right hand shimano 105 shifter question

[deckertim]

Just got a new bike and this has shimano 105 shifters like my other bike. However, they operate completely different to each other.
On the old bike, shifting the little lever moves the chain to a bigger rear sprocket. On the new bike it is the other way round.
Am I right in thinking this is fixed and can't be changed. Can anyone enlighten me on the reason for the difference.
Thanks, Tim

 

[PpPete]

Sound like a "Rapid Rise" rear mech ? They are "backwards"

 

[buggi]

On your old bike, it was the wrong way round.

The bigger lever shifts to a big sprocket. The small lever only moves once click at a time, and that's to drop to a smaller sprocket. It doesn't matter whether it's left or right shifter, the effect is the same, the big lever for the bigger sprocket, the smaller for the little one.

the only thing is that shifting to the smaller sprocket with the right shifter (your rear casette) has the opposite effect to the left shifter (your front rings). on the rear cassette, the smallest sprocket is the hardest, on the front rings the smallest sprocket is the easiest.

However, as far as the actual shifters are concerned, it remains the same for both... small lever = small ring, big lever = big ring.

 

[buggi]

Sound like a "Rapid Rise" rear mech ? They are "backwards"

OR THIS ... (i'd never heard of it)

 

[rb58]

On your old bike, it was the wrong way round.

The bigger lever shifts to a big sprocket. The small lever only moves once click at a time, and that's to drop to a smaller sprocket. It doesn't matter whether it's left or right shifter, the effect is the same, the big lever for the bigger sprocket, the smaller for the little one.

+1

On both mine (1 x Tiagra; 1 x Ultegra) the bigger lever shifts the chain to a larger sprocket, and the small lever shifts down (one click at a time). To be honest I've never heard of it working the other way around.

 

[frank9755]

+1 more

Rapid rise, or low normal rear mechs are the work of the devil.

Shimano introduced them for reasons that were not entirely clear, but they weren't very popular and I think they may have dropped them. But they were fitted on some new bikes c.6-18 months ago.

Tim, you have clearly come under the spell of these evil devices, but I'm sure you'll soon get used to it being the normal way round. It's better because you sometimes want / need to be able to shift down more than one gear at a time, while you never need to shift up by multiple gears.

 

[deckertim]

Thanks everyone for clarifying.
I got used to it pretty quickly when I was out on my first ride on the new bike. Still confused as to which bike has which system though!
Ross, for the record I got up Exedown Hill this time with plenty of gears to spare! Got to get a new saddle though.