All Road Bar Plus

I made a new drop bar with Nitto.

While Kaneyan was designing his Jam Bar, I also happened to be designing a handle bar. Kaneyan’s post about his bars were so good, so I’m pretty anxious to post this one, but here it goes.

This is the drop bar I designed.

It took two years in total to land to the final product.

I have to thank Nitto for thier productivity and their will to make things happen. Huge respect to them.

I named the bars “All Road Bar Plus“.

I wanted a drop bar that are comfy and something that will make you want to ride everyday.

To me, drop bars are typically for riding fast for competitions. It gives back pains and makes me avoid riding that bike with a drop bar unless I have to ride in those types of situations, but I wanted to put an end to that.

One thing I’d like to say about the bar, is that I didn’t make a drop bar that is relaxing. I made drop bars that are comfy.

We build dozens of different type of bikes, here at Blue Lug.

A fast commuter for riding the main street

A gravel bike for having fun in the weekends

A touring bike for bikepacking.

I want people who loves bikepacking to choose these handlebars because they feel com

Is there such thing as a comfortable drop bar?  Yes.
I immediately think of the Rivendell Noodle Bar, also known as the world’s most beautiful drop bar.

。This is the pioneer of the non-competative drop bar in my opnion.
Designed to provide comfort, while being beautifully shaped.

The M174 All Road Bar was actually inspired by the Noodle bars.

The 174 had shorter reach, shallower drops, for our small Japanese hands.

I can’t believe Aze had though up with such a great bar a decade ago.

Back to the drop bar I made.
I thought of just making a few small adjustments to the174 bars. Bulging the bar clamps to 31.8mm and making them wider.

This is because the bikes we currently build are different than ten years ago. So I took the name “All Road”

Two years of back and forth with Nitto and it’s finally complete. These two years have been the most I thought about drop bars in my entire life. It was almost haunting me.

And thus, the All Road Bar Plus was born.

Allow me to break down what kind of handlebars they are.
As you can see, the top of the bar sweeps back a little bit. This feature was inspired by Rivendell bars and Ritchey bars.

This feature allows you to;

Be closer to the levers

As the levers are physically coming back towards you, it prevents from feeling that the bars are too far. You will no longer have to pinch the bars with your fingers when resting your back while riding. The actual angle of the kink is more than that of the noodle bar.

Being able to hold beside the stem easily

We all have the time we want to hold the place where I’m holding in the picture.

Imagine this was a flat bar. Our pinky fingers are generally closer to our body, so instead of having all fingers alined in a straight line, it feels more comfortable with a slight sweep.

Climbing hills? Put the gears into low, grab the top and maybe enjoy the view a little bit.

The “sloped shoulder” is a reminiscence to bull horn bars back in the day.

This is just a “secret spice” and it’s hard to explain with words, but the I wanted a similar feeling of holding the top part of the RB-001 or Syntace. Not sure if this is ringing anybody’s bell, but if you know you know. Let’s keep it at that.

I wanted this handlebar to be a comfy bar for people who often grab the top of drop bars, while being able to get a nice grip when holding the hooks.

The bend of the hooks has a pretty big R.

Gonna explain this with some Japanese letters.

The modern compact drop bars are shaped like a  “つ” =tsu

This is what a つ bar looks like

-The top is easy to make it pararell to the ground and can install the brackets of the brakes without big issues, resulting a sturdy grip of the top.

-Shorter reach. The levers can be installed close to you.

-The hooks are still easy to grab.

As you can see, there are a lot of strong points of this style of handlebars, which is why they are currently “mainstream”. I used a lot of these types of bars recently.
– Due to the reach being short, I was always holding the same spot

This was something I felt awkward in these types of bars. It’s not frustrating, it just felt weird.

And to be honest, there are too many of the “つ” bars in the market these days, I stated to get tired of seeing them. Same goes to flared drop bars.

This is where the letter “と”= tō  comes in.

A large R in the hooks and a beautiful curve.

These types of drop bars are often out of date, meaning that they haven’t changed to modern standards and not available in 31.8mm clamp diameter.

-The hood is often slanted down towards the levers, making it awkward to hold the top. This may be due to the racers back in the day would often grab the hooks.

-Reach is too long, meaning the levers are too far. (We would often put short stem or kill the offset to solve this issue)

However,

-It looks beautiful.

Some people would give the “と” drop bars an angle to make the hoods parallel to the ground, but I’m personally not a fan of that.

By doing so, you kill the space of he hooks, making it very awkward to grab and the reach becomes longer.

The Rivendell Noodle Bar was the bar to solve that issue.

By installing with the hoods being parallel to the ground, it still a good length and angle to hold the top. The reach under 100mm…This started me to compare the Noodle bar and “つ” bars.

What I noticed is that these bars with a large R and a round curve often feels great and it looks great. I can place my palms comfortably.

The arrowed space is longer

↑so, I can also be in this position.

This is the biggest feature of this bar. If you’re back is hurting while riding, you can grab the bar like this, which I recommend trying if the rear tires keeps slipping when riding gravel a un uphill gravel path.

That being said, the Noodle bar also has those classic shapes, 95mm reach, 100mm with an angle making the bars still feel far.

I wanted to make a drop bar based from the Noodle Bars with specs for modern standards.

I asked too many things to Nitto, but they were always down to try almost everything.

Thanks to this back sweep, it keeps the larger curve like the Noodle and the reach is about 80mm from the center of the stem.

Compact, still enough space in the hooks 
10° flare.

Available in S, M, L.

Most bars are available in 20mm differences, but I believe that these too much detailed sizes are what makes us hard to decide.
If you’re a racer and need to have everything specific, sure, but most people should be fine with these 3 sizes.

Small – hook to hook 440mm, hoods 420mm. Great for road bikes, fixies, CX, that sort of stuff. If you always choose 420mm drops, this should be your size.

This is Isshu’s 53 Monstercross.

Medium – this should work with gravel bikes from the recent years. This size should make it easier to control bikes with wider tires.

I chose medium for my touring bike. I can fit a rando bag in between both levers and easier to control when you are riding off the saddle.

Large – Fits the Zeitgeist bag. Great size for bikepacking and goes well with bikes that have 55mm + tires.

I have this size installed on my La Cabra.

I had so much fun riding with this bar.

Handlebars are one of those things that many people have different opinions on, so I’m kinda nervous writing this blog. However, if you are interested in converting your bike to a drop bar build, I hope these bars will be one of the options you think of. If they feel great to you, I couldn’t be more happier.

Thanks for reading.