The first "real" road bike I owned (Bianchi Limited, 1986-ish) had downtube shifters and I've always had at least one bike so equipped since then. In my long range plans for a custom rando bike, it will have downtube shifters. My daily commuter has friction DT shifters, as does my Trek 560. I also have bikes with thumb shifters, a Bontrager mtb with grip-shifts (hate those but haven't taken the time to convert yet), and a cross bike with brifters - whose only advantage I can see is when I race I really can shift quicker. But those buggers are sure expensive to replace and I hate components I can't service myself. Strangely, the only thing I don't currently have running is bar-ends, but that's going to change when I get the dirt-drops on the 91 MB 2 ;-)
As others have said - though maybe not here, one advantage to DT shifters (besides simplicity) is that on longer rides you regularly take you hands (or one hand at least) off the bars. This helps relieve pressure and fatigue, I think. And maybe it's how I was "programed" when I formed my love for the bicycle, but I prefer the look of a steel road bike w/DT shifters to the look of any other bike. Mike On Aug 2, 11:12 am, John Speare <johnspe...@gmail.com> wrote: > I like indexed DT 8 speed shifting on my commuter and my long distance bike. > I guess I actually love it. > > I'm generally moving towards indexing on most of my bikes: > -- trails bike (Rawland dSogn) has 8 speed brifters -- which I love for > technical climbing. > -- CX (RB-T) bike has single 8 speed brifter > -- mountain bike is indexed. > > Until now, I didn't realize that I'd made such a transformation. I must say > though, that I do miss the feel of Suntour barcons, which I used to run > nearly exclusively on all drop-bar bikes. > > My move to the dark side of indexing stated with the DT shifters though, > which index beautifully since there's only one loop in the housing. > > > > > > > > > > On Fri, Jul 29, 2011 at 5:00 AM, Forrest <ftme...@me.com> wrote: > > Among those of you who now use downtube shifters (or have in the past), how > > many of you are confirmed fans of downtube shifting, and how many of you > > tried it as an experiment but then switched to a different shifting system > > that you felt was better? Oh, and any thoughts re downtube indexed vs. > > downtube friction would be welcome. > > > Thanks, -- Forrest (Iowa City) > > > -- > > 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/-/ewWKs5Wvv_gJ. > > To post to this group, send email to rbw-owners-bunch@googlegroups.com. > > To unsubscribe from this group, send email to > > rbw-owners-bunch+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. > > For more options, visit this group at > >http://groups.google.com/group/rbw-owners-bunch?hl=en. > > -- > John Speare > Spokane, WA USAhttp://cyclingspokane.blogspot.com/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. To post to this group, send email to rbw-owners-bunch@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to rbw-owners-bunch+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/rbw-owners-bunch?hl=en.
