Dingling (ding a ling?).... part one
part one.. mostly a success...
a month or so back i posted about wanting to have a gear to ride to the trail and a different gear to ride while on the trails... eliminate the automobile part... and with our short and steep (and rocky and rooty) Hudson Valley trails, my trail gear is 32/22 (love it!)..
i found a sram dub to shimano 104 adapter with edges/lips on the inside and the outside on eBay... local shop for the thick and heavy KMC singlespeed chain and Surly steel cogs and steel chainrings.. super heavy... should last years...
i chose the gearing to be the same number of teeth... so my 32/22 for the trail became 34/20 for the road... oh.. tires are 29 x 2.8" at 12 to 15 psi... slow...
i was hoping with a loose enough chain that I could just force the chain to change with my hand and never loosen the sliders.... no shift ramps on the cogs and the aforementioned thick chain said no...
so now probably a chain tensioner hanging from the middle of the chainring... should work.. i have a CNC machine.. shouldn't be that hard, right?
just general singlespeeding in the woods notes:
this 34/20 in tight woods is a big boy gear.. to spin this at a proper cadence on my bike in tight singletrack was flying! i could do it in most sections.. but it is intense.. you just have to keep the momentum up so much more than a 32/22... fun, but i feel like i missed some of the enjoying the woods part...
i also left one more link on the chain than i had previously.. so the chainstays were 1/2" longer.. 12.7mm... it was VERY obvious... the taller gear made for a bit tougher wheelie up onto things, but the chainstays clearly contributed to that.. the bike felt very solid and grounded.. not as playful... but it also felt a bit more monster truck... if you just kept momentum up then you felt confident that you would make it through nearly anything...
so.. any other dinglers out there?