Temporarily turning a 20 speed road bike into single speed

Cats Eyes

Hi folks,

I broke the rear shifter on my road bike & I'm still waiting for the replacement shifter to arrive.
In the mean time I decided I'd turn the bike into a single speed so I could still use it. I removed the rear mech & shortened the chain but I'm finding it difficult to find an appropriate chain length. It's either too tight or too loose. Any tips you can offer? The chainset is a 50/30 with a 12-25 cassette.

Pseudonym

if you have vertical dropouts (which you probably do), you will need something like this...

http://www.on-one.co.uk/i/q/FSOOSSD/on-one-doofer

gilesjuk

Sounds like a lot of wasted effort for a temporary fix.

Bikes with vertical dropouts require a cable tensioner. This what the rear mech does for you.

All you needed to do was find a ratio you liked (somewhere down the middle) then lock the rear mech in place by adjusting the limit screws or undoing the cable clamp and moving the mech to the desired location and then tightening it up again (trimming with the cable trimmers on the down tube).

With the rear mech in place you can still use the front mech for swapping between two ratios, hills and flat mode

Cats Eyes

gilesjuk wrote:

All you needed to do was find a ratio you liked (somewhere down the middle) then lock the rear mech in place by adjusting the limit screws or undoing the cable clamp and moving the mech to the desired location and then tightening it up again (trimming with the cable trimmers on the down tube).

The rear shifter & cables have been removed from the bike. I can't follow any of the above advice when the rear mech has no cable fixed to it, or can I?

sheffsimon

Cats Eyes wrote:

gilesjuk wrote:

All you needed to do was find a ratio you liked (somewhere down the middle) then lock the rear mech in place by adjusting the limit screws or undoing the cable clamp and moving the mech to the desired location and then tightening it up again (trimming with the cable trimmers on the down tube).

The rear shifter & cables have been removed from the bike. I can't follow any of the above advice when the rear mech has no cable fixed to it, or can I?

Depends which rear sprocket you choose. If the lower limit screw can be screwed far enough in to push the derailleur over enough then you dont need the cable.

Cats Eyes

Thanks for the feedback guys, I'll give it a go!