3 Speed Fixed Big Block

January 14th, 2010 / Jeff

After a few botched tries, I think I’ve finally got my 3 speed setup dialed

A few months ago Sturmey sent over a 3 Speed Fixed Hub for me to try out.  Embarrassingly I haven’t gotten it together until now and this morning was my first ride on it.  I had originally routed the shifter cable along the downtube to the chainstay, using a band clamp to act as the cable stop on the stay.  Within the first mile of my ride this morning the cable pulled free of the clamp rendering shifting impossible as all it would do is pull the cable housing further towards the hub and I was left pedalling a 43 X13 gear.  I stopped at a hardware store and bought a bigger band clamp, mounted both clamps and tried again.  No luck.  So this afternoon one of the homies from Bike Builder suggested I try using one of the Surly cable hangers as my stop, and run the cable along the seatstay. 

There were a couple of issues with attaching the hanger in the center of the post clamp, namely that it would rub on the stay, so I moved it to the outside of the bolt and presto, it works like magic. (sorry the  photos don’t do a good job of showing that the hanger is bolted to the outside of the collar instead of hanging in the center open area)

If you’re wondering why my dropouts look like that it’s because this is the original proto Big Block, before we had the nice forged versions

Sturmey’s shifter

Super stoked to try this out on the way home tonight.  I’ll let you know how it goes. Wish me luck.