It will not have escaped the notice of many that sprockets of up to 36 teeth are now available. So there's an even bigger and better reason for Shimergo - especially if you only have a 'compact double' (i.e. not-compact-enough) on the bike. However: to use sprockets that big one generally needs the 'Shadow' design of rear mech, and the cable fits on those in a totally different way. But looking at how it does fit and thinking about how the usual adaptation works, it has always seemed to me that it ought to be a reasonably simple matter to space the cable away from its usual anchorage by a similar proportion.
Finally I've gotten around to calculating how much more spacing might be needed, which I reckoned to be about 8mm. Then I carved a little lump of aluminium to do the spacing-out and fitted that plus the original cable clamp plate on an 8mm-longer bolt. And here's the result.
- 9-speed Shimano 'Shadow' mech (RD-M772) fitted with Shimergo spacer block, so it indexes Shimano 9-speed when operated by Campag 10-speed shifter. (Hole also drilled in arm for neat routing of excess cable.)
It's early days, but I've made a few test rides and the indexing is good, so the 8mm thickness of this spacer block seems to be correct. The other key dimensions are the notch that locates the corner of the block with a feature on the mech's arm, so it doesn't rotate, and a groove in the back of the block to locate the tab of the clamp-plate, so that doesn't rotate either. Here's a close-up of the block:
- Shimergo-Shadow cable spacer block.
When I get around to it I'll make an proper dimensioned drawing of this little block and maybe someone will be kind enough to manufacture and sell them on Ebay.
