This is a fairly simple question....I hope...

I have an older (like 20 yrs) Hard Rock MTB that's still well-maintained and in fairly good shape (ride it 3 times a week). I've been thru a couple of free hubs, cassettes, bottom brackets and crank assemblies. It's all pretty much been Shimano Alivio class, so more low end. Even tho it's an MTB, I rarely take it off pavement (I do have some favorite "short detours" on smooth-ish gravel paths, tho) and it's fairly flat riding.

Assuming chain and crank are new, rear der fairly new, how many miles could I expect to get out of a lower end cassette (like Shimano HG-4X or HG-5X, 11-28).

Thx in advance for you feedback......

Depends....



question is simpler than the answer..






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Shouldn't be hard to get around 30000 miles out of the cassette. But, as stated above, the distance will vary depending on the circumstances.

[MENTION=197614]fietsbob[/MENTION]

Last longer than what, 1 day, 2 days.... I'd be interested in some kind of general estimate, if you have any idea...thx

[MENTION=147740]prathmann[/MENTION]

30,000???!?! Really? Or did you accidentally slip an extra "0" in there...thx...

No, but that is based on keeping the chain well-lubed and replacing it whenever it shows significant wear. An alternative is to run the chain and cassette together until both are worn out but that would result in reduced cassette life - say 10-20000 miles. Much riding in rainy or snowy conditions with grit being thrown onto the chain and gears would also reduce the life.

I will typically run a Shimano 10-speed 105 or Tiagra cassette and chain for 6000 to 8000 miles and replace them both together. I ride a lot of hills and in some pretty bad weather so I expect I replace them more often than a good weather, flatland rider.

Three times chain lifetime is fairly common.

Hes right. Measure chain wear and replace it well before the limit and it will last a long time. I got over 8 chain replacements on one cassette. Chains is cheap.

I have one with about 15,000 and it still seems to shift as well as my newer one. I do keep on top of the chain wear.

Lazy question;
you need to go on your own experience ,
rather than crowd source it.
which will be an average of hundreds of inputs .. to have any real meaning.

I get about 3,000 miles out of a chain absolute max, no matter what chain, or how it is maintained.

I get about 3 times that out of a cassette.

The expensive approach to drivetrain maintenance is to let your chain wear to 5,000 miles, which will cause your cassette and rings to be eaten away exponentially. Then they will all have to be replaced together - prematurely at 5,000 miles.

Chains are cheap; replace often. Please do it 'donate' worn-out useless chains to your local bike Co-op. Throw them away; they are inanimate objects without feelings or a soul. They are trash; get over it.

Related question: Are any of you finding that 11-speed cassettes don't last as long? I have only one such bike (Shimano) and had to replace the cassette at about 4000 miles/two chains. 'Course, that was a gravel bike, so it gets hard use, but still, that seemed pretty fast.

Changing chains prematurely to avoid new-chain skip will extend the life of the cassette, but increase chain cost. If you buy 3 or more chains and alternate their use, so each chain gets some wear on it, you can use each chain longer and never get new-chain skip.

I get 10's of thousands of miles on 9 speed Shimano cassettes (closing in on 30,000 with current 9 speed XT cassette). We should all acknowledge that wear on the different cogs can be hugely different. It depends if you typically use just 1 or 2 cogs and which cogs you typically use. For instance, a 14T cog will wear twice as fast as a 28T cog. Then, if you ride in that 14T cog for 80% of the time, well then yea, that cog will wear out fairly quickly while the rest of the cassette is in near new condition. So someone that rides in a small cog most of the time may get only 3,000 miles, while someone that rides a lot of rolling terrain, and thus uses a lot of different cogs including the larger ones can get 30,000+ miles.


I personally use the middle cogs (16//18/21/24) most but I also do climbs and use my largest cogs (28/32) a fair amount. The smallest 3 cogs get used the least. For those that change their cassettes before 10,000 miles, I would be interested in knowing what they are basing their decision on. Noise, bad shifting, chain skipping under load, visual, anecdotal stories told to them by their riding buddies, advice from strangers on forums, or just following what the pros (who don't pay for their gear) do?


Also, why are people so existed about the new Shimano and SRAM cassettes with 10T cogs. Lower weight (including in your wallet)?

Probably some yahoos that run "compact" cranksets and now feel the need for a higher gear...

If chain and cassette life are primary concerns; use cassettes and chain rings with more teeth as [MENTION=450515]Eggman84[/MENTION] says. Consider 14 teeth for the smallest cassette cog, and make up the rest of the drive train to suit. Admittedly, this is a few grams heavier (cogs, chain rings, longer chain, possibly long cage RD), but it will last longer.

[MENTION=197614]fietsbob[/MENTION]

Thanks for nothing except a condescending reply This wasn't about "crowdsourcing". It was about getting a sense if the wear and tear on my bike was within range or way off and I need to examine my maintenance patterns. And all the other responses have been quite helpful...except for yours.....

@To all (except fietsbob


Really appreciate the feedback. The comments about "the chain is cheaper than the cassette" isn't quite true for me. I must be using a really low end 11-28T Shimano cassette because, unless I find a chain on sale, I pay the same or less for the cassette than for the chain. That may explain why I'm not getting 20K miles on a cassette, even tho my chain lube/cleaning schedule is fairly often.

Guess maybe it's time to look at higher quality cassettes.

My drive train is close to its time for complete replacement (Crank/Chain rings, chain and cassette). I've been using, and will continue to use, an 11-28T cassette because I like the higher end. However, that 11T cog is what wears the most and the quickest, for obvious reasons (someone has a 10T cog...wow!) My new crankset will change the crank/cog ratio such that 6th gear will be what 7th gear is for me now. Hopefully that will reduce the wear and tear on the 11T cog and I'll get more miles out of the cassette.

Thanks much for the input. Learned some things I hadn't thought about before.

Many years ago, I would replace chain and cassette at the same time, probably every 7-8,000 miles or so and I rode in harsh conditions. Then, I finally started checking chain wear and found that if I replaced chains before they wore to a certain point, I didn't need to replace the cassette.

Like mentioned, 3 chains to a cassette is about right. In my case, I generally replace an 11 speed chain at around 6500 miles so a cassette (for me) goes around 20,000 miles.

Also, I have several sets of wheels and multiple bikes. By keeping an eye on chain wear, I can swap wheels/cassettes back and forth with virtually no problems.

To the OP, the chain is the weak link (pun intended) and will damage the rest of the drivetrain if not replaced regularly.

Interesting...I guess I always (well, mostly...) viewed that the cog/cassette was the weaker link since the chain was both always having to slip on and off any specific cog and would typically "clunk" into the trailing edge of the "leading tooth" causing the valley between to become more ovoid than circular over time. Maybe time I need to change my perspective on that.

What do you use as the wear point for the chain when you decide it's time to replace it? Iirc, isn't 0.1" the normal recommendation? By then, tho, wouldn't the cassette have seen too much wear and tear?

Thx and cheers.....

I've been replacing my 11 speed chains early too. And, so far am getting quite a pile of chains without destroying the cassette. I still need to decide what to do with the half worn chains. Perhaps I'll choose a bike that I will want to use slightly stretched chains on.

So, the life of a cassette? I've blown out cassettes with a single over-stretched chain. And, kept cassettes in good working order with very careful attention to stretching.

This is a mountain bike, and so you are using a triple, right? Can I ask which front ring you are using most often? If you are spending a lot of time on the 11T cog, perhaps consider using the next biggest ring more often, or installing a bigger ring if you are already on the biggest one the majority of the time.


Maybe a few grams heavier, but isn't the current conventional wisdom that bigger bigger cogs and rings are more efficient? I think your advice is good, and he should try a bigger ring, which will have him spending more time in bigger cogs.

Yep, it is (triple chain rings). And I'm pretty much always on the middle ring. Teeth count has been 24/34/42. I bought a new crank to install sometime soon that changes to 28/38/48 (see my msg., #18 , above). I tend not to want to change the front der anymore than necessary (like at all).

So, I already have plans to adopt your suggestion, but in a slightly different manner. Great minds think alike

Sounds like a plan. I think those new tooth counts should help.