Hey everybody, welcome back!
I must admit that five years ago if you were to tell me
that I'm gonna install a drivetrain and not worry about cables I would have called you crazy.
Here we are today, we have the GX Eagle AXS, let's get this installed!
No cables but we have to worry about batteries this time.
The tiny battery that comes with it, mine was dead so make sure you use that charger to charge it up.
Controller already has a battery installed, if you press on the AXS button you get a green light, green is good so that's fine.
Next you have to install an actual battery here on the derailleur.
And to remove this battery cover, the easiest way that I found to do it is
reach out here on the inside, and as you unclip it from the inside it comes right off.
There's only one way you can install this battery and that's like this,
and again if you press that AXS button, here you go, it just blinked green and you heard the motor initializing.
So these are ready to be paired, a process that connects one controller with one derailleur so they can work together.
Now the pairing process is described here on this Quick Start guide
and I'm sure everybody reads the quick start guide, right?
Three easy steps and step number 1 says press and hold this AXS button on the derailleur until you see that LED blinking
okay, and you see it green right now, and now it's blinking.
Now move over to the controller, press and hold again until you see this LED blinking
now it's blinking fast, and now we go back here and you press on the button one more time
and that should connect the two together , so now let's go!
It works! And now we're ready to install this toy, did I say toy? onto an actual bike.
And back in the lab where I'm working on my other toy, the Santa Cruz that I showed you guys recently on my channel.
Obviously the first step is going to be to install the shifter.
Interestingly this is a new bar clamp with two bolts on it
versus the old SRAM bar clamp that used to come with all their shifters.
And here's the controller installed with the old bar clamp, however if you look at the new bar clamp
this has like an integrated spacer, like a 5 millimeter spacer, so your shifter would be pushed down.
I assume that has to do with ergonomics. I'll see how that goes when I have the grips installed.
And like with any shifter I would say shift in the hardest gear, this is this up button,
there we go, so I bring the cage all the way back.
And surprise surprise! We're gonna make it a ShRAMano install!
So Shimano cassette, chain, and cranks with the SRAM AXS GX,
this should work just fine, give us that smoothness of the HG+ with the magic of the wireless shifting.
5mm hex and again it's gonna be B-bolt, tab, and the derailleur hanger stop, that's the sequence.
Push the derailleur down to keep that tab and the stop in contact and tighten this to 11 Nm.
Back in the good old days of mechanical derailleurs at this point I would have said let's adjust those Hi/Lo limit screws.
But in this case this is done at the very end so let's install the chain now.
SRAM and Shimano talk about chain length differently
but they both recommend to put the chain on the largest cog and on the largest chainring,
don't run it through the derailleur, and then you're gonna have end- to-end plus a few chain links.
In my case I used the Shimano method so end-to-end plus 5 links,
that's because my suspension is NOT in the SAG position or fully deflated shock position.
And I did end up pretty much with what SRAM recommended if deflating the suspension fully.
Use the magic of that Cage Lock and run the chain through the derailleur first,
remember the Shimano chain is directional so you gotta see Shimano written over there,
remember you have a tab over here, you got to be below it,
and on to your chainring.
The Shimano Quick Link is directional, you see the arrow in the direction of the movement of the chain.
In case of SRAM you would have that kidney shaped Power Link looking like this,
so just connect the two parts of the Quick Link, I'm gonna release the cage now,
and then you can use chain pliers to properly connect the Quick Link
or just move that Quick Link up top and then go and yank on the cranks.
There you go!
And this is going to be your first glimpse on whether the chain is the right size.
As you can see here I still have room to play with my cage
and also my B-gap is not adjusted yet, that's going to be the next step.
So first revolutions of this ShRAMano drivetrain,
start shifting up the cassette, one-by- one all the way to here,
because that's where SRAM recommends to adjust the B-gap.
B-bolt is there, you have a 3mm Allen/ Hex and this derailleur comes with the new adjustment tool.
The problem is that trying to use it with this Shimano cassette it doesn't really work because as you can see,
this second largest cog is too close to the 51T so you cannot really sit the tool properly.
I actually have a video on my channel looking at the new tool, the 3mm hex hack, and the old tool,
make sure you check that out! But in this case I'm gonna try to use the old tool.
So chain on the largest cog, put the tool behind the top jockey and take a look at that line.
Go ahead and adjust until the top of the 51T aligns with your line here.
If you don't have the old tool use a ruler to measure about 40- 41 mm from the cassette to the bolt of that top jockey.
And remember that this adjustment has to be made at the SAG point of the bike
so I'm gonna have to do this again with my weight on it.
So with the 11 shifts being hard-coded into the mechanism here, how do we fine-tune this so you don't hear noises like this?
This was called indexing in the good old days and it was done by using the barrel adjuster at the shifter.
That is now called Micro Adjust and is done by pressing on to the AXS button,
and then using the paddle up or down.
This will micro-adjust the derailleur in the direction that you wish, so
press and hold and you would see the LED here blinking as you do this.
These are micro adjustments so you're not necessarily going to see the 0.2 mm movement of the derailleur cage.
SRAM recommends doing the micro-adjust with the chain on the second largest cog and you can do that,
but just keep in mind that you want the derailleur to be perfect for the middle of the cassette.
There is a 1.1 mm delta between a SRAM 12s cassette and a Shimano 12s cassette,
you want that difference to be spread half and half on the two halves of the cassette.
I want you guys to think about this Micro Adjust as being nothing else but the job done by the High limit screw in the good old days.
And that is to tell the derailleur where the first gear is, and then the 11 clicks of this cassette will start from there.
This is no different, using the Micro Adjust you set up that first gear
and then the derailleur mechanism is set up for the exact 11 clicks that the SRAM cassette needs for perfect shifting again and again,
and that's what the AXS drivetrain is known for.
And we're almost done but we have to look at the limit screws that used to be so important in adjusting these drivetrains.
I'm convinced that SRAM is using a stepper motor in there so these two screws now are only used for safety.
We're gonna use a 3mm hex to do so,
and with the chain in the largest cog we're gonna adjust the Lo limit screw first.
The idea is to bring this close to start with, and stop when that top jockey starts moving.
Bring it back and then counterclockwise another 1/4 turn.
Repeat that for the Hi limit screw and remember, you don't want the stepper motor and the gearbox in here to fight this limit,
you want this to be just offside of this last step as a safety measure.
And folks, I do realize this is a bit unorthodox way of installing SRAM AXS but don't be fooled, if you have a full SRAM drivetrain
the only difference is going to be using the new B-gap tool versus what I've used which is the old B-gap tool.
But the million-dollar question is: will this work?
So here it is, I have the B-gap optimized for the bike stand, not the SAG point, just for the sake of this demo.
One step at a time to the largest cog
Not bad at all!
And I know you guys are gonna ask me about backpedaling on the 51T
and I can tell you that even with this oval there's no issue whatsoever.
I can backpedal as much as I want, the chain is not going to drop.
This bike has a 430 mm chainstay right now, and this is a 52 mm chainline for Boost spacing.
Back down to the smallest cog, if anything this is gonna be a bit louder than a normal Shimano setup.
Okay now multiple at a time, a couple at a time.
and back down...
So not bad at all, are you guys surprised by this?
I am not since I've been mixing Shimano and SRAM for the last couple of years.
But obviously I'm gonna have to take this to the slopes before I can give you a final verdict.
And I do know you're gonna say but, but, what about the apps? What about my AXS app?
And yes, SRAM has something like that and it has to be set up, I recommend using it
but for now this is all we need to know in regards to installing SRAM AXS GX.
Was this useful? I hope it was and it looks like I'm gonna have to do a follow-up video
in which I talk about my experience on the trail and also if I learned any other tips and tricks
using the app, or any other gizmos around this.
So that's the end of my video folks, hope to see you on the trails
riding SRAM AXS, see you next time.
Cheers!