livedarklions

I won't be satisfied until my q factor is small enough to pedal side saddle.

wolfchild

I don't really care or feel offended by what other people choose to ride or what latest technological trends they choose to follow....I know I am in a minority here but I just appreciate the simplicity of single speed, fixed gear, mechanical disc brakes, steel frames, no strava, etc etc. I am sure you get the idea. I am the same way with vehicles. My pick up truck doesn't have power windows or power door locks or infotainment system.

70sSanO

GPS?

Folding maps is an art form.

John

wolfchild

I enjoy reading and studying maps...Never used GPS yet.

sjanzeir

You can never have too many gears. I want a five-chainring, 56-22t crankset and a 13-cog, 9-51t cassette running off of a 14-speed, 563% IGH. And I want it all to work fully automatically, with a computerized, solar-powered controller that gets its data from sensors that work out exactly how much effort I make, in real time, by measuring minute deformations in the pedal axles ans crank arms, as well as speed, grade, tire pressure, and wearable heart/blood pressure sensors to work out exactly what gear to shift to at that exact point in time.

And while we're at it, let's have dual, eight-piston, servo-assisted front brake calipers and a six-piston rear caliper with automatic brake force distribution. And ABS with pushbutton traction control that operates in the chain via a servo motor and a counter sprocket that tugs the chain backwards as soon as the ABS sensor detects a sudden change in wheel speed.

sjanzeir

Until they find a way to sell us on the idea of a second set of chainrings on the left side, along with a second cassette with slightly different ratios from the one on the right, running off of a counterclockwise freehub body; whichever side has the fastest ratio gets to engage its drive pawls first.

Of course, all of this will require whole new bottom bracket and rear axle standards, so... A decade or two from now we'll be pining for the good old days of the "classic" 2x12.

SpedFast

You poor child....

mschwett 

i feel this. i'm similar about cars - for me the less controls, gadgets, features, cameras, screens, buttons, switches the better for a car, until you go all the way to the logical conclusion with a fully screen based interface like a tesla. the in between world of 500 switches and 10 screens up front in a car is maddening to me. i've never even owned a car with an automatic transmission.

i feel a little differently about bikes - having no long history to build nostalgia or a frame of reference on, things like electronic shifting are actually SIMPLER to me, because they work better, require less adjustment, skill, etc. since i never learned on them, things that others consider simpler or more elegant are often just clunky, uncomfortable, ugly, and inefficient to my eyes.

Wildwood 

You forgot - the whole package, less pedals, has to weight under 16pounds in size medium.
and it must be X% more laterally stiff while being Y% more vertically compliant, and is ridden by Z number of Teams in the pro ranks. and stores carbon from the polluted atmosphere.

sjanzeir

I also forgot to throw in an acoustic sensor that's built into the helmet - which doubles as an Android-powered OBDIII code storage module.) The sensor would measure how loud and intense my grunt is while I'm going uphill - and how terrified I sound going downhill - and wirelessly signals that data to the controller, which then fine-tunes the gearing (and brake servo assist) accordingly.

Wildwood 

…..what….no self-cycling mode? (get Elon on it!) LIDAR collision avoidance? And something to make sure you cannot back over your children. And something to remind me I left my PB&J in the handlebar bag!!! Nothing worse than a moldy PB&J, and since I have many bikes in rotation = it could sit for weeks in winter.

ahhh, ….tech will solve all my cycling problems. Garmin, are you listening? - well of course you are!

Miele Man

I have not tried any rear gear clusters over 9 cogs. When I built up my touring bike a few years ago (actually over a decade ago now) I moved from 7 cogs to 9 cogs in the rear. I liked my 7 cogs setup but had times when I wished for a lower gear but without sacrificing the closeness that I had with my current 7 cogs. With the 9 cogs I was able to keep the nice spacing i had with my 7 cogs but now had to great bailout gears for the steeper hills, the longer hills, or those pesky strong headwinds when the bike was loaded. I also changed from bar-end shifters on that bike to Campagnolo Ergo brake/shifters. Those give me the ability to shift quicker and don't have and cables sticking out the side like the early Shimano ones did. I find that I shift more frequently now on that bike and am not nearly as tired over the same distances as it's more efficient.

Some people can make use of more gears. I like close ratios in my gearing and I can see where some people might like an 11 cogs (or more) rear cluster so t hat they too could customize their cluster for the best gearing on the roads/trails/terrain that they ride.

Cheers

sjanzeir

That's probably because the sprockets are spaced closer, so the chain has to bend less between one sprocket and the next. And the chain being narrower means that the pins are shorter and stronger.

armille1

I think the industry adds one gear every 3 years until they get to 14 or 15. Then the chain and cassettes will start wearing down more quickly and customers will start complaining. Then it settles at 12 or 13 gears.

armille1

I think the problem is that the industry will always want to add another gear in the cassette because customers always want to buy the bike with more gears.

armille1

Any. My point is what will stop the bike industry from keep adding gears? They always want to say "we have added an extra gear" for marketing purposes, but for practicality I suspect that at some point that needs to stop. And how many gears is that point? Why don't they just get to the ideal number of gears now?

armille1

I searched and had trouble finding a thread on what the correct number of gears should be. Also, I didn't see anything discussing why bike industry keeps adding more gears. Maybe my search keywords are off.

indyfabz

I use PGS—Paper Guidance System—for tours in unfamiliar areas. Also known as cue sheets. Try starting a campfire with a GPS unit.

During 1999-2000 I took three long trips totaling 10,000 miles with only printed maps and almost never got off route. I still have most of the ACA maps from my cross country + tour in 1999.

Maelochs

Steel is simple? It sure took humankind a long time to learn how to make it. Even drawing it into tubes which would suit your "simple" tastes in technology is high technology.

You want a "simple" bike? Build it out of wood and iron ... like the first bikes. Push power, no brakes or maybe a wooden block on a lever. You weaklings and your modern technology. You think roller chain is "simple"? You think modern rubber tires are "simple"?

What you call simplicity is simply the stuff we used while you were growing up. It was never simple. We just like to pretend that what we liked in the past is simple, straightforward, honest .... somehow more real .... but seriously .... you take some ore-bearing rocks and some rubber plants and make a steel bike with a chain ring and sprocket, roller chain, bearings supporting the headset and cranks, and wire wheels with rubber tires and then you can tell me how "simple" your preferences are ....

At least the people who like tube amps don't try to pretend they are "simple" .....

Troul 

i dont think a corporate owner of a major bicycle brand is actively on BF, but you might try contacting them direct to get to the bottom of it all.

livedarklions

You know this thread is about number of gears, right? Can we give him single speed is simpler than multi-geared?

And a tube amp is likely a simpler device than anything with a chip in it.

So is your new motto "steel is real.... complicated"?

livedarklions

Doesn't the chain get too thin if you go more than about 12 on the cassette?

Maelochs

Ummmm ..... whatever.

First of all, if the added gears were not finding favor with cyclists, manufacturers would have found features which did.

if you ride much over differing terrain and different weather conditions, or if you compete .... you will find that having the right ratios allows you to travel faster and or farther for the same energy output---it is called "efficiency."

Bike makers don't add gears to sell bikes and people don't buy bike Just to get more gears. Riders---do you actually ride a bike, by the way?---found over time that ten ratios (which was actually probably six) brought greater efficient than three, which was easier to ride than one. obviously, if six usable ratios is better, nine might be better still .... and thus we got 6-, 7-. and 8-speed freewheels.

Nobody said, "Wow, I would feel super-cool if I had a big 'I have more gears than you' decal on my bike." People who actually rode their bikes found that when climbing, when loaded, when riding into wind, when fatigued, or when trying to maximize speed, efficiency was ... well, efficient. That is why cars now have eight-speed automatics, and why four-plus-overdrive was a thing (back in the '70s.)

In fact, looking at cars really shows how lame this whole "Bike makers add gears because riders are stupid" notion actually is. Car makers who want to sell performance (and this is where it gets stupid---most "performance" cars can break any speed limit in second gear, and who wants to or has space to burn a whole tank of fuel and likely a set of tires to hit 200 mph?) realized that efficiency is really important because at some point the sheer size of ever larger engines worked against that performance .... so they sought greater output per cubic inch, and then better utilization of that power. Engineers realized that an engine could be tuned to deliver more power in a narrower band of revs (cadence) and to keep the engine in that narrower power band the transmission needed more ratios ....

Nobody talks about how Bugatti or Porsche of Ferrari are adding gears just to sell cars .... And, Surprise, surprise .... physics is the same if you drive a car, ride a bike, drive a car with a bike on the back .... or whatever. "Physics" is a description of how the physical world works, and it is the same world on a Fuji or in a Ferrari.

As I said somewhere above, bike makers tended to add a gear or two per Sales Season because there are people who want the "latest and greatest," but if added gears weren't a benefit, no one would want them .... Notice how there hasn't been a trend to add more spokes, or more saddles, or more handlebars? On a machine as simple as a bike, which is human-powered, there isn't much room for waste--or rather, waste carries a high penalty. If performance is not your thing, sure, ride whatever, but for people who ride loaded, or long, or varying and challenging terrain, or ride very quickly, every bit of waste hurts them.

As for "the right number of gears" there are limits--width of the crank, and width of the rear axle being the two most important. New road bikes often have the gears extending over the spokes, inboard of the actual hub, while mountain bikes, where aero is less important and longer wheelbases make heel strike less frequent, have increased width to 142 mm or more .... but because the human being has to be able to make the bike work, the bike has to be scaled to the average human being. (If we all rode tadpole trikes we could have 22-speed rear clusters.) The limits are imposed by physics---the gears can only be so narrow and still be sufficiently strong, there has to be room for the chain to fit over the teeth, and the derailleur has to be precise enough to direct the chain accurately to an ever-smaller target (electronic shifting might help a little.)

As for the "best" number of gears .... what is the "right" oven setting? What is the "right" wrench size? It is all situational. If you ride off-road a 1x system might meet all your needs, but when tested in pro road racing, it was found not to create victories ..... if you ride around the neighborhood at 7 mph for 20 minutes after dinner, 1 speed is probably best for you. If you do randonneuring, you probably cannot get too many gears.

Also, technological advances affect how many gears can fit in how much space. That is why the "chain and gears will wear too fast" comment is not accurate. Engineers devise ways to make the stuff smaller and lighter .... always have, likely always will, because anything smaller and lighter and just as strong can do the same job with less power---Increased Efficiency. Engineers love increased efficiency, and whether we realize it or not, all we machine users do too.

Possibly in time we will all have bikes with geared transmissions in a case with a pinion-gear driveshaft, or CVT belt drives or who knows what? How many gears does a CVT have? One, but never the same one .....

badger1

Um, no, I don't think so. But never mind ... carry on.

Branko D

They don't, though. 3 x 9 was popular for a while on hybrids and some MTBs, then the third chainring got deleted and you've got 2x11, 2x12 and even 1x 12 and 1x13.

Running 2 x 11 on the road at the moment, I can certainly see the allure of a 2 x 12 setup; I could have an extra low gear without sacrificing spacing (or anything, really, except a small bit of weight I guess). In many ways it simplifies life; I can do an epic mountaineering tour one day and a fast flat-ish ride on the other all on the same cassette because I don't have to choose between close ratios at tall end of the cassette versus sufficient low gears for steep climbs, I can have both all in one.

If customers were just "more gears better" then you'd see 3 x 12 speed with 36 gears! and that'd be a big selling point. Except, it isn't - nobody really wants a triple up front.