11 speed brifter extinction?
 

A friend has a very similar bike-11 speed -and told me the our LBS can't even find replacement brifters for her. Electronic preferred, but mech will do. I had my Ultegra 6800 replaced once and experience tells me that these will crap out in a few years too.

True? Should I find some and stock pile for a rainy day? I have no problem with my mech 11 speed and would buy elect on my next bike.

Stuff is available but cost has doubled in the past year. I used Cento 11 on the Cannondale Synapse I rebuilt with R7000 105 and it's a great option.

eBay is replete with new 105 11sp brifter sets (7000 series?) for $110-140 - anyone who says they can’t find such things isn’t looking very hard

+1. Trav1s is referring to the Microshift Centos Centos Drop Bar Shifters 2x11 | Microshift. Still being produced and plenty available.

Are you sure the shifters were broken or possibly just needed a flush and lube. There are a fair number of posters here unaware of this being a common issue.

So your friend's electronic shifters crapped out? These are almost impossible to kill, except through a head-on collision. If your friend is a profuse sweater, or spills Gatorade on the insides of their shifters, and the electronic connectors are gummy, then electrical contact cleaner...

Or are we talking mechanical? If so, the WD-40 flush cures 90% of the problems that come through our shop. Followed by a lithium grease spray chaser, good as new.

Replacement STI 11-speed shifters? My local Trek dealers have been clearing out 11-speed stuff in their bargain bin. Out with the old and in with the new! I got a pair of 105 11-speed shifters for an excellent price.

Otherwise, Fleabay, where at any one time you should be able to find dozens or hundreds of options. This is where shop mechanics money sell 'broken' customer shifters that have been 'restored' as per paragraph #2 above. Beer money!

I wouldn't be so worried that I'd stock an extra set. Wouldn't it be worse if it's just sitting on your shelf and never needed?

Besides, it might be a excuse to get a new bike if the STI goes bad! <grin>

This for sure. Grease and oil dry out. This is a certainty. Of equal importance is cable housing function. The stuff degrades and degrades slowly. Most people think their "shifters" are going bad when things lose that nice, light shift feeling. In reality, it's cable housing degradation that imparts more and more friction in the system. Friction grows and the rider simply has to push harder and harder on the shifter just to get the cable to move in the housing. This kills shifters.

Fresh housing (and cable while you're at it) properly prepared and installed makes a huge difference. Replace housing BEFORE friction grows to the point where you're stressing the shifter. This, plus occasional shifter lubrication, can extend shifter life by a very long time. I have 33 year old STI that's still functioning perfectly fine.

Just had a rider in my group this morning complaining her brifters weren't working well again. She took them to a shop where they charged her for a flush, and as I unfortunately predicted they worked for a while, but then the old grease re-solidified. I offered to degunk them in the ultrasonic, but she doesn't want to unwrap the bars and pull the brifters.

Well, that was nice of you to offer for sure. Maybe the next shop will just tell her she needs new shifters and will gladly replace them for $$$$$$$.

I reached the plateau with 11sp DA, and bought new spares years ago.
The mechanical right brifter will poop out before the left. My experience calls for 50k miles lifespan.
Other prudent spares include a RD, pulleys, rings, and cassettes.
Shimano historically updates components like pedals, bottom brackets, calipers, etc to reduce the necessity of spares.

I purchased an '08 tandem with 10-speed Ultegra in 2021 (Jan. 6 of all days.). The seller wasn't the owner (son of late step father) and didn't know anything about it. Both shifters were completely gummed up and non-functional. The bike was somewhat dirty and not in "show" condition for sale. Luckily for me, I had just overhauled, flushed & lubed some other Ultrega STI shifters, so I knew I could probably restore these to fully functional. As it turns out, the bike was in absolutely pristine condition, despite its appearance. Spoke tensions perfect; as if the couple riding it didn't put much miles on it and never slammed a pothole. The triple-color fade paint had about three tiny scratches on it; I put more on it in the six-week restoration!

Shifters work like butter now. The entire project revealed such an incredible "diamond in the rough" find for me.

When mine stopped, I took it to the LBS, who I trust and was there while he was on the phone with the Shimano rep. So while a flush and lube might have worked, these two guys seemed to know what they were doing. Mechanical, BTW. I was told that it was a worn cam or gear or something like that.

Assuming the gunk hypothesis, what is the preventive maintenance for this? A WD-40 flush?

There are two ways to approach this: (1) keeping the old grease soft, or (2) getting rid of the old grease entirely. The first method doesn't require disassembly of the bars / brifters but does require periodic reapplications. The second involves disassembly & long ultrasonic cleaner cycles but if done correctly is a permanent fix.

My 11 speed 105 mechanical left (front mech) shifter broke at the end of last year. Some of the internals grenaded (probably due to a cable routing issue in the frame, I had to use extra force to shift the front mech).

The shop had no problems finding a replacement, but it wasn't as cheap as I expected. I think it was $120+/-.


Gummed up shifters - I bought an older bike with Ultegra 9 speed setup. It had sat for a spell and wouldn't shift. I shot WD40 inside and worked the shifters thru the gears a bunch, let it dry, then hit it with some Tri Flow. Had to do that exercise twice... but they've been good now for the past 2 years.

To clarify, I just squeeze the brake lever and flood the inside withWD-40? Relube with something else, or just do that periodically?

Instructions i got from here or somewhere else - flood with WD40 and shift the gears a bunch. Easier to do if the shifters are removed from the bike and you can just work them back and forth a bunch... but it worked for me when mounted to the bike, just took a bit longer.

Then lube with Tri Flow.

Worked for me.