Geared advice - compact to standard

Ive been riding geared road bikes for just under a year. i have a ultegra fuji and a veloce willier ive acquired from my brother. i ride both regularly, but have a tighter cassette on the willier. they both have compact crank sets.

in the last two months or so ive been finding the gearing limited. everything on the big ring is fine, but when climbing i run out gears on the small ring, especially when climbing out of the saddle.

can i simply change the chain rings and adjust the front derailleur? the front mech is clamp on so its easily adjustable. is there any reason this wouldn't work? im pretty sure the BCD will be different but surely someone makes standard rings with compact fit.

What's the actual question?

When you say limited gearing what do you mean?

A standard chainset is only going to reduce your gearing for hill climbing. Maybe swap to a 12-25 cassette if you're over-geared.

The real answer here is probably training, if you can't climb anything in the UK on a compact, even with a 11-22 then you prolly just need more climbing miles.

very confusing post, but as dov says, if you cant climb stuff with a compact chainset then you need to train harder.

training>spending cash

He's undergeared not overgeared no? What size is the smaller chainring currently? If it's a 34 then change it, at it's an utterly stupid chainring size for most people and inferior to a 36.

You can change the chainring, what brand are you running? Some compacts can run up to 38 but it depends on the BCD.

Stop training?

very confusing post, but as dov says, if you cant climb stuff with a compact chainset then you need to train harder.

training>spending cash

He's undergeared not overgeared no?

Difficult to tell Andy.

Why wouldn't he just shift up at the front and down at the back?

sorry i was really baked when i wrote that so no wonder its a bit confusing :)

the problem is im undergeared, i currently have a 36 ring. basically can i make my compact chain set into a standard?

What make and model is it? What's the BCD?

Most compacts are 110 BCD I thought.

Ultegra and Veloce are and FSA too. So you can easily get a 39t to fit.

Might want to change the big ring to if you go to a 39t.

And 'Compact is gay'

53/42 up front, 13-23 in back.

Campag ones whilst being 110 BCD have the offset hole so you can't fit standard 110 BCD rings to them.

Ride up the north side of the Stelvio on that, then tell me compacts are 'gay'.

sorry i was really baked when i wrote that so no wonder its a bit confusing :)

the problem is im undergeared, i currently have a 36 ring. basically can i make my compact chain set into a standard?

Assuming you have a 50 on the front and a 12 at the back, how often are you finding 109.5 undergeared. Have a play with Sheldon's gear calculator.

Yes, this is what is confusing me too. Why can't you choose 36 as an option as you can with the cassette.

Where can you buy Campag 11 speed 36 chainrings?

Not many people on here are going to be riding up the north side of the Stelvio on a regular basis.

Shakes head and is very confused.

TA make Campag CT standard chainrings - 34-42 on the little ring and 48-53 on the big ring.

So you can go 53-42 on a CT crank.

http://www.cyclesportsuk.co.uk/product_info.php?products_id=8190

If you have campag CT, that is. You haven't said.

On my bike I went for compact as well, the ultegra 6700 stuff with the largest cassette in the back, so the lowest gear is 34 to 28 me thinks.
I am still in conflict whether I shouldn't have gone for a triple instead, but when I commissioned the bike it was what was recommended and I didn't know anything about gears.
Apart from Beachy Head, where my lungs folded inside out and I was praying for some smaller gear I was fine with it so far.

Anyway, changing from compact double to triple in ultegra 6700 land means changing nearly everything. It's just not compatible. Sucks ...

Yes, this is what is confusing me too. Why can't you choose 36 as an option as you can with the cassette.

Where can you buy Campag 11 speed 36 chainrings?

Not many people on here are going to be riding up the north side of the Stelvio on a regular basis.

Shakes head and is very confused.

Stupidly, Campagnolo have stopped specifying their compact chainset with the option of a 34 or 36 inner ring. It now comes with a 34 ring as standard, which is fine if you live in the Alps but not much use if you live in London. As others have pointed out, TA offer a 36 (and a 38 I think) inner ring for carbon CT cranks. The UK importer for TA is Chicken and most decent bikeshops can order them in for you.

The traditional 53/39 set up is used by pro riders and for most of, even those who race, gives a range of top end gears that are rarely used. I find a 50/36 set up gives me a good range of gears and suits my riding style as I spin a gear rather than churn one.

Cheers Andy et al. I was looking at TA, but couldn't find anything in my short search. Need to update my spreadsheet...

yeah the problem is that ill be riding up a hill seated, then when i switch up gears to ride out of the saddle, i find that im in the top end of the cassette and my chain rubs the big ring. it didn't used to be a problem, but im a much better bike rider now.

the crank is a 110BCD Ultegra. i dont think i need to change the big ring as its not really a problem, so might just swap out the small for a 39t.

Sounds like you want to be able to climb whilst staying on the smaller chainring and simply shifting up and down the cassette. This is of course the easiest way of doing things, and the only way I climb when heavily loaded (have wide range cassette on load carrying bike).

But for roadie'ing up hills, you may need to work on shifting to the big ring and droping a bunch of gears on the cassette at the same time. Not something I'm any good at myself, but I'm sure I read about it in C+ sometime ;)

running 50/39 will give a fair bit of overlap I would have thought. Irritatingly enough (winky smilie), Mitre_tester has already covered some of the failings of the compact set-up in a similar thread. Something about the lack of Chainring around the 40T mark.

Personnally I'd take my favourate flat cruising gear (ca 80" for me), and look a set-up that puts this in the middle of the cassette. A 50 outer with 11speed 11-25 does this nicely for me.

What is your exact set-up?

On my bike I went for compact as well, the ultegra 6700 stuff with the largest cassette in the back, so the lowest gear is 34 to 28 me thinks.
I am still in conflict whether I shouldn't have gone for a triple instead, but when I commissioned the bike it was what was recommended and I didn't know anything about gears.
Apart from Beachy Head, where my lungs folded inside out and I was praying for some smaller gear I was fine with it so far.

Anyway, changing from compact double to triple in ultegra 6700 land means changing nearly everything. It's just not compatible. Sucks ...

Do you mean the Enigma tourer?

50/34 with 11-28 is not really considered a full-on touring set-up, and is'nt expected you help you carry much weight.

If its only slightly out a 33T chainring from TA will help.
http://harriscyclery.net/product/ta-ta-110-bcd-chainring-33-teeth-1420.htm

If you dont really carry much then I'd suggest lots of HTFU ;)

For now HTFU it is. The bike is not meant as a full on tourer but an audax/cc-tourer bike, so not much load carrying here.
I reckon that I'll get stronger in the long run (I already have from when I got the bike first) and it was fine for everything of what I've encountered on the Shaftesbury Audax last weekend, where I didn't really have to use the 28t cog but always had one or two in reserve.

Should I encounter more difficulties or do some rides through very steep Mountains, i'll have to reconsider. Maybe then I'll just get a triple and will have aquired the knowledge to just swap it around if I need to. (Workstand and all that is coming next week hopefully).

And 'Compact is gay'

53/42 up front, 13-23 in back.

armchair bullshit theory.

I reckon that I'll get stronger in the long run (I already have from when I got the bike first) and it was fine for everything of what I've encountered on the Shaftesbury Audax last weekend, where I didn't really have to use the 28t cog but always had one or two in reserve.

Sounds like you're set-ups spot-on then. I would'nt consider bigger gears for mountains, so much as bigger gears for bigger loads.

Depends how steep and long they are I guess.