Mini Project: Shimano 11-speed road thumbshifter on a budget

[Bill Lindsay]

Earlier I posted a Want To Trade for a single Paul Thumbie.  That did not pan out.  I still wanted one, and at the moment I was reluctant to shell out $80 plus tax and shipping.  So I did it on the cheap with a SunRace shifter.  

A SunRace SLM96 thumbshifter is easily gettable for $30, and it's a shameless copy of Shimano building blocks.  I took the 8speed indexed shifter part off the thumbie base and put the shifter part from my SL1 11-speed indexed barcon onto that base.  Now I've got an 11-speed indexed road Shimano thumbshifter with a 22.2mm clamp.  Plus I have an 8speed indexed SunRace barcon.  The only features I sacrifice by not buying a Paul Thumbie are: 

1. no hinge clamp.  Not a problem because I'm clamping the shifter to my quill stem.

2. no barrel adjuster.  I'll offset this with an inline adjuster.  

3. not supporting MUSA machine houses.  That's regrettable and I'm going to feel badly about that for a short while

The feature I get is the SunRace base has an adjustable exit angle for the housing.  That's an extra degree of freedom in setup.  

Pictures Or The Project Didn't Happen:  https://www.flickr.com/photos/45758191@N04/albums/72177720328952427/

This will go on my Rivendell Charlie H. Gallop "Lord Charles".  I'll post photos of the bike when that happens.  

Bill Lindsay

El Cerrito, CA

[James McGregor]

Oh - the SunRace "extra feature" - thanks for sharing that picture!  Good stuff!

Also - I actually don't like the hinged clamp on the Riv and Paul offerings - I often end up putting my palm right over that spot and feel like it would be irritating.

[Conway Bennett]

IMO shifter mounts and brake levers should always be hinged.  Tangentially related, there's a blurb on the RBW site that states their thumb shifter will shift a 9 speed derailleur across an 11 speed cassette.

[Steve]

Bill, thanks for sharing this one - pics and all. I'm storing it in my (sometimes leaky) memory bank.

Steve in AVL