Alivio/105 component compatibility

Ron338 said:

Several years ago I built an 8 speed touring bike from a Trek 520 frame. The bike has a Deore LX rear derailleur, a Shimano 105 front derailleur, Ultegra downtube shifters, and a Sugino XD crankset with 46-36-26 chainrings. I want to convert this to a flat bar bike. I bought some Alivio 8 speed mountain bike shifters, but my question is, will this shifter work with the 105 derailleur? And if not, what front derailleur would work with an Alivio shifter and the Sugino crankset I described? I don't want to switch to a 9 speed, and naturally I'd like to make this changeover as simple as possible. Any advice would be greatly appreciated....

Not the front derailleur. shimano flatbar/MTB shifters and road front derailleurs and vice versa don't talk well to each other. Get a shimano MTB front der that is meant for a crankset with the chainring differences you have, probably a Alivio or such MTB FD will work fine.

Sheldon Brown implies that it won't work,
"Road vs Mountain Front Derailers: While rear indexing is the same for all recent shifters/derailers, Shimano fronts use a different amount of cable pull for drop bar vs straight bar controls." (Link here)

You could always try it and see what happens. If it doesn't work, then purchase a mountain bike style front derailleur. Cambria Bike has quite a few options between $10-20 or check Ebay for used.