my daughters gear shifting woes

toslow

Hi , all
wondering if anyone could help.
My daughter has a six speed bike with the very typical cheap shimano twist shift and rear mech.
The problem she is having only being eight is she has little hands and changing to a the lower gears is a problem ,as it seems she cannot grip the shift with enough purchase to pull the ' throttle' back .
The cables are as free moving as they can be , so it's not that .
I was wondering if anybody has had this problem with there child and if they had resolved this issue .
My thought was , i may have to purchase a seven speed freewheel so i can run a trigger shifter set up .
I would be very grateful for any advice as this this gear shifting issue becomes very frustrating for her and inturn is putting her off of riding altogether .
thanks again.

ride_whenever

how much does she use the gears? single speed? Start 'em young they say!

I think some of them have replaceable grips... might be worth looking into.

there are these are these the ones she has? if not they might be smaller.

toslow

Yeah thats the sort of grips she has but hers are shimano which as you say may be thicker.
The single speed option may be something to look into if i can convince her as to the benefits of a singlespeed, problem is her friends have geared bikes and you know what peer presher can be these days .
I think i may pop to my LBS and see if they have the shifters you have shown me to see if her hands fit them better .
Thanks for swift reply .

ride_whenever

I'd also look into thinner grips for them, might be possible...

Also I'm really bored...

lovewales

We had exactly the same problem with our daughter and her little hands, we resorted to putting a trigger shifter onto her bike to allow her to change gear. She however does not have the strength in her thumb to push it so she operates it a bit like a door handle which means she has to be looking ahead for hills etc. She is much happier with this and manages fine, even on single track.

If your daughter is trying to use the gears give it a go you may find your rides together don't take as long once she gets the hang of it.

BorisSpencer

Would switching from Shimano to SRAM help, the 2:1 ratio should double her mechanical advantage ?

nicklouse

shimano is the 2:1 ratio and sram is the 1:1.

but as the shimano ratio is the wrong way round to help little hands you are still thinking the right way.

I would also have a look at the cheep nasty Sram triggers that are basically a push pull option SX4 or some such as they feel very light in action.

I hate them

vorsprung

Kid bikes have too many gears

My 11 yr old daughters current one has 18 ( 3 x 6 )

She always keeps it in the granny ring at the front and is either in the smallest spocket or the largest one. She can't trim the derailuers correctly to prevent rub in the gears in between ( not surprsingly ) and doesn't like the noise it makes

A bike with 3 gears would be better for her

londonlivvy

I don't have children but have lots of friends with them and they all rave about http://www.islabikes.com/ - designed specially so small hands can reach (and have enough strength to use) the brakes + gears.

I'm told there's also a system of buying back bikes once they've grown out of them.