Cycling UK Forum

Bike Works in Nottingham might be another one. It's a community bike workshop.

https://www.nottinghambikeworks.org.uk/

Thanks.

I have one close if you're in a car but a long way on a bike with knackered gears. It just seemed like I could upgrade my gears without the hassle of going out there, but maybe not...

Is that the Microshift website? That's the factory 'Decathlon' derailleur in the screenshot, so maybe the answer is simply to buy a replacement, for the sake of £14.

So, based on no 2, if I understand you correctly, getting a Shimano 9 shifter should work, and that's what I planned to do. But looking at the options on Wiggle, it seems to me specific shifters don't work with all their derailleurs, so I was after any advice on which work with which...

Even more confused now...

The gearset is Decathlon 9-ring, factory. The current shifter, according to Decathlon's spec, is a BTWIN SL569 shifter (here: https://www.decathlon.co.uk/500-hybrid- ... 50466.html). If they don't make their own, presumably they've rebadged someone else's, so how do I find out whose?

I understood my tech to say a 10-speed derailleur would replace the Decathlon factory one because what's needed is sufficient range of movement, and the shift would supply the necessary number of 'clicks' across that gear. But that applies to road bikes but not hybrids?

Is the bottom line here that I need derailleur and gearset to match, so get a specifically 9-speed derailleur or alternatively get a 10 ring gearset?

... because I'm confused.

I had to replace the factory derailleur on my Btwin Riverside 500 because the cage got bent, and 'my' bike tech said anything which could cope with 9+ gears at the back would be fine, so I bought one of these from Wiggle and fitted it:

https://www.wiggle.co.uk/shimano-deore- ... 5360634017

However, I couldn't get it set up remotely properly and so got him on the job, and it turns out the Btwin gear shift doesn't pull enough cable through to work with the Shimano mech, so I need to get a compatible (preferably Shimano) gear shift. I'm once bitten twice shy now, and it's really not clear from the website what'll work with what, so I thought I'd ask people who actually know what they're talking about. Wiggle apparently have no way to ask them stuff like this...

Thanks. Saumur is the nearest town so will definitely go there... I'll check out the others.

I'm planning a cycling holiday with a friend in the Loire valley in May, and I have few questions.

The idea is to take our bikes down there on the back of a car, meet up with friends who have rented a house, and use it as a base for pootling - very much Three (or Two) Men On The Brummel rather than anything involving lycra.

• How well does the Chunnel and bike racks work?
• If we were to hire a car in the UK, are there any specialists in carrying bikes? (I'm thinking about potential bike-rack related damage and insurance especially)
• Any recommendations for Loire and bike related activities?

Thanks (and feel free to point me in the direction of any threads already covering this kind of thing - I couldn't find any).

So an update...

I was overthinking. I put some toeclips on and they're okay. I've got used to them and my feet do feel a little more secure, I can get my toes into them fairly easily, and also out of them. Wouldn't necessarily miss them if they went though.

dobbo800 wrote:My commute sounds very similar to yours.

On my current bike I swapped out the original, crap, narrow, flat pedals for good quality - light, good bearings, wide, grippy - flat ones. I wear boxing trainers because the sole is flat and grippy and they have Velcro fastening. This combination works for me - I can't recall one incident of feet slipping off pedals, and I ride 5-days-a-week-all-year-round. In terms of 'lost performance', you're commuting a short distance (5 miles?) not racing. Any gains would be tiny (what really affects commute times is traffic lights, cars, wind, pedestrians....). On an urban commute what's important for me is to be able to get my foot off the pedal and onto the ground as quickly as possible, without hassle. So no clips for me. Biggest priority for me? Full mudguards! They make such a difference.

All this, pretty much. Performance gains are easily trounced by a couple of inconveniently timed traffic lights. My pedals seem okay and ancient running shoes are grippy enough - I'm just back from a weekend cycling on the Norfolk coast, though it tended towards the 'slightly circuitous route to the pub' rather than 'thigh-crunching marathon' end of things - and had no problems.

drossall wrote:It does come quite naturally with a little practice. And, like riding a bike, it's not something you forget once learnt. I wouldn't let this be the decider, except that it becomes a pain when you're doing it every 100 metres.

My commute wouldn't involved this quite every 100 metres, but maybe averaging every 500m, or at least potentially if the lights/traffic didn't go my way.

It's the 'little practice' bit that bothers me - the practice would involve a couple of weeks (I know my level of cack-footedness). It seems to me that the left pedal would need flipping round every single time, because gravity would pull the heavier side of the pedal - the one with the clip - underneath. So I'd need to whack the back of the it with my toes then flip my toe up just at the right moment to catch the spinning pedal as it moved on the crank, because I'd already be pedalling forwards, probably with a white van up my rear. Repeat every 3-4 minutes, wobbling violently and/or falling over, in traffic, every time I re-started, and in between times, getting stressed about the next time I have to perform the manoeuvre all over again...

I'm fully prepared to believe this is entirely me finding this hugely difficult, but if there's some easier way of doing it, I'd love to know.

Thanks for the replies. Glad to see I'm not the only sceptic... No particular axe to grind, I just wondered if I was missing something vital with toeclips, but it seems not.

I also wear retired running shoes for cycling, and I'm realising I'm definitely at the utilitarian end of the cycling spectrum so I prefer minimal faff. And I'm definitely far too cack-footed to easily get the hang of flipping pedals round as I accelerate away from lights.

I'm getting back into cycling to commute (urban, about 25 minutes) to work on a Decathlon hybrid, plus some weekend canalpath/railway line excursions. A friend has been moderately insistent I get toe clips because of the - alleged - pull-up, so I just spent an unbelievably frustrating 30 minutes attaching a cheap pair from Halfords, only to find I really don't like them. At all.

The weight of the clip makes the pedal swivel round so it's underneath any time I take my foot of the pedal (at lights, for example). Flipping the pedal round to get my right foot back in the clip is mildly annoying but I expect I'd get used to it. But then it seems that as I ride off, mostly, in my case, in rush hour traffic, I apparently have to flip the left pedal round, catch it with my foot, and slot my foot in, as I change up through the gears and attempt not to get cut up and find a reasonably assertively safe road position. I doubt I'll live long enough to get the hang of this before I end up under a bus.

And for my purposes - a fairly short city commute, with no massive hills - I really don't buy this 'pull up' thing. I'd have to be pulling up with more significant force than these clips look like they'd take, before it would make any difference to anything.

Also, having my feet attached to the pedals just feels unsafe. My feet (in perfectly normal trainers) just don't slip off the pedals, but if I did veer or wobble, getting my feet out of the clips would take a few fractions of a second which might make all the difference, or might just mean I twist my ankle. It's a solution to a non existent problem, for me.

Am I missing something, or am I just the wrong use case for toe clips?