it works fine today.

axelwik

Thanks a bunch all... I thought it would work, but wasn't sure with the new 9 and 10 speed systems. (I left cycling 11 years ago and am getting back into it after riding motorcycles during that time.)

I don't think the front will be an issue with the thumb shifter's infinite adjustabilty.

(by the way suhinaffy, nice bike)

suhinaffy

[QUOTE=axelwik;6500012
(by the way suhinaffy, nice bike)[/QUOTE]

cheers , i taped it myself (couldnt afford paint)

axelwik

Here's a photo of what I've built so far. Still needs a lot of parts...