Originally Posted by
Bianchigirll
I never realy understood the whole compact drive. We are still running something like a 11-23 or 12-25 9/10/11 spd in the rear so what is the advantage of a 3448 chainwheel over a 42/52(3) other than lower top end?
BTW depending how small of an inner ring you want you could make that 105 crank a compact, you could do a 38/48
With the setup I have on my two "modern" bikes, I spin out in the 50/12 combination at ~35 mph. That only happens on downhills, and they're few and far between where I live.
I normally run in either the 50/21 or 50/19 (12-27 cassettes). I do okay with the 52/39 on my Bianchi, but would probably be happier with a 38 small ring. I'm going to play with the 42 for a while to see how it works out. From what I understand the smallest Biopace ring is 40t (130 BCD), and they're hard to find.