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Changing up ... or changing down?


LeTurbo

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If I'm in the car, going form 5th to 4th to 3rd is gearing down, yes? And I go slower.

 

In theory, that's also the case with the chain rings: 52 to 42 is also gearing down.

 

But on the cluster, if I go from 19 teeth down to the 14 cog, would I say I'm gearing down when I'm actually going faster (or trying to)? Or gearing up?

 

Then, of course, there's gearing up and gearing down simultaneously.It all gets terribly complicated. I think I should give up cycling before I make a fool of myself. Oh wait, it's too late for that.

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If I'm in the car, going form 5th to 4th to 3rd is gearing down, yes? And I go slower.

 

In theory, that's also the case with the chain rings: 52 to 42 is also gearing down.

 

But on the cluster, if I go from 19 teeth down to the 14 cog, would I say I'm gearing down when I'm actually going faster (or trying to)? Or gearing up?

 

Then, of course, there's gearing up and gearing down simultaneously.It all gets terribly complicated. I think I should give up cycling before I make a fool of myself. Oh wait, it's too late for that.

 

Turbo, I was wandering this on my ride yesterday! Would be interested to hear the answer!

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As far as I see it, gearing down means making it easier (slower), irrespective of the cog size.

 

At the end of the day, do you look in your cars gearbox to see the ratio of the cogs. Nope.

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I wish I'd had a ride yesterday, it seemed pretty good weather. As it was, this question kept me awake last night. Isn't that sad? I need a life.

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Gear up because you go up in numbers. Small ring front and 1-10 and then big ring and 1-10 (11-20). It works like that when buying a derailleur aswell. Hi-normal means it sits low down in 9th/10th gear with no tension.

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I'd say, increasing your gearing is gearing up, and decreasing is gearing down. So when you changing gears you can do the maths in your head, (front size / rear size) x 27 to give you your gear in inches, or x 68.5 to give you your gear in cm. Easy peasy.

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