What Is It About “Funky Bars”?
October 24th, 2007 by Guitar Ted
Back when, you know, in the early days of mountain biking, you had one “real” choice in handlebars. “Bull Moose”, and then flat bars were the norm. Then the 90’s came and the flat bar became “the broomstick” bar. Three degree bend, 23 inches wide, and bar ends maybe. That was standard issue until the mid to late 90’s when the “riser revolution” took place, and that still sums up the bar of choice for a lot of folks.
The point is, handlebars were of little concern up until recently. You got riser bars in your favorite bend/sweep, hacked off the ends, or not, and mounted them up. So, what happened? Where did all this crazy, “funky bar” stuff come from anyway?
Well, to be fair there were always some strange handlebars out there. However; not to the degree we are seeing these days. I think there are a couple of things at play here. Let’s take a look, shall we?
First and foremost, I think the “funky bar” stuff came along hand in hand with the rise of the 29″er as a viable mountain biking platform. I’ve seen a lot of reasons put forth for this, but one that I think is obvious is that riser bars don’t work all that well for a lot of 29″er riders, at least the early adopters. Why? Because the front ends of 29″ers are already taking up height that a riser bar on a 26″er uses to get your hands where you like them. For instance, a typical 100mm travel front fork on a 26″er is in the 430mm-440mm axle to crown measurement range. A 80mm travel 29″er fork has about a 470mm axle to crown measurement. Add in the headset, head tube, and what ever stem rise you have going on and you can see that height isn’t really needed in a handle bar for a 29″er if you are trying to match your 26″ers posistioning, like most early 29″er freaks were trying to do. Other alternatives were needed.
The fact that as a 29″er adopter, you were already on the outside of “normal”, (at least early on) made it easier to try different things as well. You were already “outside the box”, so why not? Several tinkerers and small builders started playing with alternatives and the 29″er freaks latched on to their off the wall ideas. Consider the Jeff Jones H-Bar, which ended up on the front of a lot of early 29″ers to the point that Titec licensed the design to mass produce it. This was also spurred on by the unique offerings of On One’s Brant Richards, whose trio of “funky bars” not only drew from mtb’s rich history ( the Midge and Mungo bars), but looked forwards as well (the popular Mary Bar).
After these bars introductions, it seemed the floodgates were opened, and now there are more “funky bars” than you can shake an aluminum broom stick at! The possibilities for new designs also affected “traditional” bars so that now a “typical” bend in a bar might be 10 degrees or so instead of the “standard” of the 90’s, the three to five degree bend. Some bars have even gone farther than anyone could have imagined just ten years ago. Take Salsa’s Moto Ace 17 degree bar as an example. Almost a boomerang in comparison to bars of the past.
Since the choices have proliferated, how does one decide what to get, and once you do decide, how do you set the bar up? I am going to tackle this gnarly mess in future posts on “Funky Bars”, so look forward to some out of the box set ups and tips. We’ll also detail some specific “funky bars” with tests and reviews here, which we hope will help you find your own handlebar nirvana!
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I’m a big fan of the alt-bar revolution. Let your arms hang by your side, and tell me if your knuckles face forward. They usually are relaxed at a 45 degree. Jill at Haro explained the Mary Bar on their SS this way. I agreed with her and have been running the Origin-8 Space Bar ever since, on a 5″ travel bike! Now having ordered my first 29er, I plan to do the same thing.
I agree, I cannot ride a “broom stick”, and just yesterday I put Origin8 Gary “dirt drops on my ‘cross bike. althou I’d like to chime in about alt stems here, on my XXIX I use the stock AE50 risers, although I have often thought about the Mary, but I have a 40° Kalloy UNO stem.
I find it very interesting that funky bars are almost not an alternative to flat bars these days. I guess if there is a good thing that has come about due to the 29er, it’s the acceptance of these alternative bars and good ole steel frames. Okay, that was two and there was a hint of sarcasm as well.
At the shop I worked at in the 80’s and early 90’s, we rode with drops on our mountain bikes. We tried to explain them to a lot of folks, but no one really “got it” at the time. The flared mountain drop bar puts your hand in such a natural position that it makes for a much more comfortable ride.
And, BTW, Jill at Haro got that reference from me and the article I wrote for Mountain Biking in 1991. http://homepage.mac.com/marleyvike/PhotoAlbum15.html
Mike
Just curious, has anyone tried chop-n-flop bullhorns on a moutain bike?
It’s possible, but typically, bullhorns are made for road brake levers. The clamp diameter for mountain shifters and levers is 22.2mm where as the road size clamp is 24.0mm.
sorry, I didn’t specify that - MTB w/ STIs on chop-n-flops
Oh yeah. Totally doable. I’ve seen plenty of 9-speed STI on WTB or Midge drop bars. Should be no problem with bullhorns. The only issue might be front derailleur compatibility, but there are tricks to get the cable pull to match.
Mike: Thanks for “dropping” by. (Heh heh!) Read the scanned drop bar article, thanks for that link. I’ve a question for you: Ever had any thoughts of mounting a SRAM X-O or X-9 shifter pod on a Midge/Gary bar the way the Rapid Fire pod is set up in the arcticle you wrote? I think it would be easy since the pods for those SRAM shifters bolt on their mounts. Posistioning would be key, and I have not figured that part out yet.
Anyway, I’m a fan of drops off road and I really appreciate the article link, thanks!
Thanks G-T, master of the pun. Actually, that exact concept you talk about is something I experimented with over 2 years ago with both Shimano and SRAM shifters. SRAM was a better option at the time because both levers were pushed with the thumb. Although, now some Shimano shifters utilize a release lever that can be released with either a push or a pull so it would work as well.
The problem is mounting the shifter to the bar because the body of the shifter has to be offset inboard a bit. That’s where we got a little hung up. We had some cobbled mock-ups, but that’s about as far as it went. I think it’s worth revisiting again now.
Funny, here in Europa at least, many relaxed high-end touring bikes have handlebars extremly usable for off-roading.
Zoom for instance, stick its label on ~620 handlebars with ~38º sweep. Just not forward sweep, so you need a long stem or top tube. The half inch of rise I use inverted for a nice aero tuck position.
Just a couple weekends back, I converted the street-mtb I once built for a lady friend. Yup, 560×3º broomstick with bars was on there. 20mm longer (140mm) stem, that cheap trekking bars, and after trying it on a longer road ride, she’s sold. Wish I’d have a 150mm stem, that would be even better for her.
That’s jsut the cheap way in, but there are more sophiticated choices like the B.O.S. FloWing. 27º of sweep I think, and a low-rise version in the works.
For now, i’m happy with the 17º Salsa. A carbon version on the way, oh boy! The alu already is fairly light for the amount of comfort. I’m used to resorting to heavy bars, to get a comfortable wrist position. This 17º seems to be on the lower end of what I can sortof live with. Hot spot seems more like 25-50º.
And don’t think you’ll lose manouevrability with comfortable sweep!
I’m also a fan of “Alt” bars. Can’t say I like the Jones bars, but many of the others I think are cool. Personally, I’ve been running 12 degree bend bars for years. I tend to run them back and a little bit down which seems to work well with my wrists. Dirt Drops have been in my arsenal for years as well.
I love having On-One Midge bars on my Karate Monkey. I wanted WTB mountain drops for years before finally getting the Midge. Back in the day, I rode almost exclusively on my bar ends, then on brake hoods when I put standard drops on my bike. Now I don’t think I’ll ever go back to a straight bar again and there is no way I’d use a riser bar.
I love my Mary Bars on my SS. I used to get wrist pain in my right wrist from a lot of standing and mashing. This is gone with the Mary and it’s a great conversation starter. I’m happy alt bars and steel hardtails are popular again as I missed out on them the first go around (being younger).
I’ve often thought of getting another Mary bar for my geared FS bike but haven’t yet. It would involve a new stem since I currently use a OS bar so the cost isn’t worth it.
-Greg
GT, do you think it would be possible to run a grip shifter on the right-hand portion of an H-Bar? I’m looking into a new commuter and want to run an alt-bar on it, I think the H-Bar fiits the bill, but SRAM’s i-Motion 9 requires a twist style shifter.
People have used Rohloff twist shifters, placed invested on H-bars. I recommend to keep all of the grip ens free for hand placement, as that’s what the H’s shine at.
Jared,
Typically the grip shifter thing isn’t very elegant or practical on an H-Bar. It can be fitted, but because of the way it works best on the H-Bar for posistioning, (see Cloxxki’s comment) it requires weird cable routing and looks……….well, hideous in my humble opinion.
Other alt bars may be more attractive. Try thinking about an On One Mary bar. Grip Shifter compatible, normal routing for cables, and if you want the extensions, like an H-Bar would have, you can mount bar ends at the apex of each bend on the Mary bar. I would think the posistions would be quite similar, and your dream of using the i-Motion drive train could be more easily, and attractively, realized.
Thanks guys. I really appreciate the input. I SRAM would just make a trigger for i-Motion, I wouldn’t have a problem.
I switched to the On One Mary Bars for my Single Speed. I just can’t say enough about the setup that I have now. No wrist/ hand numbness. I also get better leverage with climbing.
Highly recommended!