Favorite shifters yet, for Bosco bars

[iamkeith]

Short story, I stumbled on the realization that butterfly shifters work very well on Bosco bars. I think dia compe has re-released something similar, and may be worth considering if, like me, you love bosco bars but never found the ideal shifter setup

I've tried thumb shifters in a variety of configurations over the years - inside, outside, reversed L-R and otherwise, with and without offset mounts, located on the straight grip section, the forward sloped area, and next to the stem clamp.   I was never satisfied though, and this feels the most natural yet.  

Longer story is that I had these bars on a Clem that I loved but imagined could be improved;  regreatably gave that frame away thinking I could just move all my parts to a Susie;  discovered that those were very different bikes and that the bosco bars didn't work as well; replaced those bars with tosco bars that are much better, but left the rest of the cockpit in place.  Then, my beloved Clem  frame was returned to me!!  I had the bosco bars, but needed new brakes and shifters;  didn't have the budget to buy new;  rummaged through my parts bins and found these old, lightly-used suntour butterfly shifters and 4-finger shimano levers, and LOVE them.

Ironically, the reason I have these is that I could never get them to feel right on drop bars as they were intended.  It always seemed like the levers were angled backward and would have worked better on the opposite sides.  It felt the same here!  Since it had been working so well with left and right levers reversed on the clem, and then susie, i just did the same thing here and use them in friction mode.

[DavidP]

Great that you not only found a setup that works well for you, but that uses those neat shifters. A pair of the Diacompe wing shifters just went for a steal over on the iBob group.

Do you shift your hand forward to use the forward "wing" of the shifter? Does the grip flange interfere?

My Bosco bar bike uses a cheap Sunrace friction thumbie positioned on the ramp of the bars so it doesn't interfere with a range of hand positions but is also accessible from my primary cruising grip, which is a bit forward on the bar.

-Dave

[iamkeith]

My hand does move slightly forward to shift one direction, and slightly back to shift the other.  But both positions are comfortable and natural. Getti g leverage is easy both ways without having to let go of the bar while shifting, which is one of the problems I have the single thumb lever, sepending on where it is in the throw.    

In fact, my default grip when actuall riding along is forward, at the curve of the bar.  I agree that the gpal is to maintain all the potential grip positions, which is why I like the fact that they're on the inside of the bar)

The grip flange is soft enough that it folds under my palm and doesn't bother me.  In reality, those grips were just another item from my parts bins though.  I thought I'd use them until I got everything dialed in, and eventually create permanent grips with tape and padding.  This is working so well, that I think placement is already good, and I like the grips enough (they're extra long to take advantage of the whole straight section) ) that I may end up just putting some cloth tape on the curve and calling it good.

[iamkeith]

Sorry for all the typos.  Hopefully that made sense. Responding on phone in bright sunlight