Originally Posted by
HillRider
I have FC-5703 (105) triple cranks on two bikes and FC-4603 (Tiagra) triples on two others. Seeing the way things were going, a couple of years ago I found two NOS FC-5703 cranks for sale at attractive prices at couple of on-line shops I bought them both. They are sitting on my parts shelf waiting for they day they are needed.
Well, the OP is asking about mountain bike triples which are quite different than road triples, much lower gearing. My touring bike has been set up with a Raceface Turbine mountain bike triple, 42-32-22 which is perfect for the sort of use the OP probably needs. I will probably never wear this out since I don't ride this bike all that often. When I bought this crank, the cost of the individual chainrings would have been almost as much as the complete crank. The reason for this is simple. For a distributor to be able to provide individual chainrings they have to carry a huge inventory. Inventory that doesn't move costs money, capital that is tied up not generating revenue. I worked for a company that was a Raceface distributor. We had literally hundreds of chainrings in our warehouse that were waiting for a buyer. No wonder they cost so much to the end user
