3speed internal hub/front deraileur

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If you want to run something with a 3spd hub and three chain rings up front....
Try using and old rear der as a chain tensioner. Set the limits so it doesn't move, and is in line with the rear cog.
The rear der should pivot to take the chain slack.
This might be a good idea... Don't really know if it will work, but i have seen similar things.
 
Becareful.....Coaster brakes and chaintensioner or derailers don't mix. When you back pedal, the chain will suck up and lock up the wheel. Possible derailing the chain or bending up the tensioner.
 
I suppose I failed to factor in the coaster brake.
Not all internal gear hubs have coaster brakes though.
You could buy something fancy that might not use coaster.
Try taking off the coaster brake arm and use rim brakes...
The arm on the nexus can be removed and replaced with a spacer if i remember right.
 
youd get extra ratio's like with derallier gears and have higher
but to me the appeal of three speed is having gears without the disadvantage of a messy derallier system cos' i really hate the noise of deralliers
it will work
i think they used to make twin rear cogs for the sturmey archer hubs so you could run 6 speed or 8 if you had a 4 speed hub
it would be quite fun to try though
 
Brompton folding bikes run two sprockets on a Sturmey 3spd hub to make six.

On my old mountain bike I experimented with a two speed 'manual' set up. Single ring, removed seven of nine sprockets and replaced them with spacers and fitted a Surly Singlator with two jockey wheels on it. I tuned the tension on the Singlator to work in both sprockets. It was 'manual' because I had to get off the bike and physically move the chain with my hand to shift gear but it worked and was one step up from a single speed for useability.

Sachs (now SRAM) used to make a 3X7, ie seven speed cassette fitted to a 3 spd internal hub.
 
there's also a lower limit to the ratio of front chain wheel to rear sprocket size. if it's too low, you'll put too much torque into the internals and kill them
i'm not certain, but i recall a figure of 2:1. they usually came with 48:18 for a 26" wheel.
whatever it is, if you use a 28 front to a 22 back, you'll shorten it's life
 
ratina said:
Sounds like a reverse set up of what Hooch just sold, the 3 speed internal hub with the 3 speed cog on it.
Click to expand...

that's been around for a while
pic-316-s.jpg
 
so do they still have the kit? that would be very interesting to try.

Outlaw
 
they stopped making it years ago.

and i think i know why....

hub gears are allegedly expensive, heavy & inefficient
dérailleurs are vulnerable, short lived, exposed, ugly and put extra stress on the chain

however, there was a time when 3 or 4 gears was the maximum ratios that were available - but hubs come in 7,8,9 or 14 now

so, when you can now have many ratios enclosed in grease, who'd want the disadvantages of both systems? :?
 
You'll still have to have a rear mech or at the very least a tensioner, which takes away the advantages of a hub gear.
But there was the Cyclo, made until 1981ish, or the Dacon Driver, which was made in the 90s and could take a Suntour freewheel. Both were designed for the Sturmey Archer AW 3 speed hub.
You'd do well listening to minimum gearing warnings on more sophisticated geared hubs, but the AW is legendarily tough, you don't need to worry about running one like that. And they're cheap secondhand, so even if you do kill one it's not the end of the world.
 

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