Pedalling out of the saddle with a Sturmey Archer AW hub

[gazza_d]

The nice thing about the no drive position of the original AW is that, when used with a derailleur system (hybrid drive), it enables one to swop sprockets whilst stationary. Brilliant!

That's a heck of a trick.

I fitted two sprockets to the fw4 in my first Moulton. Not sure if fw4s have the same trick but never thought to try.

[Sid Aluminium]

AWs are not Sturmey's best idea.

Ah, 'best'. Slippery word, that.

Reilly's X - now there was a three-speed hub. Quite a bit more dear to manufacture than the AW, though. Is there a market for an expensive three-speed IGH? Surely not since the debut of the FM in '39, and possibly some twenty years before that.

Sturmey-Archer's historical documents indicate they never considered, promoted or intended the AW to be the be-all and end-all of IGHs. Rather, it was designed to be 'good enough' - and so it has proven to be for lo these many decades.

[Sid Aluminium]

Even on an AW, I basically only (pedal out of the saddle) when it's out the bottom of my gear range and the alternative is walking up the hill...

Just so. It seems rather unlikely the hub would slip out of second gear when one is pedaling in first.

[Brucey]

The nice thing about the no drive position of the original AW is that, when used with a derailleur system (hybrid drive), it enables one to swop sprockets whilst stationary. Brilliant!

That's a heck of a trick.

I fitted two sprockets to the fw4 in my first Moulton. Not sure if fw4s have the same trick but never thought to try.

FW and FG hubs also have a neutral between 3 and 4 in the same way as an AW has a neutral between 2 and 3. They use the same cruciform clutch as AW.

Re the AW design, it was meant to be functional, cheap to manufacture, easy to repair. If it was such a terrible idea there wouldn't have been at least a dozen different licence-manufactured versions of it. Even Sun Tour sold their own 3s gear which was a SA AW inside, at a time when Japan were busy becoming the bicycle component workshop of the world.

cheers

[6.5_lives_left]

I came a cropper riding a Sturmey Archer hub gear bike after just a handful of outings. I am pretty sure it was because I was riding out of the saddle. Next thing I knew I had come off the bike, falling to the left and struck my head on a wall made of flints (A common building material round my way). I got a nasty cut to my left eye and may have been knocked out momentarily. Trip to A&E in an ambulance to have the gash sewn up.

I had bought the bike for use a a hack bike. I gave up using the bike after that incident. That happened about 8 years ago. I can pin down the date because I still had the black eye and stitches when I went for my job interview a couple of weeks later.

This was after many years experience of using a Sachs spectro7 and various shimano IGH's. I have never had those hubs slip, so I wasn't ready for when the Sturmey Archer hub did what it does. It is more than likely that I didn't have the shifting properly adjusted but I was (am) a complete newbie with this hub and didn't know better.

[Andy Short]

Never had a post NIG hub.
I have had 5 or 6 'AW's' and maintained several others for friends. I have never been shy of standing on the pedals up a steep hill.
Never had a problem with false neutrals, in fact, I have only ever had one fail. On a tandem, the cruciform distorted and engaged two gears at once, the drive chain locked solid and we coasted to a halt up the moderate gradient.
My secret, other than checking the internals are in good condition, is to make sure the toggle chain and cable move freely. Pull the lever in from top to get a neutral, then in to second, adjusting so the neutral is midway.
I also never changed gear while standing

[simonineaston]

I'm almost tempted to revisit my old ambition to create a Moulton Safari-a-like with an SA/freewheel transmission...

[jb]

They way I adjust the gear change is to put it in first then tighten the cable so there is just the faintest amount of movent left in the cable. You know then that second is engaged as much as it can be. When in third the cable should go slack, proving it's as engaged as it can be.

Never understood SA's odd way of setting it up.

[Brucey]

that is fine but it makes no allowance for faulty/worn shifters. If the shifter might be bad, or the control rod might be the wrong length (more common than you might expect) ideally you need to do the check I outlined upthread, in which the engagement of second gear (from neutral) is assessed.

All shifters can wear, and possibly the worst of these is the current SA thumbshifter; this has a slightly longer cable pull from 2 to 1 anyway, and it has a certain amount of 'sticky backlash' from the start. As the lever wears (and corrodes inside... ) this 'sticky backlash' just gets worse and worse, and eventually the lever won't latch into first gear (without overstressing the cable) and retain good gear 2 adjustment, not both at the same time.

cheers