Attention Equipment Geeks! I have a rear cassette question

[maryellen]

not if you're going up serious hills . . . trust me on this, I had the rear cassette swapped out before going on my recent AIDS ride and I adjusted to the new gearing real fast and real gratefully

[eofelis]

Hey Surly and SadieKate... do you guys have a triple in the front? I'm concerned that if I get a 34 with my 30 in the front, I'll be spinning out if I'm in both my littlest gears.

Yup, I have an Ultegra triple on the front. My lowest gears are 30-34. I don't have any issues with "spinning out". I'm not sure where you live, but we have a few hills here in Colorado......

My Trek 520 touring bike, which I use as a back-up and foul weather road bike has even lower gears: a 24-34 on the low end. Compare to my mtn bikes with 22-34 on the low end.

[slinkedog]

We do have hills around here... I live in Northern CA. I could probably work my hiney off and get to where I could climb them in my current gearing, but I have 4 kids and just can't get out that much. (I spend lots of time in the trainer.) I'd like to be able to ride some more fun routes with my husband and with the local touring club, but I just can't get up a lot of the hills yet (or I'm scared of trying and falling over.)

Okay, the quest for a MB cassette is on!! Roll on Christmas!!

[SadieKate]

Hey Surly and SadieKate... do you guys have a triple in the front? I'm concerned that if I get a 34 with my 30 in the front, I'll be spinning out if I'm in both my littlest gears.

My Litespeed (which I brought to San Anselmo) is my "flatland" bike. I can ride it in hills but would have a very difficult time riding something like Diablo. I could probably make it to the base of the 17% grade but it would be painful. The granny gear is a 30 and the cassette has a 26. Sometimes I swap to a 28 when I think I might need a "safety" gear for the unexpected - like the aptly named "Happy Valley Rd" on the TopHat Classic.

My new Kelly Bonestock which I built for riding the gonzo hills included in the TE Girl's Hill Training Program has a 26 granny gear and a 34 cassette. I only need that lowest gear for the top of Diablo or when riding at high elevation where there seems to be a lack of oxygen. The crankset has a gearing of 48, 36, 26 which means I have several selections for low gearing. It's not just the 34 cog, it is the 2 or 3 next smaller ones in combo with the 26 granny which make the biggest difference for me so I can maintain a nice cadence before I ever hit the really, really steep stuff when the 34 is necessary.

Having had 4 operations for acute and chronic chondromalacia (softening of the patella cartilage), I am acutely aware of knee pain that can keep me off the bike. I also think people need to really examine the "one-size fits all" approach to gears sold on most roadbikes and evaluate it for the terrain on which they ride, their own fitness levels, knee issues, etc. Last I checked, neither we nor our home riding terrain is "one-size."

You and Santa should visit www.sheldonbrown.com and his gearing calculator. Put in the various crank ring and cassette options you're thinking about and look at the gear inches. You'll see how all this works.

[slinkedog]

Thanks to all of your for all of the info. SK, I think you're right in that not all of us are going to be at our best in the stock gearing that comes on the bike from the shop. Now I just have to get Blaine convinced that I need some more gears. He's all for a 27, but doesn't think I'll need much more than that. Maybe I don't. I don't know. My knees do get painful sometimes, but I've never had serious problems with them. But I'm sure getting older ain't gonna help the situation much!!

[bikerz]

I'll chime in with SK's post - I swapped my front chainrings from 52-42-30 to 48-38-24, and it made a huge difference. Then after the Mt. D ride with the TE gals, where I still felt I was grinding up the steep parts, I thought about getting a mountain rear casette as well. So now I have an 11-34 Sram cassette on the rear instead of the 12-25 cassette the bike came with, and it's great. For one thing, the 11 gives me a higher gear than I had before, which is nice going down hills, and the super-granny is really a great spin gear. In fact, on my last ride with hills, I was 2 or 3 gears above the super-granny much of the time on the hills, but it was nice to know those gears were there!

The only thing I have noticed is that sometimes, because there is a greater tooth dfference between rear cogs now, I sometimes feel like one gear is "too easy" and the next is "too hard". I know as I get stronger this will change, so I think it's ok for now. The other thing is I do need to attend just a little more when I shft into the lower rear gears because of the distance between cogs. But the new rear derailleur is better than my old one, so overall the shifting feels easier and smoother.

Finally, I am keeping all the old chainrings and other bits and pieces, so if I ever get to the point where I feel like I can drop some of those granny gears (that will be a happy day!), it's not a big deal to swap them back.

[tprevost]

Hey Slinkedog!

Did you ever get your gearing changed out! I was reading all of the old posts and was so glad I came upon yours (and Bikerz's); it reminded me that I needed to make some adjustments on my own bike. I ended up putting a 12/27 (was 12/25) on the back and changing the two smaller chainrings (I have a triple) from 30/42/52 to 27/39/52. That was the combination that is apparently going to work on my bike with the least number of side effects; hopefully that will give me a reasonable granny. The touring bike I have ridden up to this point has a small chainring of 23 so I'm a little worried about the hills on the new bike!

Thanks everyone for sharing what your solutions have been; very helpful stuff!

Tracy

[slinkedog]

I did end up switching my rear cassette out to a 12 x 27, but my front rings remain the same. I don't know if I'm going to stay with the current gearing long term. We'll see how it goes this season and go from there, I guess.

[tprevost]

how much difference did you see with that change? Did I read somewhere that you have a roubaix? that's what I have so I'm thinking the solutions might be similar??? I'm so clueless, I just wanna make it up the hills!

I'm hoping maybe the next time I come up that I can tag along with you and Carimail and MountainPuddles... I figure that between the three of you ... and some bungee cords ... I can make it up the hills!

thanks for your help!

tracy

[bcipam]

Just so you aren't in suspense, it is a 12/25. I think I want a cassette with a 34 for my little gear. I think it would help my climbing immensely.

I bought my Lemond Zurich with a 12/25. I had them put on a 27 and eventually got convinced to change out the rear Ultegra derailleur and cassette for an XTR derailleur and cassette which now gives me 12/34. At times I wished I hadn't done this and just struggled with the 27 to make me a stronger climber but with all the touring I've done through Utah and other states I am soooo glad for the 34. I don't go into it as much as before but glad it's there when needed.

Just a word of caution: need to find a good mechanic to make the proper adjustments. In the beginning I could not drop into the 30,32 and 34 found a good mechanic and now the shifting is very smooth - not as smooth of course as the 25 or 27 but works OK for me. You also lose some "fine tuning" by moving the cassette up. But then, I can climb up almost anything.

[slinkedog]

Hey tprevost! I'm not sure how much of a difference it has made just because I put it on right before my son started soccer last year, at which point I essentially stopped riding my bike. So I didn't get a lot of chances to go do some of my benchmark hills for comparison. I'm sure it is helpful, though. I'm still tempted to try a mtb cassette in the back. We'll see.

We'd LOVE to ride with you. I'm very bad on hills and slow on the ones I can make it up. We'll be great riding partners!

[DebW]

As with everything, there are tradeoff. With wider gears, you give up quickness and precision in shifting, plus you have bigger jumps between cogs and more weight. A wide range cassette requires a derailleur with a long cage and with the jockey wheels positioned farther from the cogs, thus slower and less precise shifting. Though with the 9 and 10 speed cassettes these days, having a couple low gears you seldom use isn't much of a hardship (I still use a 6-speed freewheel) unless your shifting is affected.

[SadieKate]

Here is my rule of thumb. Flatland riding like I have around Davis means a road cassette with very closely spaced cogs. 26 is the largest cog on my flatland bike and typical 50/40/30 chainrings. I have a lot of minute choices to fine tune my cadence on the flats but no cliff climbing gears.

For hilly and mountainous rides, I opt for a bike with a touring style crank and an mtn cassette. The chainrings are 48/36/26 and the cassette is a typical 34T 9spd which gives you a high top end and a low bottom end, but not minute increments in the middle. The only time I notice "missing gears" is when I use this bike on the flats because of the wider spaced cogs.

If you are a good wrench and have a derailleur and chain that will handle a larger cassette, there is no reason you can't swap cassettes when necessary. I swap out the 34T cassette for a 12-25T when I really want to use that bike on the flats, thereby giving me the narrow range.

I believe in using gears to get you where you need to go, not attempting to strengthen your legs to match the gears. The latter can be very discouraging and perhaps damaging. There are so many anatomical and physiological reasons for each of us to be able to turn over a particular gear that I hate to see people told to "just get stronger." Low gears get you up a hill while you get stronger and then can use the next gear up. Plus, it never hurts to have a "bail out" gear.

[tprevost]

I actually printed this thread and took it to my mechanic yesterday! Initially, we tried to put a 32T on the back but ended up with shifting issues (clicking etc.) So, by putting the 12-27 on the back and reducing the smaller two chainrings by 3 each, I can get pretty much what I want without having to change anything on the derailer etc (I wanted it to be where I can switch it back and forth easily without having to modify any other aspects!) The chainrings are forthcoming so I hope to have it all together by next week. I do still have my touring bike that has a pretty good granny so if I do the "utah" thing (bcipam, that's all your fault! ) I can always take that bike. SadieKate, your bike has amazingly low gears! I can't wait to meet you at LRRH!!!! I find it so interesting how differently each bike has to be modified; in my simple mind I would think they should all be similar! If I tried to put what bcipam has on my bike, I'd need to do quite a few additional modifications just to make it work!

Slinkedog, I will be up there in the next month or two and I will definately bring my bike! My kids love the drop-in day care near Valley Fair so that makes it easy! When I was young and in better shape I did that ride out of South San Jose (I Care Classic, I think?) that went up Bailey and then up by the lakes south of Almaden; I love that ride; definately a goal to do that route again (couldn't make it up Bailey without stopping to save my life now though!)

Before I forget, do any of you NorCal ladies do the Healdsburg Harvest Century (my very favorite) or Foxy's Fall Century in Davis? Also, bcipam, if you are going to do the LAGBRAU in 2007, I'm gonna follow you!

I really appreciate everyone's input and info on all of your various modifications; I'd forgotten all about the ability to make those changes and had no idea what types of changes to look into!

Tracy

[SadieKate]

SadieKate, your bike has amazingly low gears! I can't wait to meet you at LRRH!!!! I find it so interesting how differently each bike has to be modified; in my simple mind I would think they should all be similar!

Jobob and Veronica run similar gears. It's what gets us up the Bay Area mountains. I didn't need those low gears until I started riding Diablo and Hamilton with them.

LRRH doesn't need these low gears. Pretty durn flat. I don't think I ever used the granny, but I accidentally left a 13-28 cassette on my Litespeed for that ride when I normally use a 13-26 for the flats. Funny how that little tiny change made a difference. I kept finding "holes" in the spacing. I'm such a princess.