Ditching The Derailleur

Lets talk about the elephant in the room, or better yet - the elephant hanging off the back of your bike.

It's a fragile elephant, while not bulky or necessarily super heavy, it does stick out for the world to have a crack at while your out shredding your favourite trail. Combine that with a heavy rear cluster and we have a great example of how to reverse engineer an idea. Stick with it, and all will be clear...

Imagine, for a moment, that mountain bikes (or all bikes) were always internal gearbox driven, with said gearbox centred in the middle of the bike - where shifting is lightening fast, protected from the elements and the unsprung mass on the rear of your bike is reduced. Now move to the scene of the boardroom of "Big Bike Co" - and you're about to pitch your new idea for a drive train system, which goes something like this:

"This new system adds a fragile piece of equipment called a derailleur, along with a cluster of rings with teeth (which is very heavy), on to the rear hub of your bike. Your shifting will be slower, less efficient, with less gear range and it'll add to the weight on the back of your bike which will make everything bounce around much more on the rowdier trails, and you'll just have to make sure you don't damage it, because it's fragile (did I mention that already?) and it sticks out. But I really do think this new system is gonna fly, and our shareholders will be extremely pleased!"

There are two possible scenarios and one certainty in the immediate aftermath of your pitch:

Scenario A ) You'd get laughed out of the room.

Scenario B) Complete silence followed by tumble weeds that somehow appear.

Certainty: You'd get fired.

When it's presented this way, does a derailleur still make sense?

Find out what the benefits of a gearbox are. www.zerodebikes.com