rohloff or 11/12 speed cassette

[wotsthat]

in the process of building a recumbent trike for touring - initially was going for a rohloff speed hub but then chatting with a friend last night he's saying that i'd be better off with sram/shimano 11/12 speed rear and have a greater range of gears - i know the rohloffs are reliable and low maintenance (which was the reason i was edging that way - mmm , What to do? What to do?

 

[Cycleops]

How big is your wallet and how much do value low maintenance?

 

[Ming the Merciless]

With Rohloff you'll be able to change multiple gears when stopped. Can't do that with a derailleur. No getting stuck in the wrong gear when ready to start at the lights or an uphill.

 

[numbnuts]

You can buy a lot of cassettes with the price of a rohloff,
Ah maintenance free you say how long does it take to clean a chain and a squirt of oil
and with a recumbent if chain runs through a tube most do they stay cleaner

 

[Tigerbiten]

Your best bet for for a wide range on a trike is a wide triple on the front with a SA CS-RF3 3 speed hub with a 9 block cassette on the back.
It's possible to get a 10x range, ~12.5"-125" with this setup.
You normally run is the middle gear on the hub due to low drag, but the other two gears will act as an under/over drive as needed.
You can also drop a range if you stop in the wrong gear.

I looked into something like that before getting my Schlumpf HSD-Rohloff setup.

Luck ........

 

[arallsopp]

With Rohloff you'll be able to change multiple gears when stopped. Can't do that with a derailleur. No getting stuck in the wrong gear when ready to start at the lights or an uphill.

I run a few ‘bents, including one tandem with a Rohloff rear. The cable run on that one would preclude any kind of sensible indexing with a derailleur setup, and it’s proven to be very low maintenance. As YukonBoy said, you can just grab a fist full of gears after an unexpected stop and resume with ease.

The others (mostly 3x10s) have a much wider range of gears, and those with tubes can be shifted down to the granny ring at a standstill be simply pedalling backwards, nudging the chain tube with your heel, and shifting to meet the chain line as it comes back around the chainring.

Given I’m on two wheels, I would think this even easier on three, as your trike doesn’t fall over when it stops I have to do it clipped in and with a single foot

 

[PaulM]

The others (mostly 3x10s) have a much wider range of gears, and those with tubes can be shifted down to the granny ring at a standstill be simply pedalling backwards, nudging the chain tube with your heel, and shifting to meet the chain line as it comes back around the chainring.

I'd never thought of that. That's great tip. :-)

 

[Tigerbiten]

If you are going for a Rohloff, have you thought of putting a triple at the front.
A 30-39-50 with add an extra 4 gears and a 30-39-56 will add 5.
Starting around 13" first gear, then the top gear is lifted from around 70" to around 120" or 140".
With the 30t chainring, then the 16t sprocket works with a 26" back wheel and the 13t sprocket with a 20".
The Rohloff chain tensioner works with the first triple but you'll need to lock a derailleur in place for the second.
Starting with a 20" wheel and a 13 sprocket, a 26-38-56 triple will give you 6 more gears, 10.5"-116", but you need to mod a front derailleur for that to work.

 

[snorri]

You can buy a lot of cassettes with the price of a rohloff,

Or to put that another way, you have to choose between Rohloff reliability or having the inconvenience and time consuming activities of ordering and fitting replacement components at regular intervals, during some of that time your bike will be out of service.

 

[Cycleops]

With Rohloff you'll be able to change multiple gears when stopped. Can't do that with a derailleur. No getting stuck in the wrong gear when ready to start at the lights or an uphill.

Or to put that another way, you have to choose between Rohloff reliability or having the inconvenience and time consuming activities of ordering and fitting replacement components at regular intervals, during some of that time your bike will be out of service.

All of which is perhaps overshadowed by trying to explain to 'er indoors or whoever that you need to spend around £1.5k on a lump of metal for changing gear that does the same job as a derailleur at a fraction of that .

 

[Tilley]

With the 11 speed derailleur you will a long cage rear changer and if you are running a 20" rear wheel this results in very little clearance which was the primary reason I opted for the sturmley archer hub gear and 9 speed close ratio block as described b Tigerbiten earlier in this thread.

 

[snorri]

All of which is perhaps overshadowed by trying to explain to 'er indoors or whoever that you need to spend around £1.5k on a lump of metal for changing gear that does the same job as a derailleur at a fraction of that .

I'm sure there must be another forum for relationship counselling.

 

[Tigerbiten]

With a bent trike, you soon run into the limits of what a derailleur setup can do.
The limit for a front derailleur is 26 teeth, so 22-36-48 gives you a maximum range of 218%.
The limit of a rear derailleur is around 49 teeth, so add 2 for luck so that the chain rubs on the derailleur when running small-small.
51-26=25 so an 11-36 block works, which gives you a range of 327%.
Combining them give you a total range of 713% or 15"-107" on a 26" wheel.
It doesn't matter if you use a 7 block or a 13 block at the back, without modding the rear derailleur to cope with more teeth, that the maximum range of a pure derailleur setup.

Now you know why I started to look at none pure derailleur setup when I had my latest trike built.
I was after 10"-130".
With my Rohloff and HSD with twin chainrings setup I ended up with 9.4"-179.4" or 1905% .......

Luck ........

 

[Nigelnightmare]

With a bent trike, you soon run into the limits of what a derailleur setup can do.
The limit for a front derailleur is 26 teeth, so 22-36-48 gives you a maximum range of 218%.
The limit of a rear derailleur is around 49 teeth, so add 2 for luck so that the chain rubs on the derailleur when running small-small.
51-26=25 so an 11-36 block works, which gives you a range of 327%.
Combining them give you a total range of 713% or 15"-107" on a 26" wheel.
It doesn't matter if you use a 7 block or a 13 block at the back, without modding the rear derailleur to cope with more teeth, that the maximum range of a pure derailleur setup.

Now you know why I started to look at none pure derailleur setup when I had my latest trike built.
I was after 10"-130".
With my Rohloff and HSD with twin chainrings setup I ended up with 9.4"-179.4" or 1905% .......

Luck ........

Why is the limit for the front derailleur 26 teeth?

 

[Tigerbiten]

Why is the limit for the front derailleur 26 teeth?

It may not be exactly 26 teeth but it's very close to that.

The depth of the front cage limits the maximum difference between chainrings.
Put the chain on the big chainring and measure the gap in mm between the chain and the bottom of the cage.
Divide by 2 and that's the maximum number of teeth possible between the big chainring and small.
Exceed that number and the chain starts to rub on the bottom of the cage when you drop onto the small chainring.

If you've seen any posts on running quad chainrings then that was only possible by combining two cages to make one extra deep one.
Basically you cut the bottom off one cage and the other cage just behind the pivot points, now solder the two parts together to make an extra long/deep cage.
The "mountain tamer quad" adapter then lets you use a sprocket as a fourth chainring for something like 53-39-30-18.
This was from the days when 32 was a big sprocket.

Luck .........