rockermike

I've always used STI shifters (mostly 50 mile day rides). I'm thinking of buying a tour specific bike, but notice that many / most use bar-end shifters. Why? I ride on my hoods most of the time and I shift a lot. It seems to me a hassle to reach down to the bar-ends to shift each time - but then, I've never used them. What's the scoop? What to tourers prefer? TIA

gamecock

Bar ends, like down tube shifters, are mechanically simpler, and have fewer parts to break or to need adjustment.

badger_biker 

Welcome to the forum rockermike!
I'm sure you will get varied responses on this and the topic has been covered before so you may find answers through the search function.
I use both although the STI bike is lighter duty and more for sagged tours. I've always preferred bar ends because they seem to have less to go wrong with them and can be changed to a friction mode if needed. I also ride on the drops enough that the nudge over to shift isn't a problem with bar ends.

Since you ride the hoods a lot you could possibly notice the loss of the extra meat of the STI hood if you went to bar ends. However there are brake levers like Tectro that are quite large also.

In the end it basically comes down to a combination of personal preference and how remote of areas you intend to tour in. If you plan to use a touring bike for commuting then you may as well stick with the STI.

zoltani

A somewhat polarizing topic on the boards, but it does come down to personal preference. My touring bike has bar ends, and personally I like them.

Also - I don't find myself shifting that often really. On a long climb with a fairly constant grade I typically find the "sweet spot" and stay there, trying to save at least one lower gear as a bail-out if needed.

Ratzinger

I've toured with STIs. They're great.

I think I'd probably go with something simpler though. Especially if you're going to be in places where bike shops aren't plentiful.

jdom

I was concerned about this about five years ago when I was shopping for my first touring bike.
Haveing allways used STI breaklever shifters before the idea of dropping my hands down to the bar ends to shift seemed like it would be such a pain.
It turns out it's not nearly as bad as I thought they would be.
I actually prefer them now and often when rideing my other bike I find myself reaching down to shift only to remember there not there.
Don't let the type of shifters sway your decision on what bike to get.
If you get barend shifters and,in the unlikely event,that you simply can't stand them then you can allways put brifters on later.

Bacciagalupe

Bar-ends are a little less convenient, but are a snap compared to downtube shifters.

Some tourers prefer them, as noted, because they can be a little easier to repair in the field. You can also install a handlebar bag without any need to fuss with the cables.

seeker333

Barends cost $100, STI cost $300+.

Touring bikes are rarely sold with brifters due to cost. Many tourists use brifters without any problems. Many use barends to save $200, plus they're less attractive to bike thieves.

I believe you'd see a great majority of touring bikes with brifters if they cost $100.

fietsbob

Lots of miles , with a simple pair of non indexed Sun Tour bar end shifters,
7 by 3 drivetrain...


people who mix a MTB crank, for the lower climbing gears
and road bars with their somewhat different FD like the way you can use either,
with bar end shifters, and gain the fine tuning trim, of the FD cage as well ..

Doconabike

Besides the very reasonable things the other folks have said, I find the bar-end shifters are much easier to set up and maintain than the STI shifters. The standard Shimano bar-ends have friction mode for the left (front derailleur), so they are very easy to set up and very easy to trim while riding. I have found the STI shifters to be much more finicky.

QueueCT

I use bar ends, it's primarily simplicity, bailout to friction if necessary (though never has been) but mostly it's a quick visual reference of what chain ring and sprocket I'm using.

Cyclebum

Riding on the hoods, and being use to STI, might as well stick with them for their convenient location.

I started wtih drops and brifters on a cross type bike. Put in many miles. Later changed the cockpit out to cow horns, bar ends, and cross brakes only. Like that set up much better. I know I would not like bar ends on drops or the downtube. Want them at my finger tips.

It's really more a matter of personal preference than anything else.

wahoonc

I have used both and prefer friction bar ends...my preference.

Aaron

sstorkel

I have STI shifters and a handlebar bag on my touring bike. Didn't have to fuss around with the cables at all...

Personally, I won't ride a road bike that doesn't have integrated brake and shift levers. I've been using STI for quite a while and never had a problem, nor do I know anyone who has had a problem, so I'm not really worried about them breaking.

Tourist in MSN

I have used bar end shifters for several decades but have never used brifters, so my answer may sound slightly biased. I did not like downtube shifters in the 1980s so I put bar end shifters on the bike that I used most often at that time. I still have the bike but I have not used it for years because I prefer the indexed shifting on my newer bikes. Those newer bikes have bar end shifters too.

In July I took a guided tour where the tour company provided hybrid type bikes. The bikes had shifters where you push on one lever to up shift and a different lever to down shift. Although not brifters, the two lever shift pattern is essentially the same concept as brifters. This was the first bike that I have ridden with those types of shifters.

When I use bar end shifters, I get a feel for the position of the derailleur because I get a sense for the position of the lever, without looking I can feel if I am on the bigger cogs on the cassette or the smaller ones because of the lever position. But, with the two lever shifter, I got no feeling for that. I found that I often only used the front derailleur if I ran out of gears on the rear. In other words, I often found myself going all the way to the end on the rear shifter to a gear that was severely cross chained before I shifted the front derailleur. That is something I never do with bar end shifters. From that experience I decided that I will never own a bike that has shifters with the two lever type shifter, either flat bars or brifters on drop bars.

An interesting side note - a friend of mine that does triathlons looked at my bike and said - I did not know that "tri" shifters could be installed on the ends of handlebars. I asked why he said that and he said that his and a lot of other triathlon bikes have "tri" shifters but my bike was the first one he had seen with "tri" shifters on the ends of the handlebars. I told him that the aero bars he was using was a much newer invention than the bar end shifters he was talking about. I don't know if he believed me or not.

motobecane69

8 speed 2300 cost about $100 microshift 9 and 10 speed brifters are about $120. many tourers like 8 speed for stronger chains. I'm in the process of rebuilding my stolen touring bike and I'm going to go with 8 speed 2300shifters simply because I have them already and i'm going to use a 48/36/26 crank. Iused to have a 52/42/30 which was fine for when my bike was unloaded but there were times I wanted lower gearing. will probably just go with an 11-28 casette since the bike is mainly used as a commuter not a tourer.

I prefer sti shifters but i would imagine you can find used bar ends for $50 so it's still a money saver. I wouldn't be worried about breaking them. road cyclists are probably putting their shifters through much more abuse than tourers will and issues with the shifters are few and far between. I suppose someone could tour with brifters and pack some bar ends just in case something breaks since bar end shifters are pretty small.

marmot

For open-road touring, bar ends are probably OK because you shift less often, and usually have lots of advance notice of the need to shift, so the slow, rather cumbersome movement isn't much of a problem. It's much quicker and more convenient to shift with brifters, so I prefer them around town and on the trails, where quick reactions matter.

2Fer

STI rocks for touring! Ultegra 10 speed, smooth and reliable.

electrizer

+1. Im buying myself an LHT which I'll use for commuting also and my concern with bar-ends was just that.

MichaelW

I have toured with Campagnolo 8 speed and Shimano 9 speed brifters.
Campagnolo shifters are much better than Shimano for touring; the cabling works better with bar bags and the front shifter is micro-indexed so you can use any front mech (road/MTB, any make).

I always carry a spare downtube shifter as a backup. Brifters dont go wrong very often (in my case, never) but if they do, you are screwed. If you drop the bike into a muddy puddle, your shifters will never work smoothly.

The trend for ever more gears is a bad thing. You need to keep a careful eye on cable tension and keep the system clean, not always easy on unsupported tours where cleaning materials are hard to find. Tiagra 9 speed are now obscelete, everything of quality is 10 speed which is really unsuitable, the thin chains are harder to fix by the roadside and everthing wears at a higher rate. If you want a gear system that is resilliant, you need fewer gears, eg 8 speed.

My experience with Tiagra STI is that they are reasonably comfortable to ride but the front shifting is not very good with MTB chainsets. The trim capability is crude, if you over shift down a bit, you need to shift up a ring and back down. You cant just trim upwards.

One good reason for using bar-end shifters is to enable the use of longer-pull brake levers. Road levers dont play well with V brakes or most discs (maybe soon to change?). The UCI ruling on cyclo-cross disc brakes may change the situation.

sstorkel

I'm not sure I understand why a 10-speed chain would be more difficult to fix than a 9-speed chain. It would seem to me that with either chain, you cut out the bad section and use a new master link to reconnect the remaining chain. I've done this with 8-, 9-, and 10-speed chains and they all seem the same to me. I also haven't noticed that 10-speed chains wear faster, assuming you buy a good one to start with and maintain it properly.

bradtx

rockermike, Many touring bikes use mountain bike drivetrains. The FD pull ratio is different WRT indexing between road and mountain groups from Shimano. Also drop bars are a different diameter from flat bars, preventing using a mountain bike shifter of the correct ratio. Bar end or down tube shifters can cope with the issues as they're non indexed for the FD, and between those two options, bar ends are handier.

Like many I have bar end shifters on the touring bike and they took very little time to become used to after using integrated shifters. Whichever system you prefer is the way to go.

Brad

PS If you now have questions about 8S v. 9S v. 10S drivetrains, use whatever you prefer.

benda18

Personally I wouldn't think twice about touring with STI.

No doubt there are going to be people setting off on epic tours where breakdowns can not only end a tour but put you at risk of being stranded for long periods of time. If I was doing a trip like that I'd think twice about STIs. But I'm not there. If I wrecked on tour to a point where my bike, derailleurs and body were functional, but the STIs broke (or just say they failed without wrecking), chances are I'd find a way to a bike shop fairly easily. If not, it's not difficult to rig up your drivetrain in a single, reasonable gear and limp into the next town.

Given all that, my experience with STIs has been quite the opposite of the internet-abundant reports of these things being made out of butter. I've been using my current set for 3 years of 4-season commuting (including rain, snow and road salt) on a cross-check. I've wrecked on the road hard with them at least twice, and my left shifter has significant road rash from one incident. I've wrecked countless times in cyclocross races. I've wrecked a few times fooling around on single track with my mountain biking friends. They still work fine.

All that said, I tour with downtube shifters. (bar-end mirrors > bar-end shifters).

mulveyr 

My loaded Raleigh touring bike uses a mountain drivetrain with a triple, and I have barcons. I could probably climb a tree with it. ;-) I like the fact that I can precisely adjust the FD to deal with the triple+wide cassette.

My light-touring/road bike has an SRAM Apex drivetrain with STI. I could probably climb a tree with that too, but faster. ;-)

Either one works just fine. My biggest issue is reaching for the barcons when I'm on the STI bike, and trying to crush the brake levers to the side when using the barcon bike. :-)

Chris!

BAR ENDS!! BAR ENDS!! I was on a mini tour and was able to fix my front bar end road side with little to no trouble. For touring once you go bar ends you wont go back. They are easier and cheaper both good things.