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The Porteur style of bicycle popular by newspaper delivery men in France in the 1940s-1960s had reverse brake levers, seen here in this diagram from an article from Bicycle Quarterly (the photo jpeg is titled rebourherseville1960.jpg):

rebourherseville1960

A bunch of manufacturers including Dia-compe used to sell brake levers that were reversed and there are also some contemporary reproductions: Reverse levers

Was this just purely for style reasons? I can't think of many advantages of a reverse brake lever (except style) and can think of major disadvantages (it will hook or catch on things as you move forward). What were the rationale for having brake levers like this originally?

Period sources preferred.

RoboKaren
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    Seems like it's possible you could get more leverage depending on how your palms are situated and the shape of the bars. – ebrohman Nov 07 '15 at 17:40
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    I wonder if is a safety thing – would there be less likelihood of impacting the ends of the levers in a crash? – dlu Nov 07 '15 at 18:10
  • @dlu a lot of risk of hooking the lever on something so they don't look safe to me. – DavidG Nov 07 '15 at 18:36
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    @BSOrider, just the opposite isn't it? I think the pinky will be closer to the pivot. If I recall correctly the reverse levers I've seen are sized for road bars. – dlu Nov 07 '15 at 19:32
  • @DavidG, that does seem like a possible risk, but I'm not sure about how/when it would happen in real life as the bars would block many objects (but not those passing below the bars) – I could see them being quite a problem in racks or when riding trails, but I'm not sure how much of an issue it would be under normal conditions on the road. What I was wondering about is the risk of hitting the end of conventional flat bar levers in a crash and wondering if that risk motivated the design of reverse levers. – dlu Nov 07 '15 at 19:36
  • Other issues aside, it does seem more ergonomic to me, allowing more use of your longer, stronger fingers... of course, one could argue that those are the fingers that should stay attached to the grip, so... good question. – junkyardsparkle Nov 07 '15 at 19:59
  • @dlu Yikes, you're right. I thought I was looking at a bullhorn bar, but now I see that they're pull-back bars. Oops :) – BSO rider Nov 07 '15 at 20:36
  • Bso rider did see it backwards but the logic is still correct. The idea is you'll have more strength and leverage if you pull the lever towards your body. If these faced the other way your hands would be pushing up and away. Even mimicking the motion is awkward and uncomfortable. To flip the levers you would need to have them also closer to the center of the bars or on top instead of bottom. – BEVR1337 Nov 07 '15 at 20:52
  • @BSOrider, that makes me wonder if perhaps the origin of the levers was for use on bull horn bars. – dlu Nov 07 '15 at 21:23
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    If you're running aero bars, they're convenient for that. – Batman Nov 07 '15 at 22:45
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    It has the advantage that the hand grip area of the bar need not be straight for the entire length of the lever. The curve in the bar can begin before the end of the lever and the lever will still be "square" to the main part of the hand grip area. It also allows the pivot pin to be outboard, and the cable end inboard, but one would have to meditate on that a bit to see what it implied. – Daniel R Hicks Nov 08 '15 at 01:20
  • Harris Cyclery, writing about the Tektro/Origin-8 RX 4.1 Bar-end "Reverse" Brake Levers supports @junkyardsparkle comment, saying "In most applications, they put the part of the lever with the greatest leverage under you strongest, longest fingers, so they have real ergonomic benefits." – dlu Nov 08 '15 at 20:03
  • Way back when, in the dawn of cable operated brakes, it could be that "reverse" levers were normal. So it might be that the sources on the reason for the change are associated with clamp-on levers. – dlu Nov 08 '15 at 20:04
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    It's also very easy to replace the cable, since it just pulls straight out the end of the bars. None of the lifting covers and fiddling with funny bends that drop bar levers have, or the lever-wiggling hackery that conventional straight bar levers need. – Móż Nov 08 '15 at 21:30
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    The risks with those levers is that they get easily caught with obstacles like clothing of passers-by and that you could spear other road-users. That's why their use was abandoned on bicycles and motorcycles. – Carel Nov 09 '15 at 08:19
  • Look at the second image. Which way is the cable running? How would you be able to turn the lever around and still have the cable run forward up the handlebar/ – Daniel R Hicks Jun 04 '19 at 00:10

6 Answers6

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If you look at drawings of old bikes, both types of brake configurations are depicted. This supports the idea that it was merely a design choice with no significant pros and cons over other configurations other than aesthetics. I suggest that it just so happens that builders in the place and time period you cited used this design because it was fashionable.

There is very limited risk here for "catching" unless the rider is literally going through shrubs (and in that situation, catching would be the least concern). Also, bizarre freak-accidents aside, no one is going to be "speared" by a reverse brake handle. Think about what would actually have to occur for that to happen.

Angelo
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There can be different reasons for using this type of lever. Personally I use it because the handlebar I've chosen bends sharply close to the end of the handgrip, so there's not room for both the thumb shifters and brake levers. I've used the reverse levers for several years now without spearing or hooking anything with them, and find with a non-linear brake they perform well enough for city cycling.

Bike Artisans
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  • Thx for clarifying the question. Style maybe involved, but pics in the linked BQ article suggest practicality too: Bar flex, and Adding grip positions. Longer handgrip sections flex more. Reverse levers allow shorter grip section.

    Also, look at the bar tape wrapping in these pics of 1940s/50s porteur bikes: These suggest the rider wants mulitple hand positions on a relatively flat bar. Reverse levers allow this, regular levers get in the way.

    https://janheine.files.wordpress.com/2013/05/singercityfull.jpg https://janheine.files.wordpress.com/2013/05/porteur_competition_bicycle.jpg

     – Bike Artisans Jun 28 '19 at 23:06
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FWIW, The rental JUMP ebikes were redesigned to use these style levers to allow the entire brake cable to be internally routed to reduce vandalism to the bikes.

Fred the Magic Wonder Dog
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    Technically, this doesn't answer the question ("What were the rationale for having brake levers like this originally?", my emphasis) but it's certainly a rationale so I'm happy that it's a useful answer. – David Richerby Jun 05 '19 at 17:25
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By moving the brake lever to the end of the bar, you're afforded more room on the handlebars for grips and shifters.

screen shot

The information is sourced from velo-orange.blogspot.com.

RoboKaren
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Chad M
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  • Welcome to the Bicycles Stack Exchange. Thank you for participating. One of our goals is to be an information resource. Good answers look a little like a very short research paper. Copy in the part of the information that pertains to the question and then provide a link to the original source. Please take the [tour] – David D Jun 04 '19 at 23:17
  • I have tweaked your answer so it credits the source without depending on the source. But I can't see a lot of space being saved. One advantage might be in hand protection if the rider falls over. – Criggie Jun 05 '19 at 01:21
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    Please don't post text as images. It can't be searched and it's inaccessible to visually impaired people who rely on screen-readers. And, seriously, it's faster and easier to copy-paste text as text than it is to take a screenshot. – David Richerby Jun 05 '19 at 08:07
  • That’s my bad, Richard. Feel free to revert my edit. – RoboKaren Jun 05 '19 at 17:24
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A cleaner appearance. A standard lever will have an unattractive clamp. Also, the rider may wish to use multiple hand positions on the bar & the clamp could be in the way of a desired position.

Malarky
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These lever style are mainly used in triathlon bicycles because of their smaller profile and positioning on aero-bars. You can read more about the evolutions of these levers here: http://university.tri-sports.com/2010/08/11/stop-triathlon-bike-brake-levers/

rclocher3
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Baratier ErebusDuHalm
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