2/23/14 10:13 AM

In this age of 10 is getting old and if you don't have 11, why are you fussing with 8 and 9 speed setups? Well, a backup or beater bike that is fairly well preserved and relatively light can still be fun to ride, can't it?

And a 9 spd setup is certainly better than 8 . .

Anyway, a friend has a low end relatively new brifter setup and 8 spds in the rear on such a bike. I recall that some of these bikes had shifters with a ghost 9th spd ability meaning you could convert without having to upgrade shifters - a real advantge.

What do we need to lok for to find out if his setup qualifies?

2/23/14 10:43 AM

1- Shift it to the smallest cog.

2- Disconnect the shift cable from the derailleur.

3- Put some tension on the cable, then see how many clicks the lever will shift. The maximum number of cogs will be one more than the number of clicks.

2/23/14 10:48 AM

Quick and simple - No,not you Brian. :-]

Thanx

2/23/14 11:06 AM

...when I would rather be quick and simple than slow and complicated. ;-)

2/23/14 11:53 AM

"had shifters with a ghost 9th spd ability "


Shimano ?? 8 VS 9 speed is different cog spacing and cable pull per shift, no? Well Campy too for that matter, cog spacing anyway, don't know about the cable pull 8 VS 9 on Campy...


I only went 10s in 2011. Still have 8, and 9 speed bikes. Gotta use up those cassettes. ;) Admittedly dove into the 10s converting 3-4 over after the first upgrade. Needed some new chains of a few. ;) Perhaps mostly due to the 16T cog issue and a 27-8 on the same cassette and mutual exclusivity. ;)

Last edited by Sparky on 2/23/14 12:33 PM; edited 1 time in total

2/23/14 12:20 PM

Slow and simple pretty much covers it...

2/23/14 1:15 PM

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In this age of 10 is getting old and if you don't have 11, why are you fussing with 8 and 9 speed setups?

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2/23/14 2:17 PM

Sort of a funny thing and side note.

I had 9s bar cons [first 8-9s path] and then D/A 9s STI for like 11 years. And how this slipped under my radar I do not know. I already had upped to DA 10s STI on the Strong when I bought a bike with 9s Ultegra / STIs.

The D/A 9s STI shifter bodies [I did not realize] were made smaller to get the weight down presumably. I was so happy with my big mitts when I tried the 10s DA and they filled my hands so much better.

Fast forward, 9s Ultegra STI are bigger than the D/A STIs. I should have got the Ultegra and not D/A STIs. 10 years later finding it out make me feel more stupid than usual. ;O

The 9s Ultegra on the TCX would suit me fine if my only bike frankly. They work flawlessly and actually fit my hands. the tandem also has 9s, wondering if 8s would be better for chain wear.

10-11 speed tandems? exist?

2/24/14 4:30 AM

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10-11 speed tandems? exist?

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2/24/14 8:12 AM

It seems every time the cog count goes up by one, there are a rash of claims that the new thinner chains will self-destruct in no time and the cogs will wear out in many fewer miles.

When 9-speed first came out, everyone was sure the chains were much more fragile than 8-speed and would have a much shorter lifetime. Then when 10-speed showed up, the same claims were made for it's chains and, suddenly, 9-speed became the standard of durability and long service life. Basically, N=bad and N-1 =much better.

I don't have a tandem and I'm old and not that strong but my experience is that, given decent care, I'm getting the same service life out of 10-speed chains (both Shimano and Wipperman) as I got out of their 9-speed predecessors and out of Shimano and SRAM 8-speed chains.

Maybe the newer, thinner chains are made of stronger better heat-treated steel but they don't seem any more wear prone.

2/24/14 9:52 AM

It's not really about the chain. Well, not about breaking them anyway.

I suspect older chains (if you go far enough back) were not even as durable as the new ones when it comes to stretch and breakage. But what N-1 setup is better in that it'll continue to work in less than perfect condition!

While there're people claiming about breaking the newer narrower chains, that's not been the main cause of concern lately. The complains about the ever increasing cogs has shifted. The tolerance is so tight it takes more focus to keep the shifting working smoothly.

Chain stretch hasn't gotten too much worse with the narrower chains. But the effect of the stretch is more noticeable, adding to the impression chains don't last as long.

Add to the fact the increased number of cogs are only providing ever diminshing benefits, it's no surprise many of us don't embrace the increased number of gears.

2/24/14 10:32 AM

Where do chains wear out more if they're 11s than if they're 8s? I suppose that as (if) the side plates themselves get thinner, that could cause an issue with increased cracking, but most gear wear is on the pins, which haven't changed in size, save to get slightly shorter (to fit the narrower gaps between the plates). Moreover, the chain doesn't actually flex over a greater distance in 11s than it did in 9s or even 8s.

So the major factors contributing to chain wear would be (1) failure of the side plates; or (2) the points of attachment between the plates and the pins.

Has anyone seen appreciable changes in the durability of chains in these areas? I've never seen a broken side plate, but my experience is pretty limited.

Or is it possible that the real durability problems have come with attempts to lighten chains by skeletonizing side-plates and using hollow pins?

2/24/14 12:10 PM

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I've never seen a broken side plate, but my experience is pretty limited.

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2/24/14 1:06 PM

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I haven't see either a broken sideplate or pin with any width chain. The only broken chains I've seen were broken by a road obstruction like a piece of wire getting into it or by poor or careless joining.

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2/25/14 6:16 AM

Since switching to 10 speed on the road back in '08, I haven't noticed any difference in durability or chain life. Perhaps it's just that I'm getting older and weaker as chains get narrower, but I suspect that improvements in metallurgy and manufacturing are the reason. That, and the emergence of connecting links as the method of joining chains.

Like April, I've broken (pulled apart) a chain on my MTB, but it required a very low gear in a very high stress situation and it was a lower-end 8-speed chain. I haven't had another such failure since then (1997, IIRC).

2/25/14 9:16 AM

I'm sure it is a rare event, but I've broken the side-plate of a 9sp SRAM chain for a road bike. While chains have gotten narrower, I do not think they have necessarily gotten weaker. Hasn't material fabrication and manufacturing, including tolerances improved greatly over say the past 20 - 30 years? I think so. For instance, compare a "department store" bike from 10 or 20 years ago to one now, and the quality is much improved. I choose a low end bike as an example, because I think the change is most pronounced.

2/25/14 11:35 AM

Been waiting a while to use that.

Seriously, I don't think chains are any weaker, either.

Is it possible to bust a chain? Of course. Have *you* ever broken one? ("Broken" here is clearly not the same as shortening, as in modifying the length of a chain while replacing it.) Some of us have. How often have *you* broken one?

I think for MOST of us (OK, maybe not April :-) ) the probability of breaking a chain, even if going from 9s to 11s increases that probability by 2-300%, is vanishingly small.

My question remains, though--aside from side plates breaking, what are the other ways in which a chain can "wear"? And are any of these likely to be influenced by a move to more speeds/narrower chains?

2/25/14 11:45 AM

I've broken 8 and 9 speed chains mtb/ing. The granny gear can produce real torque and shifting under severe loads can break side plates. I've broken maybe 6 mtb chains in 20 years.

I have never broken a road bike chain.

2/25/14 12:03 PM

I've broken a couple of modern, 8s chains while using the granny gear over the years. Always a pin slipping out of the sideplate iir, once in the final yards of a hillclimb time-trial up Mt Diablo.

But also on some older road bikes, where a rusted chain ruptured a sideplate. Rusted chains can lose a lot of strength, I've seen some that had several cracked plates but still no failure!

2/25/14 1:17 PM

...about broken chains? Really?

Few of us ever seen road bike chains broken because we changed the chain long before it got weaken enough to break on the road!

MTN bike chains break a lot more often partly because it can get weaken by the massive amount of dirt getting into the chain. So there's a much higher chance of sideplate weakening between maintenance cycles. Hence, much higher probability of chain failure on the trail. Still, that's really not that big of a concern even for mountain bikers. Ok, except perhaps we carry chain tools on trail rides and not on road rides.

When we talk about chain durability, we're not talking about how many miles between two broken chains! We're talking about mileage between chain either failing the length test or poor drive train performance. Broken chain is only the extreme end of that chain wear spectrum and hence not the best indicator of chain durability.

2/25/14 1:50 PM

AND...

maybe we are a touch more diligent changing out the chain when it show wear x on the road bike, and the MTB more of a when we upgrade or get a new cassette ??

Or maybe I just speak for myself...

2/25/14 6:21 PM

"upgrade"? What is that? ;-)

No, it's the other way around for me. Things break, and gets "upgraded" with the latest replacement!

2/27/14 2:13 AM

Actually, observing things more closely, I reckon the reason that my wife's 10-speed chains don't last as long as my 9-speed chains, given identical distances and maintenance, is that she cross-chains a lot. Once she's in the big chainring, she tends to stay in it until she gets to a gradient where the big-big combination isn't low enough, and once she's in the small chainring, she tends to stay in it until she gets up to a speed where the small-small combination isn't high enough. So the chain spends quite a lot of time running at an angle, which must wear it more quickly than running in a fairly straight line.

Whereas I'm a bit more anal about such things and never use the big chainring with the two biggest cogs at the back or use the small chainring with anything but the biggest three or four cogs.

2/27/14 5:57 AM

My son does the same sort of thing. Whereas I like to have just the right gear, his approach is to lock into some combination and stay with it until it just won't turn...

2/27/14 8:43 AM

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Once she's in the big chainring, she tends to stay in it until she gets to a gradient where the big-big combination isn't low enough, and once she's in the small chainring, she tends to stay in it until she gets up to a speed where the small-small combination isn't high enough.

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