merlinextraligh

Interbike 2015: WickWerks 53/34 chanrings offer best of both worlds | Road Bike News, Reviews, and Photos

If this works as advertised, this could be a great option to get wide spaced gearing on a double on a tandem.

wn rider

Having had ongoing problems with front shifting on our Co-Motion, I replaced our stock Truvativ rings with the Wickworks 53-39-30 road triple along with swapping the 105 FD for the Ultegra FD. Don't know if it was the rings or FD (probably a combination) but this setup has greatly improved shifting performance on the front end.

I wouldn't be surprised if the setup works pretty well.

mtseymour

The 53-34 rings seem like a good option but I wonder about the front derailleur compatibility. The Ultegra 6800 & 6870 front derailleurs are rated for 16T capacity. Will the Ultegra front derailleur need to be modified to handle the 19T spread?

merlinextraligh

I believe they were using a regular Dura Ace di2 derailleur at Interbike.

Their "bridge shift technology" which uses pronounced ramps, instead of pins on the big chain ring is supposed to extend the capacity of the FD.

They claim they are the fastest shifting chain rings available.

I'll be anxious to see real world reviews.

jnbrown

Any reason you couldn't change the 30T to a 28T or smaller on the triple? I don't see any ramps on the 30T.

waynesulak

I have changed to a Praxis big ring and am very pleased with it. No triple available so I use their big ring with a TA middle and small ring (50-36-24). Shifts to big ring are much improved from TA big ring. Now it feels as if the big ring grabs the chain rather than the FD pushing it against to big ring and forcing it up.

Praxis rings are forged and not CNC.

https://www.praxiscycles.com/chainrings/

jnbrown

What crankset are you using that accepts 50/36/24? Is it 110 BCD?
Praxis does not approve their chain rings for tandem use, but probably just CYA:

NO – Our rings are not designed for the stress loads of Tandem bicycles. Use on tandem bikes will void the warranty as stress loads are much greater on a tandem drivetrain and not what our rings were intended for.

merlinextraligh

I think you could swap out a smaller inner chain ring on the triple setup because as you point out, the ramping is on the big and middle rings not the granny.


We're running Praxis 53/39 chain rings with a 26 Salsa chain ring for the small ring on our Co-Motion.

The middle to big ring shift is dramatically improved over the original FSA rings.

The shifting from the granny to the middle is not very good because the middle ring is not designed to shift from a granny to the middle, i.e. no ramps and pins.

The problem is easy to overcome; you just overshift and it gets up there. I was willing to accept the tradeoff because I was more concerned about positive shifting from the middle to big moreso than getting out of the granny.

The WickWerks triple rings would be a better answer for a triple than the Praxis, imo, because of the ramping of the middle ring.


As for the Praxis rings not being up to the stress of a tandem, We're a pretty big team, good for 2000 plus watts in a sprint. We've raced with the Praxis rings, done stomp drills and standing starts, and never had a problem with them flexing or breaking.

We're also running Praxis mid compact rings on our Calfee. Calfee spec'd those without raising any issue regarding their use on a tandem.

I think that warning is lawyer speak.

merlinextraligh

I sent a email to Praxis relating that a number of tandem teams are using their rings. I'll post if I get a response.

jnbrown

I still have the original FSA rings from when I built the bike in 2010.
They still shift ok, but I imagine the WickWerks would be an improvement.
I am using 50/39/28. Going to a 53/39 would be a change but probably not a problem. Since our biggest gear is 50/12 I find times when its not enough.

waynesulak

We run 110 BCD which allows the 36 middle ring. I had to buy the 50-36 set which makes for an expensive big ring but the shifting ease is worth it. Also only comes in black which I don' like but it works great.

Like mentioned above we had some shifting issues with the middle ring so I put our TA one back on. Our problems were more shifting into the granny rather than up to the middle. It seems to me the Praxis has very tall teeth on the their inner ring which do a good job of catching the chain as it drops from the big ring but inhibit shifting into the granny.

We put out much less power and weigh less than Merlin so I guess were good there.

jamesdak 

If it helps, I've been running the WickWerks 53/34 combo on my Lemond since Friday. The weather has not cooperated but I've managed 81 miles on them so far. What can I say, they rock! My front derailleur is a Dura Ace 7800 and I was using an old R700 50/34 set of chainrings. But I do run full Dura Ace crankset on my Scott CR1 Pro so I now how it feels.

All I now is that the last 3 days I've been switching between the two chainrings just to experience how quickly and surely that chain climbs to the big ring. It's instantaneous, honestly! It seems like I don't even get through making the throw with the brifter lever and it's already on the top gear. For sure my quickest shifting front end on any of my bikes now. No hesitation, no clank, no missed shift, just pure and sweet snicking into place. I actually caught myself grinning on the ride yesterday each time I shifted up, it was so quick. I've honestly never really cared about the front end since I normally only drop to the small chainring to climb. But this is just so nice and even if you don't need the big gear jump a standard set of these have to be worth it just for the satisfaction of how well they work.

Just a quick snapshot but here they are on my Lemond:

twocicle

Can anyone name one mfr that does design chainrings specifically for tandem bicycles? I wonder what load issues Praxis has maybe reproduces in their product testing. I do use Praxis 52/36 rings on my single, and feel these are the best shifting I've ever had.

On the tandem we run 48/30 Stronglight CT2 rings which are performing perfectly. The 18t jump is handled without any problem by the Ultegra Di2 11spd front derailleur. TA 48 tooth did not shift well due to it having an abrupt shoulder edge instead of a gradual transition, plus TA teeth seemed to wear quickly.

akexpress 

We have Praxis 11 speed 50/34 rings on Lightening cranks that have been flawless with our Di2 set up.

mstyer

It's not quite that simple. The shift ramps that matter are the ones on the middle ring. They're clocked to a specific interval with relation to the small ring so that they align with features on the chain. Changing from a 30 to a 28 small ring has a high likelihood of disrupting this clocking. It might be possible to get lucky, and it's always possible to force it, but it's unlikely to work as designed.

waynesulak

Extremely good photo of the chain engaging teeth on both rings at the same time. Often this is not the case and the chain is on top of the teeth for part of a revolution. I have found that the Praxis 50th ring works as well with at TA 36 middle ring as it did with the Praxis 36 tooth ring. Note that in this case the number of teeth is the same. I made the chain because the Praxis 36 ring caused problems shifting down to our 24 tooth small ring.

I just ordered the Praxis rings on their web page and did not tell them that we use their rings on two tandems. There is no way to tell how many people use them on tandem.

Very few components are designed for tandems. While bending a ring could ruin your day, it seems to me that brakes, wheels, tires, and forks failure would be more critical.

merlinextraligh

You missed my point. Praxis chainrings are designed to be used on a double chainring. There's no ramping on the inside of the middle ring to facilitate an upshift from a granny.

Thus it's not going to make a big difference if you run a 30 or a 26 in that situation, particularly where you only shifting up to a 34 middle, because there are no ramps to misclock

As I posted earlier in the thread using the Praxis rings on a triple compromises the upshift out of the Granny, but that's manageable by overshifting, and the shifting between big and middle is improved over FSA rings.

As I pos