Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

MakeShift: Security analysis of Shimano Di2 wireless gear shifting (2024)

usenix.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 54 posts

Re: MakeShift: Security analysis of Shimano Di2 wireless gear shifting (2024)

#31

Post by gdbsjjdn »

doctorpangloss wrote: post #22
mauvehaus wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, but for racing bikes, which are the target market for wireless shifting in 2025, the efficiency losses of an internal hub are a non-starter. The casuals whose bikes haven't seen a wrench since they were assembled aren't buying wireless groupsets. For them: we're in agreement about belts and internally geared hubs. Automatic shifting has yet to prove itself to be more than a curiosity. A 20-something year old Aut…

> In good shape it would be an entirely adequate solution, if only it solved a problem anyone had. I cannot understate how big of a problem shifting is for the demographics you are not seeing on bicycles.

1x setups have negated a lot of this. My wife does not enjoy bicycling and we got her a cruiser, it is very simple for her to understand "click up for harder, click down for easier".

Re: MakeShift: Security analysis of Shimano Di2 wireless gear shifting (2024)

#32

Post by stonogo »

topaz0 wrote: post #27
cheeze wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To me, it's night and day. Cables stretch, need replacement (yearly or every 2 in my case), and mechanical shifting requires more effort. Di2 is literally 'mouse click' with little electric components that _instantly_ shift. Maintenance is reduced, the shifting is notably smoother, and adjustments are a breeze. IMO the "but my shifters could die" crowd overblow the concerns. I charge my bike _once a month_ and that's…

All this tech, just to recover the speed and smoothness of friction shifters from 30 years ago.

Friction shifters suck really bad, if you ride your bike more than once a month. Having to feel out the right shift point, adjusting front derailleur trim, remembering where you are in the gearing so you can avoid cross-chaining, having things shift slightly differently as your cable stretches over time, all of it sucked. I know the retrogrouch nostalgia goggles are an entire market sector in cycling, but 100% of the time people who spend a lot of time on bicycles prefer electronic shifting in practice. I'm old enough to have had friction shifters on my downtube, and I'm not going back.

Re: MakeShift: Security analysis of Shimano Di2 wireless gear shifting (2024)

#33

Post by stonogo »

zettabomb wrote: post #19
ck2 wrote: post #18

I've always wondered what happens if you are in a big pack with these kind of devices There's no stepping on each others signal? Error-correction? Garmin is ending ANT+ because it's not-encrypted and Europe won't allow that anymore but it would be fascinating to do an ANT+ capture next to a marathon of 50,000 people, how does it deal with all that signal noise (BLE is on same frequency)

Is that really why it's going away? I just sort of figured that BLE chipsets had gotten so cheap these days that it was more economical. Can't see why you'd care about encrypted data for something which you could measure pretty trivially via other means, if you were close enough to pick up the signal.

Technically that stuff is health data (especially the heart-rate, o2 levels, etc) so it's probably just not worth trying to fix the protocols.

Re: MakeShift: Security analysis of Shimano Di2 wireless gear shifting (2024)

#34

Post by topaz0 »

stonogo wrote: post #32
topaz0 wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All this tech, just to recover the speed and smoothness of friction shifters from 30 years ago.

Friction shifters suck really bad, if you ride your bike more than once a month. Having to feel out the right shift point, adjusting front derailleur trim, remembering where you are in the gearing so you can avoid cross-chaining, having things shift slightly differently as your cable stretches over time, all of it sucked. I know the retrogrouch nostalgia goggles are an entire market sector in cycling, but 100% of the…

I'm old enough to ride with downtube shifters too, have for close to 20 years, do so roughly every day including for the past several years in a hilly city where I shift a lot, and I could not stand the brief stint (~year) I did with slow, unwieldy brake-lever shifters. I had to adjust those way more often and more precisely than I adjust my friction shifters, too.

Re: MakeShift: Security analysis of Shimano Di2 wireless gear shifting (2024)

#35

Post by wil421 »

voidUpdate wrote: post #2

Wireless gear shifters? What was wrong with a cable? Even if you don't want it to be a mechanical connection, you could still at least send data over that instead of wirelessly...

I’d take a wireless dropper post so I don’t have to mess with cabling.

Re: MakeShift: Security analysis of Shimano Di2 wireless gear shifting (2024)

#36

Post by motorest »

topaz0 wrote: post #23
tokai wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Besides what other have answered you already have a lot of wireless connections on a race bike. To the sensors measuring speed, cadence, watts, and possibly stuff like rear traffic radar, gear selection etc.. It all integrates with an unwired bike computer, so wireless shifters makes fine sense in the system.

What ever happened to measuring speed, cadence and pedal force using your body and mind?

> What ever happened to measuring speed, cadence and pedal force using your body and mind?

How do you export a time series of that?

Re: MakeShift: Security analysis of Shimano Di2 wireless gear shifting (2024)

#37

Post by crabbone »

voidUpdate wrote: post #2

Wireless gear shifters? What was wrong with a cable? Even if you don't want it to be a mechanical connection, you could still at least send data over that instead of wirelessly...

I'm with you on this!

Here's a bit of a marginally related rant.

So, I moved to the Netherlands about four years ago. Of course I needed a bike. Since I was a child, I always fixed my bike if there was a problem. I've replaced punctured tube countless times.

Yet, in the Netherlands, I discovered that on the local bikes the gear box is a lot more complex... and you need to disassemble it in order to remove the back wheel (if you want to replace the tube). It doesn't have that many moving parts, but it's really not made with an eye for easy assembly and disassembly. Not in the field conditions. And the first time I discovered it, to my shame, I ended up pushing my bike to the bike shop to have the tube replaced. I felt like I was telling the shop owner that I peed my pants when I had to ask him to do something that should've been trivial for an adult.

I can't imagine using a wireless gear box. I'll never get on this kind of bike. Some kind of interference and you lose control of the bike? Broken far away from home: push it for hours? This thing probably needs a battery... Is it waterproof? This is such an unimaginably bad idea...

Re: MakeShift: Security analysis of Shimano Di2 wireless gear shifting (2024)

#38

Post by crabbone »

mauvehaus wrote: post #17
raoulj wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Counterpoint - the benefits of wireless are there but the worry of your unit dying in the middle of a ride now replaces the concern of whether your derailleur is tuned and ready to go. It's easy for a shop to assemble, but now I'm worried about shorting the control unit of my di2 which would be a pricey fix. I have two bikes: one with and one without di2. Both work just as well and one costs much more. I do love disc…

Honestly, routing the cables through the headset introduces so many tight bends, I suspect you'll get better long-term reliability with wireless. Plus, there are no connections to make waterproof aside from the battery.

You will need to take it apart any time you need to change the tube... "no connections" is a fantasy.

I've never seen anything wireless being more reliable than a mechanical analog. Anecdotally, I moved into a house that had a bunch of this wireless garbage: wireless thermostat, wireless doorbell, wireless light over the backyard gate. All this garbage is dead and dysfunctional in just a little over two years.

Re: MakeShift: Security analysis of Shimano Di2 wireless gear shifting (2024)

#39

Post by crabbone »

moritz64 wrote: post #4
voidUpdate wrote: post #2

Wireless gear shifters? What was wrong with a cable? Even if you don't want it to be a mechanical connection, you could still at least send data over that instead of wirelessly...

Shifting is faster and more precise, with no need for readjustments. It also eliminates a lot of cabling, which makes it look cleaner and simplifies the setup.

A wireless (electronic) device simplifies the setup? What kind of insane fantasy is this? Will you really be able to fix your broken wireless gear box in field conditions? This is the proof of simplicity, not some superficial observation that you make about the amount of cables.

Re: MakeShift: Security analysis of Shimano Di2 wireless gear shifting (2024)

#40

Post by mauvehaus »

doctorpangloss wrote: post #22
mauvehaus wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, but for racing bikes, which are the target market for wireless shifting in 2025, the efficiency losses of an internal hub are a non-starter. The casuals whose bikes haven't seen a wrench since they were assembled aren't buying wireless groupsets. For them: we're in agreement about belts and internally geared hubs. Automatic shifting has yet to prove itself to be more than a curiosity. A 20-something year old Aut…

> In good shape it would be an entirely adequate solution, if only it solved a problem anyone had. I cannot understate how big of a problem shifting is for the demographics you are not seeing on bicycles.

The complete market failure of the Autobike suggests that the demographic of people not on bikes who would ride if they didn't have to shift is either not that large or wasn't reached by their marketing.

This was literally the only one I've ever seen. And I volunteered for a year and a half at a community bike shop that was infamous for attracting oddities and evolutionary dead-ends. For instance: a side-by-side bicycle built for two. If there were a gazillion Autobikes out there, we'd have seen a couple. People simply didn't buy them.

Post reply on HN