GeoffNA

I like Ergon but was looking at these as well: https://www.sq-lab.com/en/products/g...rip-stuby.html

900ss

Once I sort out which crank set to get for my Sirrus I will order it and crank arms for my wife's TurboVado Sl and my Turbo Creo SL comp carbon EVO (sounds like a Harley Davidson). The good folks at Praxis have offered 15% off it I order them all at once. Which I shall, being a cheap (frugal) Englishman. I'm in San Jose, 45 to 60 minutes from Santa Cruz and Praxis, depending on the traffic gods on any particular day.

Thank you all for the input.

GrizzledBastard, thank you for posting your upgrades. You have good taste sir, and that is one fine looking machine you have. Perhaps we can meet in Santa Cruz or Salinas one day for a socially distanced beer. My treat!

GeoffNA

Lots of knowledge in this thread and I'm appreciative.

Could you run a complete Shimano XT groupset on the 2021 X 5.0? It seems there isn't a compatible Shimano 40T 12 speed chainring, unless I'm missing something.

GrizzledBastard

Technically, yes...but as dorkdisc mentioned, chainline needs to be considered. That can be adjusted via the new bottom bracket by running no spacers or adding spacers (likely running none). You definitely want to avoid a "boost" crank and have something that's running a low Q-factor of about 147mm. What I'm not certain about is the offset of the chainring. I didn't go so far as to establish those last 2 issues. It should be available in the bowels of Shimano's specs.

GrizzledBastard

I'll add, the 12 speed option is new to me like most others. It was a concern I had as I noticed even on the Praxis cranks, they were listed as 10/11 spd chain compatible. I asked their CS Rep when I confirmed answers to some other questions I had and he came back after a pause and said "yes..it'll work". I haven't yet discovered how much different the 12 spd link is over an 11. I'll have my crank tomorrow morning so I lay up a 12 spd chain on it and see.

GrizzledBastard

UPDATE:

New Praxis Zayante Carbon crankset is installed but not without a little pucker factor with the bottom bracket install. Short version, the left NDS bearing cup did not want to thread into the frame shell without just stalling and not being able to thread by hand. Called Praxis and sent them a pic before proceeding just confirming I didn't have an oddity. While out, stopped by my dealer and discussed the issue with my owner/mechanic buddy and he said sometimes you just gotta suck it up and keep turning! The frame is pretty much done if you screw the threads badly so I was more apprehensive than I've ever been on a BB install...and I've done a bunch. He sent me home with the threading tool so I chased the threads on the offending side and the cup threaded in. WHEW! I was sweating it!

The crankset is very lightweight and the BB is very smooth. I'm impressed. I installed the supplied 3M vinyl protection, fortunately being very familiar with the operation as there was no instruction. These require soapy water then activation with water/alcohol to stick.

30 mile ride in the morning. We'll see how it feels.

8 lbs of Bottom bracket threading tool. Scary stuff on a brand new frame!

Fresh crank

Fresh crank with 3M protector installed.

Right side cup installed.

Job complete with OEM 42T chainring installed.

900ss

I'm envious! How much of a weight difference is there between the stock assembly and this setup? I will be following in your footsteps shortly.......

Thank you for sharing your upgrades!

BTW, when threading the Bottom bracket, are the threads dry or do you apply lube or anything else?

GrizzledBastard

I didn't weigh the Praxis before I installed it but they do have a published weight I'll dig up and then weigh the old crankset and see where it is.

Like most mfg's, Praxis calls for grease or anti-seize on the shell AND the BB threads prior to assembly. I always roll with anti-seize on threaded BB's.

GrizzledBastard

Edit: OEM crankset weighs somewhere north of 820g. I say more because that weight is with the Praxis 40T that I didn't use and the Praxis is definitely lighter than the OEM chainring so it's not apples to apples.

Praxis lists the Zayante Carbon only with TWO chainrings and puts it at approx 620g in that configuration. The 40T ring I have is 138g so it might be safe to shave close to 100g once you factor out a ring? Looks like the new system is possibly just short of half the weight of the OEM give or take. Maybe 520-550g?

Just an observation and warning...if you do remove the OEM crankset via that anemic main crank bolt, you might want to order a new one to have on hand. That said, I obviously re-used mine after taking it off and I re-installed to proper torque specs but used 242 (blue-mid strength) Loctite quite generously. Yesterday my cranks were noisy when I was doing a lap around my neighborhood before stripping them and pulling the BB. The main crank bolt was hand tight and the crankarm came off in a super easy fashion.....just like the recall bikes suffered in '19-'20. So, if you break that nut loose, be ready to red loctite it back in or face the consequences. It's clearly a crappy design and I already feel better being rid of it.

Skiddz

^^ Looks great, GB! Continuing along those same lines of crankset replacement, I believe the Easton EC90SL (CF) and their PF30 BB would also work on the X5.0? (sorry...can't post a link yet...too new here). The Praxis unit looks damn nice, but was curious to see if anyone has seen the Easton unit up close and personal...

Thx!

GrizzledBastard

Easton makes good stuff though I have zero experience with their cranksets. As for PF30, the answer to that is "NO". The BB shell (frame) on the Sirrus is a BSA 1.37" threaded (English) shell. Press Fit 30 is a totally different animal and won't work...and sometimes a massive PITA on the bikes it's designed. PF is just not an option on the Sirrus, though. BSA threaded is just extremely easy. You can still get a crankset that sports a 30mm spindle but it will require a proprietary BB...sort of like the Praxis. It's a 30mm spindle on the drive side necked down to a 28mm on the non-drive side. SRAM GXP is similar in that it's a BSA threaded BB but the DS is 27mm and NDS is 24mm and that would work on the Sirrus. Easton might have an appropriate BB for the BSA...it's just not a PF type. I'll look up that crank and see what I can find about it.

To keep things less complicated, you'll want to stay with a "ROAD" crankset like the Zayante or similar. Getting into MTB cranks you will find yourself in the rabbit hole of multiple Q-Factors (the distance between the outside edge of each crank arm) as well as many different chainring offsets and chainlines. The Q on the Praxis is 147mm, IIRC, and the chainline of the OEM 42 I put back on is dead-nuts centered on the 6th cog up from bottom. No spacers are needed on the BB. Aside from my little detour on threading, it's a 20 minute install from BB till finished.

One thing I can say is the Zayante Carbon is an impressive product. I've already got 60 miles on it and it's silent, generates not one bit of vibration, and is ultra smooth. The BB has good bearings in it and you can go ceramic if you choose. If mine wears prematurely, which I doubt, I'll go ceramic. I've spent twice as much for SRAM cranksets on my mountain bikes, both GXP and PF30, and I'm thinking fit and finish on the Praxis is equal if not leaning towards better. The $300 price point is great.

Lastly, I went with 175mm crank length. It made a difference in power from the 172.5's that come on the bike. That tiny bit of leverage is surprising significant for my size (5'11"). I've been there before on MTB's when experimenting with 170's and 172.5's. The smaller felt better on my knees after long trail rides but I lost my ability to hammer through the chunky trail features. It's quite amazing at how much such a small measurement can make such a difference. My climbing power on the road is improved. I'm getting more out of my output.

DorkDisk

EC90SL cranks are currently the sweetheart for light gravel builds. I've a set of EC90SLs on my cyclocross build since April of this year. They have been trouble free this whole time; but my personal long term assessment is still years away. This crank has been out for several years by now and there are no long term mass issues to watch for. For this build, I wanted to hit a certain weight so the 120 grams I save over the GRX 810 crankset was the deciding factor over GRX810. Other deciders were that GRX810 does not come in 30/46, and the slightly lower Q factor with Easton. Easton and RaceFace are the same company, either have a great reputation in this sector.

Keep in mind that Shimano cranksets are incredibly good; going from no-name OEM to Easton carbon cranks is quite a jump. Shimano set the bar very high balancing weight, strength, and price with their cranks. Aftermarket cranks can beat Shimano on only ONE of those points. Regarding bearing design and preload, I much prefer Shimano's patented system.

You'll need the right BB for your frame. All my bikes are English threaded.



RaceFace Turbine LPs from the 90s are still sought after and relevant.

Skiddz

EXCELLENT info from both of you (GrizzledBastard and DorkDisk)....much appreciated!

I watched some videos tonight on the Praxis, and I agree it is a nice unit - interesting that the NDS is stepped down 2mm.

One thing is for sure - one of these cranksets is going to be installed on my bike soon...im headed to one of my LBS' this week to inquire and purchase. Upgrade fever! :-)

DorkDisk

Do you like rabbit holes? If not, do not click .

Skiddz

Interesting video and analysis of the bearing failures. I would assume that the failures aren't terribly widespread, however...a quick search did turn up some results though. I guess as long as the spindle and bearings/BB are available as replacement parts, all is well. I'm off to watch more of his videos....

GrizzledBastard

HA! Gotta love the Hamibi! Stirring up sh*t as usual. I've watched a number of his vids and they're always entertaining but the common denominator that I have seen is EVERYTHING is shiite! I'll have to watch more to see if he actually ever praises a design. In the first 2 minutes of that video I called a frame alignment issue. Then I see it's a Salsa.....giggity! Funny, I get to the end and Hamibi say "Frame alignment issue!"

I don't worry one bit about the Praxis/GXP design. I have a few thousand miles of hard MTB wear on the design and have never had an issue aside from dropping a set of Enduro bearings in after a year or two and that comes from the method of required bike cleaning with the fine powdered silt we ride out here on the dry coast in summer. I'm riding a new Specialized and if frame alignment is an issue, I'll be given a brand new frame. Specialized's done that for me before with a bearing housing machining tolerance issue after 2 years of riding it.

So, just to update my Praxis experience, I had mentioned I was having an issue with the 40T chainring that was supplied my crankset and that it wanted to shed the 12 spd chain to the outboard side. I've been running the OEM 42T chainring since install with no issues. Yesterday, I decided to get to the bottom of the 40T issue. Firstly, the chain must be put on the ring in a certain orientation for the "locking" function to work. I think what happened at first was my KMC master link wasn't locked so it started the chain walking off the ring when I first tried. Yesterday, I was getting a lot of chatter on the Wave Ring chain ring so I talked to Praxis and we went through the entire set up, shared photos, engineers offered opinions making sure offset and chain alignment were correct. The chain was staying on but rattled on the front ring as I went down from center (6th cog) chainline towards the 10T. It was fine going up to the 51T. Everything was set up right and I was just super leary of riding it for fear that the chain might shed and ding up some carbon. Before taking it off and replacing the 42T back on, I ponied up some courage and road it. As soon as there was some "human" tension on it, it ran perfect. No chatter, no skip, perfect. I think it just needed to settle in being essentially all new components. I've never experienced that before with a new groupset.

I put nearly 20 miles on it today, most all crappy hill climbs that make me wanna puke along with some rolley country roads. Aside from an occasional chatter when in 10T, it was perfect and I gotta say, for me, this 40T may just be the perfect ring for my kind of terrain. It felt like every gear was the right one, not like before where I wished I had one in between because one's not enough, the other is too much. I'll see how it goes on my next few rides and report.

bobthebike

I have a Sirrus X 5.0 with the 42 tooth ring. I'm not even close to touching the 5 largest rings in the back. Has anybody gone up a couple of teeth, to 44 teeth, in the front? Thanks, Bob

GrizzledBastard

Sounds like you need bigger hills!

ArneDarvin

Just picked up what I think is the last Sirrus X 2.0 in my area until next year. I have only put 10 miles on it because we're currently suffering from a hurricane.

But I wanted to find out what accessories folks are considering or have purchased recently. Any when I say "smart," I don't mean necessarily artificially intelligent, though if someone has something to suggest, I'd like to hear about it. To me "smart" means something that doesn't waste time or money and enhances the riding experience.

So, whatcha got?

Mojo31

Better pedals - I went with RaceFace Aeffect flats, others like the RaceFace Chester.

QuadLock phone mount - a small bit more than others but solid. Downloaded the UnderArmor MapMyRide app on the phone and it gives me a computer for free.

Specialized Stix lights, front and rear - use them for DRLs so we will be seen (hopefully). The saddle mount for the rear at $5 is a nice add.

Topeak saddle bag to carry spare tube, CO2 trigger and canisters, tire levers, and a patch. Get one big enough to also hold your keys and a snack (I'm using the medium size, my wife uses a small since I carry the flat stuff).

A couple of bottle cages and bottles.

ArneDarvin

Wonderful suggestions! Exactly what I was looking for.

W/R/T the pedals, I did see a review that said the standard equipment pedals were something that everyone upgraded not long after buying the Sirrus (Sirrus X).
Thank you, friend!

Mojo31

Enjoy the ride!

Way2Slow

Congrats Arne on the X2! Hopefully you make it through the hurricane safe and sound.

Mojo provided some great additions, just make note in regards to the quad lock. If you use glass protectors on your cell phone, the quad lock case is a tight fit and it will cause some bubbling - only negative I have in that regards.

Are you planning to ride when its dark out? I chose this light because of run times when not in high mode.
https://www.niterider.com/products/6...mina-micro-850

I have pics of my setup on my X5 here: https://www.bikeforums.net/21759615-post1346.html

Stix lights are awesome but you won't be able to mount to your seat since you have an X2 - no mounting holes.

Mojo31

Did not think about that. Doesn't matter though, the Stix come with seat post mounts that work well.

If you want more headlight power, an alternative is the Specialized Flux 850. Wife has one on her Roubaix, and it works well, but I don't know how it compares to the Niterider that James linked.

Mojo31

Way2Slow - how's the bike? Riding much?