Whats the difference between:

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I'll start the bearing balls bobbling: SRAM has a lot less moving parts in the lever department...presumably this is less 'maintenance'. This is what a rep. from Fisher Outdoor told me at ExCel Bikeshow a couple of years ago.
 

Smokin Joe

Legendary Member
SRAM is not widely used enough to get much user feedback at the moment, but there have been rumblings of discontent. CW's testers all slated it on the Scott Addict during their race bike of the year feature, marking the bike only 7/10 purely because they did not like the shift action. I have heard similar comments on other forums. It would be interesting to see how it fares if and when use becomes more widespread.
 

jashburnham

New Member
That's a bit like asking what's the difference between Campagnolo and Dura Ace tbh. SRAM are a component manufacturer that produce 3 road groupsets: Rival, Force and Red. Force is roughly comparable to Dura Ace, Red is roughly comparable to Campags Record and is very expensive. Rival and Force were debuted to the consumer for the 07 season, Red for the 08. The main difference between SRAM and the others is their shifting mechanism which uses just one lever to shift up or down. Red also utilises a unique (I believe) cassette that is machined from one piece of metal as oppose to individual sprockets. I looked at Red when I bought my new bike but was put off by the price and it's newness to the market, I don't want to shell out a fortune to be a guinea pig and chose Chorus instead as I know I can rely on Campag's products. Having said that, the ex-pro in my LBS swears by his SRAM Force gruppo. More info here: http://www.tdottriathlon.com/index2.php?option=com_content&do_pdf=1&id=84
 
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yorkshiregoth

yorkshiregoth

Master of all he surveys
Location
Heathrow
Reason I am asking is that I am tempted by the Focus Cayo, one of whch uses SRAM and as I have never used it I have no idea how it works.
 

Smokin Joe

Legendary Member
Two complaints I have heard about (bearing in mind I have never even seen a SRAM roadgroup, let alone used one) are as follows;

1. When you are knackered after several hard hours in the saddle tired and maybe cold fingers can loose the sensitivity to differentiate between the amount of tap needed to shift up or down.

2. If you are on the largest sprocket and you think you've still got one gear to go a push on the shifter will change up a gear as there is nowwhere else for it to go. Not much fun if you are grinding up a 1 in 5 and you mistakenly shift from the 26 to the 23.

As I said, CW's testers hated the system and those were two of the reasons they gave. I would want a decent test ride on one before I made my decision to buy.
 
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yorkshiregoth

yorkshiregoth

Master of all he surveys
Location
Heathrow
Silly question but how does one change up and down gear with SRAM? And will most LBS know how to maintain such a product if it isn't that widespread?
 

Smokin Joe

Legendary Member
SRAM use a system known as "Double Tap". There is only one shifter positioned behind the brake lever, a short push drops the chain onto a smaller cog and a longer sweeping push switches it to a bigger cog. Probably the reason some people have complained about it, when your hands become tired and confused it is easy to over or underdo the required movement.

I should not think a decent shop who sells it would have any trouble maintaining the system.
 

yenrod

Guest
Thats quite interesting that*

Though I heard mutterings thats its more user serviceable than Shimano or Campy..

Smokin Joe said:
SRAM use a system known as "Double Tap". *There is only one shifter positioned behind the brake lever, a short push drops the chain onto a smaller cog and a longer sweeping push switches it to a bigger cog*. Probably the reason some people have complained about it, when your hands become tired and confused it is easy to over or underdo the required movement.

I should not think a decent shop who sells it would have any trouble maintaining the system.
 

giant man

New Member
Location
Essex innit?
I can't take SRAM seriously yet I'm afraid. They've only been in the market five minutes so it's very early days yet.

I shall stick to what I know and love for now.
 
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