Talk to me about single speed.

Thinking of doing this over winter, dabbled a bit before and found it ‘interesting’.

Do it. Initially I thought ‘what the **** have I done’ but after a few rides I realised it was awesome fun. There are things you can do on a fixie off-road that you can’t do on any other bike and I’ve developed a feel for the trail that I wouldn’t have otherwise. I now have a sliding scale for trails / individual features of: Done it on the full susser, done it on the hard tail, done it on the fixie. The gap between them is getting smaller.

Join us…

I’ve flirted with singlespeeding for about 5 years, but have become committed during the last 3 months.

I tried it about 5 times on and off and initially found it an unhappy combination of frustration with parts that didn’t work right (9 or 10 speed chains, chainrings :|) and hard work (32:16 wasn’t right for me).

But since having my second child, I’ve found my MTB’ing almost entirely limited to local trails (Ashton Court, Bristol).

Like me, most people will be converting a geared bike and I’d recommend going for a singlespeed-specific chain, cog and chainring. They don’t cost much, but make a world of difference. The set-up that works best for me is:

– 32T Hope single ring
– 18T Shimano DX cog (found 16T too much work with hills around here)
– SRAM singlespeed chain
– On One Doofer chain tensioner (mounted where rear derailleur would go)

I still have my XTR shifters, mechs and cassette in case I’m doing a longer ride – but, realistically, I haven’t done any this year and they tend to be planned well in advance when I do.

Although I enjoy having a clean / new bike, it’s very helpful to be able to just put the bike in the shed at the end of a ride with no worries – and singlespeeding is almost immune to new product development envy. 🙂

– 32T Hope single ring
– 18T Shimano DX cog (found 16T too much work with hills around here)
– SRAM singlespeed chain
– On One Doofer chain tensioner (mounted where rear derailleur would go)

Does the single speed chain make a big difference, mine shipped the chain a couple of times despite a reasonable tension, iirc it’s a nine speed kmc, will a single speed one help?

^^

I think so. I was previously using an M780 XT 32T chainring, which has ramps all over it and is narrow for 10-speed use – basically making it not ideal for singlespeed.

Had often thought about trying SS & I had enough spare parts to build one so picked up a cheap frame & put it all together (after all, I could always sell it). Expected to hate it but was pleasantly surprised. Yes it can be hard work at times but it’s satisfying and fun – the fact that it also has almost zero maintenance is a bonus.

To make matters worse, I recently put rigid forks on it and like it even more 😯

Kilo – I also used a 10-speed XTR chain, which didn’t help either!

I’ve just built up a ss rigid inbred – converted Alivio triple up front with original 32T chain ring in outer position, 8 speed chain, 17Twide base cassette sprocket rear with DMR simple tension seeker. On vertical dropouts, only just getting enough tension with tensioner pushing down.

I like it but chain tension will become an issue. Most of my riding on it will be fairly flat, so in time I think I’ll go 33T or 34T ss specific on front, 32:17 seems fairly easy at the moment, so shouldn’t be too much of an icrease, and will help chain tension a fair bit………

But, I like it, so simple and natural, no fuss, just get on and pedal!

I’ve converted my scott scale 29er to singlespeed for most winter duties. The trails round my way are so slow and slick at the moment I’m not going to be setting any PRs, so may as we’ll make it interesting in a another way. I don’t find it as bad as I thought, hills are tough but you get plenty of rest when it’s flat or road. My average speed is about the same as on a geared bike. I use a narrow wide chainring and can swap to a 1×10 in about 10min if I feel the ride needs some gears, 3×10 takes about 40min, but I can see me going back there again.

It’s not for everyone, quite cheap to do, and you can always put the gears back on!