Pursuit of Perfection : New Life for Old Parts

Perfectionism, I believe, is not as bad as some would make it out to be. For me, perfectionism is the art, and sometimes science, of improvement. The last time I rode the SUB was over a month ago and needed some cleaning from all of its rain riding. Something that has been on my mind is to ever improve the location of the shifters. Ultimately, and if I had money to burn, I would have down tube shifter bosses brazed on. However, money to burn is not one of my luxuries at the moment. So, after re-browsing around on the web looking for ideas and/or ready made parts and even more time introverting some ideas I came up with a solution that, well, has me pretty pleased.

In the previously most current version  you can see the shifters are mounted on the handlebars and rotated to the front. For the most part, this worked out, though a few gears were a bit awkward to work. Also, aesthetically, it was not as clean as I would have liked.

The new version, I think, is much, much cleaner looking. In addition, the shifting works very similar to the old stem-mounted shifters. I can use just my thumb or thumb and forefinger to shift. Riding on the tops is now unobstructed. Total new expense as $18.00 for new bar wrap.

My "perfect" solution consisted of recycling a set of aero bars that I had way back in my early to mid-90's cycling days, that clamp to the handlebars. I removed the armrest pads and arms, then tested to see which position and location would work best.

Here you can see where I cut most of the aero bar tubes. After short road-testing the different position options, the one that felt best was mounting the aero bar tubes below and facing rearward. This position has the shifters out of the way, but very easy to reach. It is hard to see in the image, but the shifters are also on the rearward side of the bars versus before they were located to the front.

{edit note: ARGH!! Some things about blogger frustrate the bejeezers outta me. It won't upload an in progress image I have without auto-rotating which the image does not need! Sorry I can't share it with you.}

I'll give the update a full road test starting tomorrow on my commute to work, so that should give me a very good idea on how the new design functions.

Bars wrapped and extra end-plugs in the cut down aero bar tubes - ready to roll. I really like that I really do  have the full bar tops available for hand positions.

I might packrat things, but every now and then it has its rewards. From go-faster aerobars, sitting off in a corner in storage, to new life as shifter mounts.