Following an accident at work that left me with a fused right thumb joint and missing tendons, I have now started to get osteoarthritis in the basal joint of the thumb. The way my hand is now means I can either grip or brake. Riding off road is a real problem as my hand tends to let go when it gets rocky especially if I’m trying to brake at same time. I can’t really contemplate life without cycling so I am thinking about ways to get round it and maybe linked brakes might be the answer. A web search finds this: http://www.bikeradar.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=10002&t=13001281
Anybody got any other ideas, words of wisdom etc?

not a clue, but in the meantime, have you tried different fingers? set your lever position as close to the bar as possible?

Ben Cooper (Kinetics) would be a good one to talk to.He builds trikes/quads etc and so will have done the linked brake thing (also he’s a bloody nice guy).
Also here

There was recently a story in MBUK about the Lad who works in Mojo who lost use of one of his arms, he’s got a very clever set-up with both brakes on the same end of the bar – it would be worth seaking that out.

It might be a better option that linked brakes, if you’re limited to having to use both brakes all the time and with a set amount of force it’s going to be very limiting for you.

set your brake levers so they’re horizontal / close to horizontal – that way you don’t need to ‘grip’ the bars, and you can still brake.

(it forces you to ‘drop’ your wrists, and it works in roughly the same way as dropping your heels gives you more grip on flat pedals)

The chaps at NotBroken might be able to offer some advice?

Empty Home

Might it be possible to set up a normal lever for the front brake and a thumb lever for the rear (think opposite side lever mounted behind the bar with the lever rejigged so you can push it with your thumb) on the same side of the bars?

A single Zee or Saint master cylinder pushing two SLX calipers through two lines might work for linked brakes though (assuming the Zee m/c piston is larger than an SLX one.)

Zee/saint levers are the same as xt/slx levers

My pub bike has it’s brake lever on backwards – the lever points towards the stem. If you had 2 levers on the same side, one on the right way round the other wrong but both levers almost touching, whilst you’re braking your hand would be way inboard but it might work.

A coaster brake?

Ben Cooper (Kinetics) would be a good one to talk to.He builds trikes/quads etc and so will have done the linked brake thing (also he’s a bloody nice guy).

Aw shucks 😉

There’s a few ways to do it:

– Paired lever. There’s a few brake levers which pull two cables at once, with separate barrel adjusters.

– One-into-two adaptor, a widget that lets one cable pull two cables.

– Paired hydraulic discs, my favourite option – Tektro make a special version of the Auriga which uses one lever to operate both calipers.

Hope V-Twin (hydro brakes) with any of the mechanical dual-cable lever systems.

Thanks all.
Just to explain it a bit better – if I have my first two fingers covering the brake lever blade and have my thumb as a brace, with my other two fingers wrapped around the bar I can’t maintain enough grip. I need to wrap all my fingers round the bar to hold on. Rigging something up for the mtb might be easier than for cx/road drop bars but we’ll see.

Ben – some of those sound like options. Don’t suppose you can give me links?
Really appreciate everyone’s suggestions, btw.

Presumably different size disks for “brake balance”

Paired lever: https://www.sjscycles.co.uk/brake-levers/twin-pull-v-brake-lever-right/

Cable doubler: http://www.ison-distribution.com/english/product.php?part=BSQBCD12

A mate of mine has very limited use of his left arm following a stroke, we got hold of a secondhand RH lever on eBay and put just both brake levers on the same side. Rear brake below and inboard of the front. Gives better control, with separate front and rear, and a very simple solution that you can try out without laying out tons of cash. I was able to use it to control the bike just fine straight away. Even with big chunky Hope levers you can arrange them in a workable layout, and if you go for something low profile like Avid/SRAM then you can get them very close indeed.

Worth dropping Hope an email about this too. There used to be a lad that raced DH (and was rapid) with a hand missing. So he was hooked on one side with both brakes controlled from the other. It was a while ago, but they might still have something in mind

i used to build up DH wheel chairs and husky rigs which would have a disc brake on each of the 4 wheels.
Most people were using two hayes levers on each side that were crudely bolted together.
I contacted hope who made some connectors that they unsure would work, but with some creative bleed techniques they worked well and had good lever feel.

“man w/ one hand” on MTBR had a set up like that and has plenty of posts and info.

Check this thread for ideas, but also check his hsitory

http://forums.mtbr.com/general-discussion/help-setting-up-rig-one-hand-control-835034.html

I rode in the Alps with a lad with only one arm. He had two brake levers on one side and was able to use both with one hand. I think they were Forumla brakes.

I’ve used the paired lever: https://www.sjscycles.co.uk/brake-levers/twin-pull-v-brake-lever-right/ as mentioned by Ben to adapt a bike for a friend who can’t use her left hand. It worked well and is an inexpensive option.

Somethink like the motorcycle Dualever would be nice, I guess…

also: http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/fettlers-mechanics-and-engineers-to-the-forum-brakes-for-one-handed-people

http://www.wired.com/2010/06/two-brakes-one-hand-how-to-stop-a-polo-bike/

Called the London mod and used for bike polo

here

I’m sure there is a technical solution plenty of one handed options but before you commit to that I’d try tinkering with what you have. Move your brakes in and roll them up a bit. That should take some of the weight off your hands and allow you to 1 finger brake. Might not work but it’s only 2 mins with an Allen key to find out.

Si – was your right hand wasn’t it? For the CX / road can we not modify a LH Shimano STI lever? Use the rear brake as standard, then rework the guts so the side swing (that usually shifts the front mech) works the front brake? Then just use a bar end shifter for the (occasional) front mech shifts (or go 1x and junk the front mech anyway).

That way you can have independent operation of both brakes from a single lever. Might take some learning to modulate but could work very tidily (needs to be a good intuitive setup with plenty of control – I know you’ll be dreaming of returning for a fast 3 peaks).

You know I’m only down the road so get your arse round and I’ll build anything for beer 🙂

Mick

Cheers Mick. I’ll take you up on that.

If that works, wonder if we could make a flappy paddle mtb lever?

Was it SRAM on your CX bike? Not sure it would work with double tap shifter as the brake lever is fixed (not a major thing to find some basic STI levers). I’ll have a look at Thomas’ levers tomorrow and see how some could be modded. Actually cheap STI are probably best as the shift cable comes straight out sideways (rather than hidden under bar tape).