ICE Recumbent Trike Gearing Options

Gearing Overview

Recumbent trike riders benefit from having a wide range of gears. it just makes the trike more fun to ride. All the gearing Options ICE offer are designed to maximise the joy of cycling.

Pedalling

The pedals are at the heart of any cycles gearing system. Keeping the pedals turning at a comfortable speed, no matter what the terrain, is the job of the gearing. But before we look at getting the right gears to suit you, we need to look at the fundamentals of pedalling, we want to make cycling as comfortable as possible. Find out more in our rider sizing section.

Gearing types

Hub or Derailleur. There are two main choices when it comes to gearing. You can choose to have derailleur gearing or hub gears. In general, derailleur gears are lighter, cheaper and more efficient with hub gears being lower maintenance and more reliable. Hub gears are preferred by a lot of people who are interested in touring and riders who want a trike which requires less maintenance. One advantage of hub gears is that you can change gear while the trike is at a standstill which is not possible on derailleur systems.

Automatic gear shifting is an option on our electronically shifted derailleur and hub gearing systems.

Derailleur gears

Derailleur gear systems comprise of a rear gear set, called a cassette, and a front gear set, called a chainset. The combination of these two gives you your overall gear range. A Choice of chainring sizes offered by ICE will allow you to choose an overall gear range that suits your riding. From low and super easy gears right up to race ready big gears.

Chainsets

Smaller chainrings on the chainset gives easier gears. Smaller chainsets are best for those who are looking to carry heavy loads, climb steep hills or those who and have less power to put into the pedals.

Medium chainrings on the chainset gives a balance between low gears for climbing hills and high gears for going fast. We use this type of chainset on a lot of our trikes as they suit the broadest range of riders.

Large chainrings on the chainset gives you harder gears, better for top speed and powerful riders. The largest chainsets we offer are suited best to flatter areas.

We also have a short crank chainset available for riders with shorter legs or with knee or hip issues which is 130mm or 150mm rather than the more standard 170mm. The short cranks reduce the size of the circle that your foot tracks through the pedal rotation and by doing this they reduce the range of angles that your knees and hips go through. We chose a short crank chainset with small chainrings as the smaller levers mean you need smaller gears. Find out more in our rider sizing section.

Shifters

Shifters are mounted to the handlebar and are used to change gear. On most of our gearing systems there is a choice of two types. Bar end shifters and Trigger Shifters.

Bar end Shifters. They work extremely well on our vertical handlebars that are used on our trikes. You can precisely select and change to the gear you need by pushing or pulling the lever on top of the handlebars forwards or backwards. Depending on your chosen gearing set up you will have one or two bar end shifters on your trike.

We choose to fit our bar end shifters slightly differently from most people. We set ours up so that you can shift to lower gears on the rear derailleur by pushing the shifter forward. This means that as you are pulling on the brakes you can push the shifter with your thumb and get lower gears selected for when you start off again.

Trigger Shifters. The most ergonomic and best shifting option for most riders, the triggers hang within easy reach of the riders thumb and fore finger and a simple push with the thumb or pull with the finger will result in a crisp easy gear shift. Our trigger shifter systems use our cable redirector to allow the trigger shifters to be mounted exactly as they were designed to be.

Single-handed controls

ICE Trikes as standard come with the gearing and braking controls fitted to both handlebars. Optional single-handed controls help riders who have limited use, or no use, of one hand or arm to ride. You can specify controls are fitted to either the left or right handlebars. This enables the trike to be safely controlled from the chosen side.

8 SPEED, 11 SPEED, 12 speed and 14 speed OPTIONS

This tag refers to the number of gears built into the back wheel. Different drivetrain options are available to suit your budget and cycling needs. On mechanical (non-electric assisted) trikes ICE usually combines the gears at the rear with a chainset with 2 chainrings at the front. This increases the overall range of gears ensuring plenty of easy gears are available for hill climbing while providing a comfortable pedalling speed on the flat and downhill. These systems have 16, 22 or 24 gears in total and are often referred to as 2x8, 2x11 or 2x12. Trikes with electric assist have a single chainring and these systems are known as 1x8, 1x11 or 1x14.

8 Speed gearing systems made by Shimano are available in both derailleur and Hub gear setups. They are our lowest price gearing option in each system that gives reliable gears with slightly less range and refinement than our other options. They are ideal for most casual and leisure riders.

11 Speed gearing systems derailleur systems made by Shimano. They cover a range of different riding styles and are a good balance of performance and price. Some offer a greater gear range to tackle steeper climbs and fully loaded touring, others are tailored for racing speeds.

12 Speed gearing systems made by Shimano is an electronically controlled Derailleur system. It is tailored for racing speeds for our Sprint X and VTX models.

14 Speed gearing systems made by Rohloff in Germany is a Hub Gear system. It offers a huge range of gears and is famed for its low maintenance and reliability.

Hub Gear Systems

Hub gear systems are low maintenance, simple to operate and ideal for touring riders. Some offer fully automatic gear shifting. One of the greatest advantages of a hub gear system is the ability to shift gears while at a standstill so that if you have to come to a sudden stop there is no need to pull away in too high of a gear. This is a great advantage for people with knee injuries as it reduces the strain on the joints. We have three main hub gear options:

ICE Trike Huib Gear options - Alfine Hub

Enviolo Automatiq Hub

Forget gears, simply pedal and go. The Enviolo Hub features truly fully automatic gear shifting technology and is available on Shimano STEPS EP8 20" and 26" rear wheel trikes. The system lets you focus on what’s important, like enjoying your ride. Simply set your desired cadence once (how many pedal rotations feel comfortable for you) and the Enviolo Hub will constantly adjust its internal gear ratio to maintain a steady smooth cadence regardless of the speed or riding conditions that you encounter. If you ride uphill it will adjust to a lower gear ratio for you and if you ride downhill it will do the opposite.

Watch the Enviolo Automatiq Hub Gearing Video below.

The Automatiq Hub uses stepless gear changing technology to automatically maintain the correct gear ratio for you regardless of the conditions. Forget gears, simply set once and off you go. The hub is ideal for riders who are distracted by traditional bike gear changing. You can even to pull away from a standstill if you have to stop quickly. Reliable and maintenance free riding.

The hub has near silent operation and can shift under a full load. You don’t even have to slow down or stop pedalling while it operates. It has a good gear range of 380% which is suited to most leisure and touring rides. For example, pedalling at a steady 65 rpm the hub will maintain a speed of between 5 and 20mph. It’s ideal for hilly riding conditions that require gear changing under full load. The system can be easily adjusted while riding using the Bluetooth Smartphone App. Simply turn on, set your STEPS power assist level, pedal and go.

ICE Trike Huib Gear options - Rohloff Speed Hub

Rohloff Hub

The Rohloff hub is the standard by which other internal gear systems are measured and not many others come close. The Rohloff hub gear has 14 equally spaced gears, with enough gear range to tour the world. Unfortunately, the downside to this incredible, German engineered quality, is the price. The Rohloff drivetrain is our most expensive drivetrain option.

The Rohloff is available with a twist shifter only, we modify the standard Rohloff shifter so that the whole grip is rotated to make shifting very ergonomic and simple. The briefest of pauses in pedalling pressure allows you to twist the shifter one way for harder gears and the other way for easier gears, there is nothing else to consider. Like other hub gears the Rohloff hub has the ability to change gear while not the trike is not moving. The Rohloff hub is available on all our touring trikes with or without an electric assist motor.

Alfine Hub

The Shimano Alfine 8 speed hub gear has the same gear range as a standard 8 speed derailleur set so it works very well when combined with a double front chainset. This gives the same range as our 8 speed derailleur system but with the rear gearing being fully enclosed and all the advantages that flow from that.

The Alfine 8 speed hub is available with manual or electronic shifting on all e-assist trikes. The electronic Shimano Di2 push button controls could not be easier to use and automatic gear shifting is also an option on this system, giving the rider a simple pedal and go experience if you select auto on the built in control screen.