[AaronJ]

I recently converted my cobia to singlespeed. I have been riding a lot lately, mostly in the city b/c of a healing wrist injury. I took my bike out for its first real trail ride the other day.

I survived surprisingly. I was kind of nervous as I had been off my bike for several weeks. I climbed well. The gearing I have set up now is 34 - 18.

While I feel this gear is good for riding the trails, I think I would like it to pedal a little bit easier.

The problem is that when I commute or just go out for evening rides in the city, I'm spinning like crazy and can't really comfortably go any faster than 14mph.

I'm really happy with my bike running one gear, but would like to be able to have an easy gear for trail riding and a harder gear for city riding/commuting.

I have an idea. Not sure if anyone else has tried this with good results..

I will run two front chainrings. One on the middle ring spot and one on the outer ring spot. Middle ring will be 34t. Outer ring be 36t. On the rear i will have two cogs with a spacer in between, each in line with the front two rings. Trail gear will be 34 - 19, commuting gear will be 36 - 17.

I have a surly singleater (sp?) so it will be easy to switch the tensioner between chainlines. With the two gear selections above, i will be able to use the same chainlength, so I can just manually side the chain over. Right???

Any experience with something like this? Think it could work?

 

[Nat]

It can work:

http://forums.mtbr.com/showthread.php?t=167302

 

[ridindog]

why not just have a 16T with spacers in the rear and a typical three ring circus up front, put your derailuers back on and than you can shift the front on the fly i tried that and it works great you can get a granny, a trail, and a fast road gear all in one fell swoop it doesnt work with the singleator though and it looks almost as funny as some guy with two chainrings and two rear cogs at the bottom of a hill reconfiguring the gearing of his bike with greasy fingers or a wrench so he can climb! i know i know im kind of a dick but hey its called SINGLESPEED for a reason

 

[Cygnus]

Try it

Do it, a 2x2 is satisfying, and neceSSary for some terrains. you might want to go steeper for the high gear on the road though.
my commuter is currently a 42x16, 36x22, surly cogs on an XT hub, the low gear is for a monster one mile hill on the end of my ride. the two combos need to be the same number of teeth. i'm using a sliding dropout, very quick gear change. i like this over a flip-flop change. works well, no issues. rides like a singlespeed, you just sacrifice a little in weight and aesthetics.

 

[Nat]

why not just have a 16T with spacers in the rear and a typical three ring circus up front, put your derailuers back on and than you can shift the front on the fly i tried that and it works great you can get a granny, a trail, and a fast road gear all in one fell swoop it doesnt work with the singleator though and it looks almost as funny as some guy with two chainrings and two rear cogs at the bottom of a hill reconfiguring the gearing of his bike with greasy fingers or a wrench so he can climb! i know i know im kind of a dick but hey its called SINGLESPEED for a reason

you wouldn't need to change the gear on a two speed at the bottom of a climb during a mountain bike ride it's just for when you switch it to a commuter and expect to be covering a lot of miles on pavement so you're not spinning out madly trying to make the green light at the intersection i tried it and while it worked i found that i prefer my road bike for pavement anyway and converted my red bike back to one speed i hate punctuation

 

[AaronJ]

Nat, that is exactly what i had in mind. The thing is, I only have one bike, and I plan to keep it that way. I really like not having that derailler on there, and I like not having the shifters on the bar, or all the cables running to the back of the bike.

Ridindog, no offense taken. You misunderstood me. 80% of my riding is spent commuting or going on evening bike rides in the city with my girlfriend. The chain would be on this harder gear as a default. In the event that i'm going to some trails, I would slide the chain over to the easier gear. I would slide over the singleater wheel and be set. The whole change would take about 1 minute. I would then throw my bike in the back of my truck and head out.

Having the two rings and two cogs in the back would not be as light or pleasing to the eye as a true singlespeed, but to me would definately be lighter and more hassle free than having the cassette and derailler, front derailler, shifters, cables, and granny ring.

 

[Kosk]

In the event that i'm going to some trails, I would slide the chain over to the easier gear. I would slide over the singleater wheel and be set. The whole change would take about 1 minute.

Do it!

I have an bike with vertical dropouts that I did this with. I use the bike so much more now. I always have a multi-tool on me with my riding/commuting gear, so I can "shift" in 30 seconds. Before the "dual-a-fication" I rarely used it because I refuse to drive 4 miles to the trail, but never wanted to waste time and energy spinning out that distance either. I'd always end up grabbing the geary instead.

I run 38x14 parallel to 34x18; perfect for the trails I ride and the "road" gear gets it done pretty well in all situations, I even occasionally commute 9 miles to work on it and hit up the trail on the way home.

Couple pics to show off a little; 104 teeth of stainless Surly goodness, BRRAAAP!

 

[AaronJ]

Nice!

 

[Nat]

What a paintjob! I take it that's custom work? Who did it?

 

[Kosk]

A little advice from my experience:

The nice thing with the Vertical drop out frame and the singluator is that with you end up with just a slight amount of chain slack (taken up by the singulator). This slack actually allows you to "shift" very easily without loosening the wheel or brake. Just loosen the pulley slider bolt, push it over, depress the spring arm and move the chain over as you slowly spin the cranks.

I tried a similar setup on my xcheck and found that frames without tensioners (horizonal, semi-horiz, or track end) require a loosening of the rear wheel and/or brake in order to shift. There is just too much tension in the chain for it to ride up and over tall teeth of SS rings and cogs. If you try and cheat and have the chain loose enough to "shift" without loosening the rear wheel, it'll skip and slap. It's a much more time consuming process too.

 

[Kosk]

What a paintjob! I take it that's custom work? Who did it?

Yup, custom powder coat. Its a '97 steel moab1 frame and a steel bontrager crowbar comp. I live in MPLS, so I had A1A Blasters from NorthEast do the frame and bars for $20 and then PowderCoating Technologies out in Plymouth did the powder coating for $50. (I did it in the middle of the winter, dropped it off, told them no rush, and they just threw it in with a big customers order that came in later in the color I wanted. Waited about 4-5 weeks. To do it on the spot would have been a little over $100 I think)

The decals are homemade jobbers using printable bumper sticker material and a spray-on ink jet printer ink-sealer that can both be order from online craft stores. So far they have held up rather well, and I have a life-time supply of material to make more left over.

Mug shot with the chain and seat in the "road" position. Dingles rock the hizzy:

 

[rigid29]

Double Speed

not that i condone having more than 1 gear (or shocks or little wheels for that matter) a buddy said he heard of a two-speed BB. I think it is call Shlump or Schlumpf or something Germanish.
no greasy hands, no wrench. It may not even work--but worth a couple of minutes of searching.

 

[ridindog]

Nat, that is exactly what i had in mind. The thing is, I only have one bike, and I plan to keep it that way. I really like not having that derailler on there, and I like not having the shifters on the bar, or all the cables running to the back of the bike.

Ridindog, no offense taken. You misunderstood me. 80% of my riding is spent commuting or going on evening bike rides in the city with my girlfriend. The chain would be on this harder gear as a default. In the event that i'm going to some trails, I would slide the chain over to the easier gear. I would slide over the singleater wheel and be set. The whole change would take about 1 minute. I would then throw my bike in the back of my truck and head out.

Having the two rings and two cogs in the back would not be as light or pleasing to the eye as a true singlespeed, but to me would definately be lighter and more hassle free than having the cassette and derailler, front derailler, shifters, cables, and granny ring.

:thumbsup: no offense intended i just like to drink beer and get mouthy after a short days work and a long ride heal up and have fun ridin.

 

[cdad_martinez]

I know what you need. White Industries makes it! It's a combo of a two speed eno freewheel combined with a two ring chainring for thier cranks that runs two gear ratios but with the same chain length for ease of use. Pretty smart huh?

 

[Nat]

I know what you need. White Industries makes it! It's a combo of a two speed eno freewheel combined with a two ring chainring for thier cranks that runs two gear ratios but with the same chain length for ease of use. Pretty smart huh?

Those are pretty nice, but the gear ratio isn't much of a spread. Too bad they don't make a wider ratio model.