seypat

When you're building a bike, you do what you have to. Each component went on a spreadsheet. I only had to do it once for each different component. Still less time than maintaining and waxing a group of chains.

PeteHski

For me it's not about weight, it's all about getting rid of the clunky, slow FD shifting and small risk of dropping the chain in the process (it happens to me typically only a couple of times per season on the road, but usually when it matters and I end up getting dropped!). For a road bike I'm happy with 2x and for mtb I most definitely prefer 1x. If I was building up a bike specifically for road climbing I would seriously consider 1x, although current options are still a bit limited. Ekar currently offers the widest range with reasonably close spacing, but I would prefer electronic shifting. So I would consider the latest SRAM 1x options for a climbing bike.

FD shifting sucks in general even if we are conditioned to accept it (imagine if you had to accept this kind of shifting on a modern car/motorbike transmission?). That's why things like the Classified Powershift Hub are being raved about i.e. front shifting that doesn't suck!

PeteHski

Yeah I know I've been there too, lol. But when it comes to 2x vs 1x, weight difference would not be my priority. When I last compared them (about a year ago when I was thinking of building a 1x road bike), the difference in overall weight was pretty negligible. IIRC I think Ekar 1x was one of the lightest setups on the market. I must admit I did have a spreadsheet!

seypat

People have different needs and wants. I ride 3X and 5-9 in the back. The reason? I can cover the range and do a lot less shifting overall with a 3X. 1X is the worst possible system for me(and a Shimano brake lever shifter) The muscles in my right forearm will get tight and start cramping on an all day ride. It gets to the point that I can't squeeze the brake lever. I can't think of anything as stupid(for me) as "Everesting" with a 1X unless you're coasting down the hill each time and staying in your low gear. Otherwise, it's 12(or whatever you have) up and 12 back every F-N time! Homey don't play that.

I also don't need 1 tooth steps everywhere. I'm a fast twitcher. The fastest way to cramps for me is staying with the same cadence over and over. I prefer 2 tooth steps over one. It forces some cadence variance. With one tooth steps, you also have to do a lot of shifting to get around in your range.

Koyote

Seems like your problem is a poorly set-up FD, not the fact that it's 2x.

PeteHski

A modern 1x drivetrain is not hard to shift quickly through the cassette (especially if electronic). That's one of the reasons they are becoming more popular i.e. easy, quick shifting. Same basic reason why sequential gearboxes superceeded H-pattern shifting in performance/race cars. It actually became quicker despite the sequential limitation.

PeteHski

No, I've been using FDs for about 45 years and have all the factory setup tools. I'm also a mechanical engineer by profession, so this kind of thing is right up my street. They work but are fundamentally a bit crap. Like I said, dropping a chain through a mis-timed front shift is rare for me (on average maybe once or twice a year on my road bikes). It was much more of an issue on mtbs back in the day (then I would typically drop my chain once or twice on every ride), before they all became 1x and the problem completely disappeared.

seypat

It has nothing to do with shifting quickly. It's the act of shifting the Shimano STI. The long throw of the brake lever shift is very similar(to me) to the movement of doing a wrist curl with a dumbell. I eliminated a lot of that problem by putting Microshift shifters on my bikes with indexed systems. I think the Microshift are similar to the SRAM 2 paddles. I still have plenty of bikes with friction. I don't have a problem shifting a FD. If you pull up a gear calculator and compare the 3 options, you can cover your range and do a lot less shifting with a FD over a 1X. The 2X will reduce it over a 1X and a 3X will reduce it even more over the other 2. If that's not important to a rider, then it's not. It's important to me. The wost possible system for me would be a fixed gear. If I couldn't coast with the pedals some, there would be no all day rides for me. On the flip side, my body makeup/physiology is best suited for fixed gear bikes and track racing. The problem is the closest Velodrome/track is 300 miles to the north or south.

There is electronic shifting, but the cost of it is not worth it to me.

tomato coupe

So, are you happy with road 2x or not happy with road 2x?

PeteHski

It's okay, but front shifting is still the weakest link as it always has been. Do you agree that rear shifting is faster/smoother/more seamless than front shifting, especially under load? The odd time I do drop the chain on a front shift is always very irritating. I do have a chain catcher on my current bike, but that's just a bit of a bodge really. I would be more than happy to see the back of FDs in future. I certainly don't miss them on my mtb.

Something like the Classified Hub would be preferable to a 2x or perhaps a 1x13 would simply make the issue go away. When I was looking closely at Ekar last year I'm pretty sure it would have worked for me as well as a compact road 2x. Only reason I'm still on 2x is because it came with my new bike and there was no 1x option. The alternative bike I was thinking of building came with 1x and 2x frame options and I would have chosen 1x for sure.

SoSmellyAir

RD shifting will always be faster / smoother / more seamless than FD shifting, because the former involves a smaller differential in the number of teeth.

Having a waxed chain helps. OK, I will shut up about this now.

I am curious about this too.

DaveSSS 

I've been using SRAM AXS 2X for 30 months now and never had a chain drop, but I use shimano grx or campy chorus cranks for more range. Shifting down to the little ring is a little slow sometimes, but on most of my 50 mile routes, I only make that shift a few times, for the 10-13% grades. The cost for electronic shifting is coming down, if you use SRAM. I prefer SRAM's two lever shifting over any four lever option.
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PeteHski

I've had just one chain drop on SRAM AXS 2x in 12 months. I've also had 2 chain drops on Shimano 105 in the last 2 years, both of them at critical moments (which I why I remember them!). It's not actually my main issue with 2x for road use. I just don't like the way front shifting works in general.

PeteHski

Well that's part of the reason I don't particularly like the whole FD concept. FD shifting across chainrings of significantly different sizes is inherently crude and clunky. That was my main point against it, which you appear to be confirming.

The Classified Hub shifts range much faster, so that's one inherent advantage for this alternative system. 1x eliminates the requirement for a big range shift in most cases.

SoSmellyAir

For me, an FD paired with a closed range cassette is a necessity given my narrow power band.

RD shifting is like shifting gears while FD shifting is like swapping a rear axle with a different final drive ratio. Let's say that the Classified hub can switch between its two ratios in 1/3 the time of a Shimano Di2 FD; that's fast, but can a Di2 RD switch gears fast enough to match revs (i.e., with minimal disruption to cadence)?

PeteHski

An FD is not actually a necessity for you. It just happens to be the only current economic solution to your problem. Hub shifting is another solution to the same problem with some obvious advantages.

Shimano claims 70 ms for a rear shift and 200 ms for a front shift (Di2 12 speed). Classified claim 150 ms for their hub shift. So both should be able to match cadence with rear shifting when shifting the front. But for me that's not really the issue. I can set my SRAM AXS to make 1 or 2 compensating rear shifts when front shifting, but front shifting itself is still nowhere near as smooth as rear shifting. The chain still has to climb 13 chainring teeth and that never feels amazing, especially going from small to big. While I haven't tried the Classified hub, I can imagine it's a much better shifting experience than bouncing a chain up and down chainrings of significantly different sizes. Especially when simultaneously shifting the rear. I actually switched off rear shift compensation for this reason as it can make front downshifts pretty rough under load.

DaveSSS 

I avoid the rev matching problem by pedaling out of the saddle in the big ring up to my 28 or 32 sprocket, then sit and quickly shift to the little ring. There's little change in the required cadence. I never have a rev matching problem on my hilly and mountainous routes. No chain drops either.

PeteHski

Yeah, we've all lived with these things for years, so we develop our preferred strategies to compensate for their limitations. But when something inherently superior comes along, these limitations are suddenly exposed. Every review I've read of the Classified Hub raves about the game-changing shift quality. Reviewers who have been living "happily" with FDs for decades suddenly get reminded how clunky and crude they actually are.

seypat

Have you bought stock in the Classified Hub company? Beginning to sound somewhat shillish.

PeteHski

Ah another cynic! They appear to be everywhere at the moment. I guess we are living in tough times.

So just to clarify I have zero stock in Classified Hub and am not about to spend a ton of money on one. Actually I'm more interested in the 1x solution. The only reason I mentioned the hub shift was because it highlights the inherent problems with a conventional FD and offers an inherently superior solution. But I don't feel strongly enough about it to spend £1000 on it and be tied to their wheelsets etc.

Happy now?

seypat

Well, if you're not convinced to get one, then it's not a superior product overall yet is it?

DaveSSS 

While the classified hub is a novel idea, their 12 speed cassettes lack in range and the 0.7 low gear also lacks range, compared to a 16 tooth difference at the crank. To get a decent top gear, I'd want a 50 chain ring and the lowest gear ratio would be 50/34x0.7=1.03. My 46/30 with a 10-36 has a lot lower gear and the same top gear. The range is 552%. Since I have no chain drop problems, it wouldn't solve any problem for me. When you shift to the 0.7 ratio, you still have to make sprocket shifts to compensate.

https://www.classified-cycling.cc/products/powershift-kit
https://www.classified-cycling.cc/products/cassettes

PeteHski

Is that supposed to be a joke? The hub shift is inherently a superior concept to the FD concept. That's all.

Koyote

If you really think it's superior, you'd be riding it.

Though I don't think it's been around long enough to reach that conclusion. Reliability and longevity are important to some of us.

SoSmellyAir

Is the Classified hub compatible only with its own cassette?

Classified: 0.7; Shimano 50/34: 0.68; Shimano GRX 48/31: 0.65, so is it really that far off?