Gravel / Gravé / Gnarmac / Groad / ATB

Yeah, I can't really see the appeal over a double... Feels like a solution to a problem that doesn't exist.

I don't miss mine at all, shifting seems a lot more precise with one chainring... I wasn't worried about the weight at all but it's made a difference for sure

Do not understand 1x obsession. Why, pls?

Additionally it frees up designers from constraints imposed by a front derailure and the little chainring. 1X specific frames are a thing.

Well no not really, if you go from 14 to 11 gears the jumps between gears only get a little bigger.. And if you're not crit racing I don't see the problem.

But maybe go back to triple cranksets?

1x is fabulous. I have NO front mechs on any of my bikes anymore. If you ride a lot of miles, and a lot of mud, and steep hills, chainsuck is a real issue with 2x/3x. I haven't had chainsuck in 3 years.

Less stuff to gather grime. Marginally larger gear spacing, which isn't a bad thing, good to change up your cadence. People moaning that the gaps are too big need to try riding singlespeed and see how great it is to vary your cadence.

People moaning that the gaps

That @umop3pisdn fella is a right moaner

I have zero problem with the range of cadences I sit at when TT'ing on fixed - but being too far from my desired cadence on gears fucks me off no end.

stop moaning

The gear jump on the 11-42 are not too dissimilar to an old 5 speed block.

The middle is very usable, the bigger sprocket is useful as a bail out gear (feel less drastic than going from big to small chainring).

The only issues is that the 10t sprocket felt too hard when you only want to drop a single gear for a bit more oomph.

#savethefrontmech

i like 1X mainly cause i'm shit at setting up front mechs

+1

Finally someone talking some truth

Since 1x11 is popular, I'm starting to think what can be done for the front chainset.

Given that it got a wide range cassette (let says 11-42), I realised an old school double would be very effective with a small 10t difference, but may still be too much with the derailleur capacity.

11-42 paired with 52/42 would make for a good all round gearing, or 46/38 for touring.

Half step chainset might be more apt.

See, I don't really buy the 'less parts to go wrong' argument. I mean, sure, it's true, but in all my years of riding bikes in a range of conditions I've had one front derailleur failure, when the bike fell over and landed awkwardly. And as @TurtleRecall says, you end up with big gaps between gears.

Even with your experience, it still is technically less part to go wrong anyway.

Like a fixed wheel bicycles.

I don't get the big gaps between gears thing either. But then most of my 1X riding is cross racing, cross training, mtb racing or mtb training or trail riding, so maybe it doesn't matter much there.

@Timmy2wheels the 1x thing is a cross over from MTB, where the chainsuck from a double or triple can happily destroy a frame.

Re going from big to small chainring, maybe if you're on 50/34 or whatever, but the cross-standard 46/36 is a really nice way to quickly ramp up the cadence.

Aesthetically, I think the long-cage rear derailleur to single smallish chainring looks daft/ agricultural.

I also find the "big gaps" complaint thing a bit odd, considering this is a FGSS forum.

I think that currently we have normal gearing where we do use the small ring regularly to get a good spread of gear and chain line.

With the huge cassette, the double can be changed a lots less as the small ring can be use as off-road/mountain, whether the big ring happily do normal road riding (46/36 fit this nicely with 10-42).

Like riding fixed, like riding close-ratio gears. 1x seems like a pointless halfway house.

I've got no issues with pedalling at a range of cadences on my fixed gear bikes, but why have gears with massive jumps between them when you could just have a sensible range of gears?

I ride my 46t 11-28 setup like a single ring - I just happen to have a 34t chainring there as well for the longer/steeper climbs. Use it a few times on a ride but when I use it I'm glad it's there.

Fair enough. Nice to know the 'FGSS' bit still applies :-)

I like to ride bikes with new parts.