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Just realized the shop's new apprentice has never seen a friction shifter
This kid came in on Tuesday asking how to adjust the 'weird lever' on a 1980s Peugeot that came in for a tune-up. I showed him the simple barrel adjuster on the downtube, and his eyes went wide. He said, 'But how do you know what gear you're in?' We spent the next hour going over friction vs. indexed, and he was totally fascinated. It was a cool reminder of how much basic tech has changed. Anyone else had to explain really old components to a new mechanic lately?
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jana_hernandez3mo ago
I read this article in a bike magazine a few years back about how friction shifters were basically the only option for decades, and it talked about how riders learned to 'feel' the gear engagement through the lever feedback. The kid I work with called them 'blind shifting' which I thought was funny but also kind of accurate when you think about it. My dad used to ride a 10-speed all through the 80s and he could shift without even looking down, just from the cable tension and the sound of the chain. It's wild how something that was totally normal for us is like ancient tech now, almost like explaining a rotary phone to someone who only knows smartphones. I bet that Peugeot will teach that apprentice more about tuning than any modern groupset ever could.
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