Originally Posted by
timdow
What's wrong with 9-speed? Parts are difficult to get across the board right now. You have a 110 BCD crankset already.... what crankset would you change to? 26 X 34 is already pretty low at 20.6 gear inches. Youi can swap in a 24T ring and probably can change to an 11-36 cassette to get down to 18 gear inches. That's almost walking speed. With a simple, inexpensive ring and cassette swap the gearing setup you already have is very good.
If you just want something new an shiny, most bikes are being built with a single or double chainring these days which does not provide the low gearing you (and I) need.
It's not so much the lust for new and shiny, as much as the things I don't like about my old bike just being less likeable every time I ride it, and pretty much the whole drive-train, except for the chain, at a point where it's becoming impossible to get parts.
IIUC, 9-speed parts are going the way of the steam engine, if they haven't already.
I've comfortably adjusted, tuned, replaced, and upgraded drive-train components; I'm cool with that. I think the only time I ever had drive-train work done by a shop was "facing" the bottom-bracket housing, when I wore out the old crankset, and I was forced to "upgrade" from a square-taper BB to an external-bearing BB. That said, I'm not sure where to start, building up a drive-train from the drawing board; as I understand it, there are frame compatibility issues that I don't fully understand. I probably could do that, and given what's available off-the-shelf I may have to, but I would prefer the convenience of just getting a new bike that's geared how I want it, or at least mostly geared how I want it.
But… If 9-speed parts are just impossible to get, and everything is moving towards 11-speed, maybe I should build a custom 3x11 33-speed drive-train? Is that even possible? The range I want is really dependent on a triple-crankset, which I think I could build up from parts as an 11-speed triple… And then add a "normal" 11-speed 11-34 or 11-36 cassette on the other end… Which would give me a gearing range comparable to a 27-speed drive-train, with a few more gears. Of course, one of the problems now is even finding shifters for a triple-crankset; I don't know enough about derailleurs to even know what kind of compatibility issues/problems to look out for, eg I don't know if it would be a problem finding a front derailleur that would be compatible with a custom 3x11 crankset.