Single speed, 3-4 speed, stupid or not?

I would like to hear from anyone running a singlespeed DH setup as well. I could probably run most of the trails I ride chainless and be just as fast so I'm curious..

why would you want to limit yourself to 3 gears? pretty stupid in my eyes, i use all 9 of my gears.

There is a kid round these parts that runs a 6" bike single speeded and gives me a run for my money on most courses, I don't think its holding him back in the least, plus its simple.

I have done 4-8 speed setups with both sram and saint derailers. Its good if your looking for less shifting, less weight, better chain line, better spoke clearance. I like the saint setup 6 speed with this gearing: 11, 13, 15, 17, 19, 23. Like you said, when riding your only using gears 11-19. I use gears from a sram road cassette and then single speed spacers to fill in the 3 missing gears. Adjust your derail like normal but crank the low limit screw all the way in to stop it from over shifting. With 5 speeds or less its hard to get the low limit screw to stop the derail swing in time and it shifts on to the spacers. Maybe someone as found a solution to this problem.

vtminuteman said:

With 5 speeds or less its hard to get the low limit screw to stop the derail swing in time and it shifts on to the spacers. Maybe someone as found a solution to this problem.

Click to expand...

Longer low limit screw.

I ended up with a bent screw when I tried a longer one on a sram. It also starts limiting the high gear swing on srams so it won't shift into 11 or your highest gear. I didn't try moar screw with a saint yet. I found 3-5 speed setups to be not enough gearing and you end up wanting to be between gears(too low or high). The best thing is, once you buy a cassette and some spacers you can try any gearing setup you like.

I love it, the gear is always predictable, and I never have to worry about clipping a derailleur. For lift access riding I only find myself desiring a second gear when I'm forced to climb. Set it up for around 55-57 gear inches and you'll be set.



Before i got the mini link I ran a profile 6 speed hub on a few different bikes. If you take a couple of cheap cassettes (ones with individual gears, no carriers) and take them apart, you can stack the cassette to your liking. I had a narrower clustering of ratios in the 2-5 gears and a bigger jump to the first and last gears for bailouts and spinouts. For the shifting, just make sure your donor cassettes and shifter are intended for the same gear count. The der. can be limited with the stop screws, and your shifter will have a couple of extra clicks. No big deal.

My chief motivation for going to 6 speed was to use a hub with symmetric flanges to build a dishless, stronger wheel. The 951 already uses a wide spaced hub, so this benefit is out the window.
If you retain a couple of gears you'll be limiting your gear choices to gain a better chain line. If you select your front chainring well you can dictate the area of the rear cassette you spend time in. This will be a simpler fix and let you keep all your gear choices.
There is the little bit of weight you'll save, but a nice cassette will not be that much heavier than a half-dozen steel cogs.
If you're going to do this, go full single. Simplifying your controls is one of the most satisfying things. Never skipping a chain won't make you smile right away, just the next time you see a friend bash his knee.


Edit:
My buddy Tom's conversion write-up.
http://www.ridemonkey.com/forums/showthread.php?t=208020

Graves runs 4 speed.
I have run 5 for a fair while. 12/21 Its great.

I run 7spd 12-25. By ditching only 1st and 9th gears the Sram limit screws work fine. This improves chainline and weight but leaves me with enough range for all DHing and most general riding. I switch from a 39T ring to a 35T if I'm going for an XC ride (only a couple times a year).

For pure DHing I could see using a 4spd setup but then you'd have to figure out how to limit the derailleur.

Yo B,

If your trying to ditch the whole derailleur thing, then a 3 or 4 speed defeats the purpose obviously. Sure you'll save a few grams but you'll still have a derailleur, shifter and cable. Personally, I would just run a normal set-up, but given the choice of the two options your asking about, go with the single speed. I do like the clean look that a single speed provides, and given your BMX background, I know you have the power to muscle it up short climbs.

i am seriously considering going ss dh for next season...i ride primarily singlespeed on my xc bike and love it (prior to doing it i really didnt understand it) but i just live simplicity...and on a dh bike the less crap that can go wrong the better...we shall see...

listen to w00dy he has been doing this for a coon's age.

so can you get away with running no retention device and just a derailure mounted pully?

yuroshek said:

why would you want to limit yourself to 3 gears? pretty stupid in my eyes, i use all 9 of my gears.

Click to expand...

not everyone is a pinner like you shrek.

I've considered doing something like this on my sx trail, just for fun.

jonKranked said:

not everyone is a pinner like you shrek.

I've considered doing something like this on my sx trail, just for fun.

Click to expand...

Currently in the process of converting my RFX to a 6-speed. Figure it should be simpler and chances are I will never miss those 3 gears anyway.

Polandspring88 said:

Currently in the process of converting my RFX to a 6-speed. Figure it should be simpler and chances are I will never miss those 3 gears anyway.

Click to expand...

Yea dude I hear ya. I rode my sx chainless at diablo a few times. Other than the flats where I had to kick along, it was a blast!

yuroshek said:

why would you want to limit yourself to 3 gears? pretty stupid in my eyes, i use all 9 of my gears.

Click to expand...

1. You really DON'T need that many gears. You'd be surprised how little pedaling you actually need to do on a proper DH course

2. Some of us have gotten REALLY tired of trashing derailleurs/hangers on our rocky trails

3. It's really nice to never have to worry about your gears when your pedaling, or your your bike in general when you crash.

A bunch of us have been running SS for a while now on our DH bikes. Even on the flat trails it's really not a handicap. Sure sure, it's always gonna be a bit slower. But it's certainly not holding back my riding, but then again I've spent entire weekends at Northstar and diablo chainless and been able to clear everything. The only time it's been a real pain in the ass was in SLO when I had to do all that damn traverseing up and down across those trails.

With my saint to go 5speed I had to remove the little plastic bit on the limit screws (or I could have got longer limit screws).

I tried it:

I don't like drivetrains in the winter, so started a project a few weeks back, and its come to fruition in its first form.

Ive been getting some jip for wanting to try this, but on sunday I snapped my chain, and rode chainless, and a number of people commented I was riding as fast as normal (was a pretty steep track) on everything but the flat start. With singlespeed it will take a little extra effort on the start, but I wont have an expensive drivetrain killed by a winter in the peak district.

I have checked without the shock, and the links can fully bottom out, which is further than they will go with the shock in.

Going to Caersws this weekend, so will give it a good test (taking my drivetrain just incase!)

Oh, and if it all goes wrong Ive only spent £19, and should be able to sell the stuff for that, so no lose, just experience gained.

EDIT: Here is what I want to do:

Click to expand...

I didnt succeed, went back to gears, this guy did better:

Mate,

I've been running single speed on my DH bike for a long time now, nearly two years. It's brilliant i don't want to go back to gears. Your riding gets so much more flow!

Here's a link to a post i started about my single speed conversion:

http://www.southerndownhill.com/forum/index.php/topic,148606.15.html

Unfortunatley the pictures seem to have stopped working. Here's the best one showing how my set-up works, essentially a mech bolted into the chain device with some elastic providing the tension. I'm revamping it currently at the moment but only as it's starting to wear and get slack rather than not work.

Let me know how you get on.

Click to expand...

yeti-henry, Roox makes the chainguide you envisioned: The Roller Coaster

http://www.roox.at/Components_web_2006/product_page_chaindevices_2006.htm

Good luck finding one though...

I know of a shop with one, but the spring isn't strong enough.

Been running 7 speed on SRAM (basically the min you can run on SRAM without modding) for ages, was running 5 speed on Shimano stuff before that, no way do I need 9 gears, depending on which cassette you choose the ratios are all either too close together or just plain useless. It suits me way better to choose my ratios and ditch the ones I don't use.

Recently been looking at single speed on my Sunday tho but the tidier smaller chain tensioners are as much as a rear X9

Remember looking at the post Yetihenry quoted ages ago on SDH and thinking it would be a really good idea, might look into it a bit more as currently my rear mech is dead.

yetihenry said:

I know of a shop with one, but the spring isn't strong enough.

Click to expand...

I'm sure that a replacement spring wouldn't be terribly difficult to source.

I really like the look of a single speed, it'll be sweet on the 951. I like the non-cluttered forward controls without the shifter and cable. But I also think you might regret not having a couple gears to run through. You may not be a pinner, but why limit yourself?

yetihenry said:

...this guy did better:

Click to expand...

That's a really interesting way to do it. Much better chain wrap fore and aft.
I would have placed a couple of tall cogs as guides on the freehub, but otherwise that's really slick.

If you're just trying it for grins don't go out and buy a nice single speed setup.
Just grab a crappy old road der. and clamp a section of cable into it. If you put the termination in the barrel adjuster and clamp the other end as normal you can use the adjuster to fine-tune your chain line.

The problem with 3 or 4 gears is that weak point is still the rear derailleur.

You might be able to avoid some shifting issues, but a properly maintained system should avoid them.

But anyone can clip a rear derailleur. That is probably the biggest culprit in any failure.

Hammerschmidt up front, single in the rear. Thats my plan

sanjuro said:

You might be able to avoid some shifting issues, but a properly maintained system should avoid them.

Click to expand...

On any 1x9 bike the chain line is sh*t in 1st and 9th. It's prone to skipping in these gears on bumps and backpedaling and in 1st the derailleur is too close to the spokes for comfort. With my 12-25 7spd setup I'm fully confident in any gear. I just couldn't make a singlespeed work. Even if my bike was only used on lift and shuttle accessed trails I think 3 speeds would be the minimum.

Lelandjt said:

On any 1x9 bike the chain line is sh*t in 1st and 9th. It's prone to skipping in these gears on bumps and backpedaling and in 1st the derailleur is too close to the spokes for comfort. With my 12-25 7spd setup I'm fully confident in any gear. I just couldn't make a singlespeed work. Even if my bike was only used on lift and shuttle accessed trails I think 3 speeds would be the minimum.

Click to expand...

You're probably right, but I would shift the chainline to the gears I was going to use, either 1st or 9th.

Lelandjt said:

On any 1x9 bike the chain line is sh*t in 1st and 9th.

Click to expand...

Bollocks. Only if you have a bad chainline to start with. I've run 1x9 on my trail bike (where the full range of gears are used much more than my DH bike) with no issues whatsoever. Dumbing down your bike for the sake of no mechanical competency is lame-o.

Or makes it bulletproof. I wouldn't say it's "dumbed down" since I'm running the same 12-25 gear spread as I was before with 9 speed. Now a few of the shifts are a bigger jump but not too big to find the right gear and this results in less shifts.

The chainline is just bad in those gears. Look at how far the chain bends to the side.

If you have the chainline set up dead center of the rear cassette, it will work flawlessly. A 9 speed cassette is no wider than an 8 speed, and you will hear plenty of arguments for an 8 speed setup. My point is, if you want to run a single, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 speed set up, have at it, but it will be no better than a proper 9 speed set up.

Someone mentioned a hammer shmidt with single rear cog. What if Sram could add a gear or two to the hammer shmidt? 3-4 speeds up front, one in the back. Some guide rings on either side of the rear cog and a guide + tensioner up front. No derailer to bust, moves weight to the frame and off the rear wheel, works with current frame standards. I think this has potential.

That would be cool but packaging constraints limited it to 2 speeds. Maybe they'll improve that in the future but if you look at an exploded diagram of it the design would have to change considerably.

the yess tensioner looks like a solid, low profile device. been (almost) tempted to try.


http://labs.yesspro.com/products/etr-d