Drawbacks
- Derailleurs cannot be used, so an internal-gear hub is used if multiple gear ratios are required.
- The belt cannot be taken apart as a chain can, so a frame must be able to accommodate the belt by having an opening in the rear triangle or an elevated chain stay.
- Belts come in limited length selection which the frame must accommodate.
- Belt-driven bicycles and their repair or replacement parts are scarcer at shops than bicycles with conventional chain.
- Front and rear pulleys or sprockets must be well aligned to avoid excessive friction and wear. A chain is more flexible in this respect.
- First-generation pulleys with dual guides had problems with snow becoming compacted and trapped in the pulley (up to complete inoperability in some cases). Second generation (one guide, wheel side) and third generation (center guide) improve upon the design.
Read more about this topic: Belt-driven Bicycle
Famous quotes containing the word drawbacks:
“France has neither winter nor summer nor morals—apart from these drawbacks it is a fine country.”
—Mark Twain [Samuel Langhorne Clemens] (1835–1910)