Mrs SwissBuster's commuter bike has a failing 7-speed shifter (cheap Shimano, circa late 90s, I think). I have a spare set of 8-speed grip-shift shifters. Will these work if I swap them out? I want to avoid swapping out the whole drive train for one failing shifter. I could adjust the derailleur setting so it only travels through 7 gears... would this work?
Assuming the Grip Shifts are the Shimano compatible ones...it will work. 7 and 8 speed drivetrains have very close (though not exact) spacing and the difference is easily compensated by the floating pulley on the rear derailuer. Mechanically, the best setup is to use 2-8 on the shifter so that your shifter is always ready to shift (1 will be locked out with the derailuer set screw). You can set it up to use 1-7, but you can still hit the 8th indent in the shifter. Your derailuer wont move, but you will have slack in the cable until you shift to 7.
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