
Cycling Cadence and Bicycle Gearing - voberoi
http://www.kenkifer.com/bikepages/touring/gears.htm
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rue
Interesting article, if a bit involved. Sheldon Brown (of course) has a
calculator for gearing: <http://www.sheldonbrown.com/gears/>.

Due to the terrain here, I have a 50/34 front (compact cranks) and 11-25
cassette., and a preferred cadence between 90-100 depending on the grade or
lack thereof.

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zackola
Sheldon Brown anything gets upvoted by me :) The amount of information and
detail of it that man put together about bikes on the internet always amazes
me.

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watchdogtimer
It's nice to see people are still finding Ken's pages on the internet useful.
He was tragically killed by a drunk driver back in 2003:

<http://www.bikeforums.net/archive/index.php/t-37758.html>

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ANH
I'm not sure if it's the book to which the author was referring (he doesn't
give any references), but I've found _Bicycling Science_ by David Gordon
Wilson [MIT Press] to have a very informative treatment of human power
generation. It also includes an entertaining introduction concerning the
evolution of the modern bicycle.

[http://www.amazon.com/Bicycling-Science-David-Gordon-
Wilson/...](http://www.amazon.com/Bicycling-Science-David-Gordon-
Wilson/dp/0262731541/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1276434642&sr=8-1)

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nl
_I also have to accept another problem -- chain slap. With some of my lowest
gears, the chain runs loose because the derailleur does not have the ability
to wrap that many teeth._

I'm sorry, but that's just a recipe for unreliability. Surely mountain bike
dérailleur can take up that much slack? (I only ride road bikes, so I don't
know)

If not, I believe the new SRAM Apex groupset will be able to support it - it
has an 11-32 cassette (<http://www.sram.com/node/2121/brand/sram-
road/src/cat>)

~~~
pmccool
Yeah, modern derailleurs have fixed that problem - it's a fairly old article.
A couple of our bikes have gearing that low, and no issues with chain slap.
They use MTB derailleurs.

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pkulak
I recently bought a single speed, and I think I enjoy it a bit more than my
stolen 24-speed. I've done hills several miles long and standing up while
pedalling slowly works great. It's like walking up steps two at a time, very
slowly. I'd like to get a child trailer though, and I suspect that will push
the limits of this experiment.

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joe_the_user
_For instance, in one book (which was much better than most), the author said
that a 27-inch gear was the equivalent of walking._

I'm not sure what 27-inches means. I have a 28 tooth back/42 front as my
minimum. One day climbing Centiniel drive - to the Lawrence Hall of Science, I
noticed an old guy walking was quite able to keep up with me.

~~~
nl
_I'm not sure what 27-inches means_

It's the distance the bike moves in one revolution of the crankset

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gamache
Nope, that would be "27 inches development". "Gear inches" refers to the
nominal wheel diameter multiplied by the gear ratio. Approximately,
development == gear inches * pi.

I prefer to use development as my unit, taking into account the actual
circumference of the wheel and tire. Only at that point can you compare
apples-to-apples among a broad range of bicycles.

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ja27
I calculated the gear inches for all my combinations and it's printed on a
tiny chart taped on my handlebar stem. It's too small to be useful in the
middle of a ride though. I do have a larger-print version just showing the
gear combinations in order of size, which is more useful mid-ride.

~~~
rue
I would classify this as a "great to know but not in any way essential" for
someone, so I am curious why you actually take a chart with you? How do you
use it?

I can understand using a chart to plan things out ahead of time, though to me
it seems that it is easy to figure out workable gears when starting out just
by riding and eventually you _know_ how to shift in a given situation. The
more serious riders will refine that by trying out different combinations in
more controlled experiments (power meters when you get to Serious Training).
The best gearing always depends on the rider.

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nhooey
If you're riding through Williamsburg in Brooklyn, you won't really fit in if
you have more than one gear on your bike... ;)

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stcredzero
What if you prefer internal hub shifters?

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jsnell
Then you just skip the math and get a Rohloff Speedhub.

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allertonm
In addition, Shimano has an 11-speed alfine hub coming that's getting close to
Rohloff's versatility at a fraction of the price.

~~~
jsnell
Thanks, hadn't seen the announcement. Looks like a nice deal for the price,
400% hits the sweet spot for range and the jumps aren't too bad.

It's good to hear that there's finally going to be some competition in the
high end hub gear space. Even if I don't expect to on the market until my
Rohloff breaks down, which might take a while... :-)

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davidw
I tried touring a few times, and didn't really care for it. Instead of my
'Ferrari', it feels like pushing a garbage truck around, both up the hills and
down.

