I'm a friction noob too but some things that helped me:
- Move to a compact double. Seriously. I have one less gear I didn't need anyway and I fiddle with my shifters 90% less. Anyone who says a triple in front is just as easy as a double hash been riding bikes for a very long time, or loves their set up so much they refuse to realize the added complexity. - Know that even with brifters triples are annoying - Friction shifting can be like driving a manual. You learn to shift at the right speed, at the right time. Faster is not best. - Shift less. - Good shifters are allot better than crappy ones. I have Shimanos which are OK. I want Silvers which I tried the other day and liked allot better. Old school Suntour Ratchets were good too. - A unified drivetrain helps. Some people can cobble together all softs of parts and friction shift just fine. In fact it's the reason some people prefer friction. I however found my all 8-speed set up to be nearly flawless. I had lots of mis shifting with a mixed up drivetrain. - Rapid rise derailler. In hilly Seattle this really helps me shift uphills. - Like everything: practice. - If you can over/under shift your chain off gears and you corrected your adjustment screws then either* something is broken* or not set up right. The older... *ahem* wiser folks can't remember how tricky adjustment screws can be when first learning how to set this stuff up. It takes practice or someone really showing you how to do it. I hope any of this helps. It may be stuff that only worked for me but now I could never go back to indexed shifting. - Ryan On Tuesday, April 17, 2012 1:44:51 PM UTC-7, Zack wrote: > > I noticed a discussion cropping up in the "New Chain Skipping" thread that > I thought it would be worthwhile to dedicate a thread to this, as I have > been thinking about it a bit - > > I am a relatively new bike rider, and change gears as it makes sense to me > - when i feel like i need more speed, i shift, when i feel like i am not > going to be able to get up the hill, i shift. > > But I never really learned the "right" way to do this. I have learned a > little about friction shifting just from poking around (lightening up on > the cranks when I am about to shift, as an example) but haven't seen a > dedicated thread to this, nor have I found a good resource. I know for > many of you this is intuitive basic stuff, but I never learned how to ride > a bike from anyone that actually knew what they are doing. > > I generally stay in the middle ring on my front chainring (I have a > triple) and use all of the back gears until I need more, and then I shift > to either the big or small chainring. I am cognizant of cross gearing, but > am probably guilty of doing it once in a while. > > I have consistently had problems with chains slipping, throwing chains > (both off the big and granny rings) across multiple bikes, which leads me > to believe I am part of the problem. > > So how do you ride to ensure that you are treating the bike the way it > should be treated? > > > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msg/rbw-owners-bunch/-/wszd9neWSoQJ. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/rbw-owners-bunch?hl=en.
