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Originally Posted by V-16  At the risk of sounding stupid, what is the use of gears in a bike and how does one use the gears, like in a car or mobike??  and what the hell are 12 and 21 gears. The last i had a bike it had 4 gears which i never used!! Now im getting a bike for me too so I shoud know these things before i enter a bike shop and appear dumb to the vendor!! |
First of all decide on what type of bicycle you want
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Lastly what do you want to go in for. An On-Road or Off-ROad bicycle. The on-road one will definitly have more speed though you wont be able to carry stuff with you easily and going off road wont be that easy. The off road version will be more comfortable as it will be with shock absorbers and youll be able to handle rough patches a lot easier.
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secondly depending on your budget and needs chose the number of gears that you need. a 21 speed bike will use a combination of 7 gears on the rear wheel and 3 gears on the pedal to give you 21 different gear options. Similarly an 18 speed bike will have 6 and 3 gears to give 18 gear options
Probably the most important think about the bicycle is its frame. it is essential that the frame is comfortable and of the correct size, Light weight and sturdiness are really important too. i think hero has a range of aluminium bikes which IMO is the one to go for as the other bikes here are just too heavy..
you engage the gears in a cycle by simply selecting them with the help of the gear levers. there will be two seperate levers for the gears on the front sprocket and the rear wheel. you simply select the gear while pedalling and the bike goes into gear. dont play around with the gears when your not pedalling as this tends to really screw up the gears. there are two types of gear levers. ones the grip shifter nd the other is the thumb shifter. A grip shifter is similar to the the gear shifter in a rikshaw nd the thumb control uses your thumbs to control the gears. theres no "better" shifter and it all depends on what you are comfortable with.
Another component that is of importance are the brakes. Most cycles come with brakes where two rubber pads are used to stop the rim by gripping it. some of the high end bikes have disc brakes which are a lot more efficient and dont depend on the condition of the rim. I have experienced that if the rim is even slighlt misaligned the brakes dont work uniformly and this can lead to a lot of trouble.
If you have a slightly bigger budget you can also consider getting a bicycle from Firefox or an imported one . The imported bikes are a LOT better than the Indian ones though I hear the Indian ones have really improved off late. Theres a place in Kalbadevi called Metro Cycles. I think they carry some imported bikes.
btw heres the hero site -
Hero Cycles Ltd.
nd heres the firefox site -
Firefox Bikes - join the trail! ยป Bikes