9 speed MTB shifters for a road bike?

neil_sheehan2000

Hi all.

Long story short, I broke my wrist in a crash a while ago and now can't ride my road bike without bricking it about falling over. Doesn't help that the bike is just too small/short for me to be honest, and having all my weight so far forward kind of scares me. So, until I can secure a C2W voucher for a proper sized bike, and to save me riding my 2-grand mountain bike to work, I think I'm going to swap the drop bars on my road bike for some MTB style flats/risers. Question is, will MTB 9 speed shifters work on my 9 speed road bike?

Also, I may as well ask, will MTB v-brake levers work on my road bike's calipers? I'm assuming that, if anything, they'll pull too much cable and make the brakes extra sharp. Which is not such a problem as I've got a lot of adjustability on an old set of Mavic v-brake levers that are lying around.

Thanks in advance.

EDIT: p.s. I realise, thinking about it, that the shifters will have to pull the same ratio. The mechs on my road bike are Campag Mirage, probably about 8 years old (maybe...), if that helps at all...

Aapje

I think I'm going to swap the drop bars on my road bike for some MTB style flats/risers.

Keep in mind that frames for flatbars tend to have a longer top tube than frames for road bikes. So you might want to fit a longer stem to have a better position on the bike.

neil_sheehan2000 wrote:

Question is, will MTB 9 speed shifters work on my 9 speed road bike?

No, the pull is different. You can try to use a Jtek Shiftmate #1 to convert the ratio's, like this guy did:

http://forums.mtbr.com/showthread.php?t=443523

Also, I may as well ask, will MTB v-brake levers work on my road bike's calipers? I'm assuming that, if anything, they'll pull too much cable and make the brakes extra sharp.

Correct.

Aidy

Aapje wrote:

neil_sheehan2000 wrote:

Question is, will MTB 9 speed shifters work on my 9 speed road bike?

No, the pull is different. You can try to use a Jtek Shiftmate #1 to convert the ratio's, like this guy did:

http://forums.mtbr.com/showthread.php?t=443523

Probably better off picking up a cheap Shimano mech.

The Rookie

Best way is to pick up mechs to go with your MTB shifters Either using Shimano road mechs or Shimano or SRAM MTB parts.

As has been said, yes you'll need MTB brakes to go with the MTB levers.

Simon

kieronymous

Tiagra road shifters work perfectly well with a Deore LX MTB deraillieur on my Spesh Tricross (both are 'as sold' on the bike). I don't see how it couldn't work in reverse. Of course, those are both Shimano parts.

I think that's what other posters are getting at - different brands don't always work together.

Re brakes, provided you can dial in plenty of 'dead pull' into your Mavic levers you should be mostly OK. Alternatively you could get a travel adjuster linkage. Road lever to V brake adjusters (e.g. a "Travel Agent") are available, could one of those be mounted in reverse perhaps?