Upgrade 7 speed Hyperglide to 8 or 9 speed?
 

I have a Shimano 7 speed Hyperglide freehub cassette fitted into 130 mm drops. There seems to be spacers so that the 7 speed assy will fit in my 130mm drops. My freehub is the model with the bulge. Can this be updated with 8 or 9 speed cassettes? I am assuming Hyperglide cassettes are no longer available. Where would I find the model nos. of the compatible cassettes? Would Nashbar Shimano compatible cassettes work? Since the cassette is the more expensive part should I just get a complete new hub and cassette in a low end groupo and not worry about compatiblity?

I am planning to rebuild the wheel so redishing should not be a problem and am planning to change shifters also to Sora 8 speed or Deore 9 speed and rear deraillers seem to be inexpensive.

Sinchi

Look at these two links, should answer all your Q's.
http://www.sheldonbrown.com/k7.html
http://www.sheldonbrown.com/k7.html#up7

You need to install a wider 8/9 speed freehub body, remove a spacer from the left side of your hub and redish your wheel so that the rim will be centered between the stays. None of that would be a deal breaker for me.

If your hub and wheel are worth the upgrade, you can fit a 8/9/10-speed freehub body to the existing hub. You will have to remove 4mm worth of spacers to compensate for the wider freehub body and keep the overall width 130 mm. If you can remove 4mm from the drive side, you won't have to redish the wheel as it will remain centered.

Shimano's 105 level cassettes (HG70) are reasonably low priced and work very well. I recently bought an Ultegra level (HG90) 8-speed cassette for $35 and I've seen HG70's for $25.

I have no experience with Nashbar's house branded cassettes but I assume they are made by Sun Race which is tolerable but Shimano's are better.

You need to ask yourself if you really need all that gearing, your drivetrain won't last as long as your 7 speed and it is a bit of $ to get it to 9/10 speed.

I have a Shimano 7 speed that I keep wondering if it's really worth it to upgrade. It hasn't let me down in almost 15 years and you can still buy cassettes on ebay for it. Nothing really wears out on it.

Tim

Am I missing something? Are new Shimano 7 speed cassettes hard to find? I picked one up a month ago from my LOB for $20 to put on an old TREK 800 we keep as a spare bike. I put it on for grins and giggles when we replaced the crank and chain wheel due to a Shimano recall. If this cassette is hard to find, I'll take it off and put the old cassette on and save this cassette for a better bike. The new cassette is a Shimano HG 12-30 unit and it came in a Shimano box.

Shimano 7-speed cassettes are not hard to find at all. Your LBS may need to order them in, but they are readily available, and inexpensive to boot.

As far as whether it is worth it to upgrade, well... yes, IF you really really want those extra 1-3 gears, and IF you go for 9 or 10-speed and forget about 8-speed stuff (more expensive and yet rarer than 7-speed equipment. Huh).

I personally don't see why you would upgrade unless you're racing or something and really NEED the extra speeds. 7-speed cassettes are cheaper and may last longer than the 8/9/10-speed stuff (although how you treat your drivetrain is probably the biggest factor here). I'm a big fan of 7-speed stuff, but then, I like friction shifting, too :rolleyes:. If it'll make you happy, go for it.

Hi!

Thanks for all the responses. The reason I am thinking of upgrading is that I think my 3 ring front vintage shifter which is a dual lever STI is not working properly. So I thought I would replace the shifter with the Sora brifter. The 8 speed from Nashbar is significantly cheaper than the 7 speed from Harris Cyclery. I am planning on rebuilding the wheels anyway since the rims are in pretty bad shape. (Am going to give the front shifter one more try with a thorough WD40 cleaning and relube and replace the FD cable housing. If this works I will stay with the 7 speed for awhile.)

The reason I was thinking of 9 speed is that the touring STI drive train of the Bianchi Volpe is pretty attractive to me and I was thinking of emulating it. The Volpe has STI Tiagra brifters, Sugino triple crank, and 9 speed 11/32 SRAM cassette. I already have the Sugino triple crank on my bike. My 7 speed cassette is 13/30. The 11 and 32 are pretty desireable with the compact crank.

I am just a small light oldie newbie wannabe roadie with only a 100 watt engine and would like to climb the 2000+ hills in our area and will need the granny gears. Not interested in a MTB.

Sinchi