Hey folks! Welcome back to this miniseries in which I'm covering
the race bikes of 2018.
In the first video I looked at the tires, Schwabe tires, Rocket Ron
Racing Ralph and Thunderbird, make sure to check that out.
But today I'm gonna look at drivetrains.
Yes, believe it or not, I am still using an 1x10,
this uses an 11-42t.
On the Yeti I've used an Eagle 12 speed that I'm gonna cover later on
but today I want to concentrate on the e*thirteen 9-46t cassette
that's an 11 speed that gives you 511% of range
I've started using this cassette exactly a year ago
I have a few videos on unboxing, installation, and a few
tips and tricks that I learned along the way.
So how does it look like today, a year after being used on two different bikes?
I built the drivetrain around an XT 11 speed from Shimano,
the front chainring is a 30 tooth oval from absoluteBlack
bolted on to a set of SRAM cranks.
The chain that I've used is an Eagle GX 12 speed.
In the back I've used the GS or medium cage derailleur, XT as well
and that works perfectly fine with this gear range from a 9t cog
all the way up to the 46t.
The cassette was used on a couple of bikes,
in spring I built this hardtail just for racing purposes and since then
I have installed the Eagle 12 speed chain, trying to solve a couple of issues with the cassette
minor quirks that are well documented in the video that I did at the time.
After about 700-800 kilometers the chain still shows 0.5 as we see it on this Park Tool
so still in the usable range.
The cassette overall has about 1100-1200km on it.
If you look at the wear and tear, the three biggest cogs here are made out of aluminum
and you can see a bit of discoloration or marks from the shifting.
Looking at the steel cogs, they definitely show a bit of wear as well
but that doesn't seem to affect the functionality in any way yet.
The reason why you don't see a lot of wear here on the aluminum cogs
is because I did size properly the chainring (30t oval)
so, the chain stayed not only in the middle of the cassette most of the time
but most importantly stayed here on the steel cogs.
Some users experienced noises coming out of this cassette.
they usually come from these tabs
that connect the steel part to the aluminum carrier, you have one over there,
second one is over here, and you have a third one a couple of teeth over, this one here.
I moved this cassette from one wheelset to another so I opened it up once
and I've used the provided grease from e*thirteen.
I have not experienced any issues whatsoever
but if you look at the video where I talk about the "issues" with this cassette
you will see the grease points very clearly pointed out.
Shifting is very smooth, similar to using a Shimano cassette,
however I found it to be noisier than that.
Most importantly, taking it outside and grabbing a whole
bunch of gears, up and down the cassette under power, doesn't seem to upset the shifting in any way.
And that's how it's been working since brand-new.
So what do I think about this drivetrain one year in?
Well, in the world of 1x12 everything
I've been very happy with my 1x11, it gave me the range, has lower weight,
it allowed me to use a small chainring up front
to keep good clearance around that bottom bracket.
Works perfectly fine, there is no creaking, cracking,
no drop chains, no miss shifts, everything worked fine so for next year
most probably I will install a new 12 speed chain and just reuse it the way it is.
This year, e*thirteen introduced a new version of this cassette
that uses a pinch bolt instead of the lock ring.
They also introduced a 12 speed version of this cassette offering the same 511 % range.
What about you guys? Did you cave in and bought Eagle for everything?
Are you expecting or waiting for the XTR 12 speed?
Or you're still using hybrid drivetrains like this ones?
Let me know in the comments below,
if you found this useful don't forget to like the video
and subscribe to my channel.
I will put a lot more links
in the description of the video.
And until next time, I hope to see you guys on the trails
Cheers guys,
Cheers!