Future of 8 speed?
 

Recently wend shopping for new chains. 10 speed road bike chain is some 40 euros, while an 8 speed MTB one is 8 euros. 10 speed road cassette is about 50 euros, while MTB 8 speed one is half the price. I've regreted getting a bargain price 105 10 speed groupset. Just because of the replacement parts cost.

However, looking for new STI brifters, I can't find any for 8 speed. Road cassettes also harder to find in that range. I find many MTBs now come with 9, even 10 speeds. Road components are going to 11 speed also.

Are the producers of bike components pushing out the cheaper longer lasting 8 speed equipment? What's your prognosis?

I don't now why there are so few 8 speed road bike brifters. I assume its because when they came out with 8 speed road bikes, 9 speed came along very very soon thereafter hence they just stopped making them and went right to 9 speed stuff. There are a LOT of 9 speed brifters and components. If price is important, I would go for 9 speed stuff. Most 9 speed consumables aren't that much more than 8 speed stuff.

I would just go for 9 speeds and look at it as the good balance between parts availability and cheapness.

Clues?

Slaninar, Shimano still manufactures 8S parts. http://bike.shimano.com/publish/cont...road/2300.html . Loose Screws has carried discontinued parts of all sorts. www.loosescrews.com .

Brad

Dang.. one of these days I'll upgrade to 8 speed. ;)

On the mountain-bike side of things, currently-made eight-speed parts are low end. Eight-speed gets used on entry-level bikes.

I'm sure the profit margin on chains is quite high. I doubt it really costs *that* much extra to make a ten-speed chain versus an eight-speed one.

You can do better than 40 Euros, btw. Here is a 105 10-speed chain on sale for only EUR 16.39:

http://www.chainreactioncycles.com/M...?ModelID=50457

Yes, but in my country customs are a ripoff. Shipping costs, plus customs... it adds up. Thanks anyway.

Three and four speed freewheels are still made. Eight speed will be around for a while.

The ever increasing number of gears on the free wheel is rather silly and costly for 99% of cyclist. It is the old sales ploy of bigger and better, when in fact it is a waste of time and money. But what the heck the manuf can always count on the nuts that want the latest and greatest, and are quite willing to take their money.

I forgot about the Sora style brifters. However they are rather low end on the totem pole of grades. Does Shimano still make any better style brifters (non thumb lever) than the Sora at 8 speed level? I can't find anything new other than the Sora models or Microshift brand.

IMO we're getting suckered by Shimano on one hand going, oh look, you can bolt a brand-new DA derailleur on your old 6spd bike, isn't that nice, while on the other we're getting boned because they should have changed the actuation ratio when they went to 8spd (yeah, I know they did for DA for a bit, but meh).

I wonder why they haven't...

Say, have you seen that new electronic gear? Wowee.

Holy crap, 1/8"!
Damn straight - it can't; eight is enough.

The 8s tooling is all paid for so I expect that they'll continue making 8s in low to lower mid quality ranges, just the same way they still make 6&7s low end stuff. However the numbers are driven by OEM sales, and no manufacturer will spec a decent bike 8s when 9s cost him about the same.

There's an assumption that more = better, and while experienced users may differ, they're not the ones mid level bikes are aimed at.

I have Sora 8spd with the thumb-lever, and I love them. I have not owned a bike with the 105+ paddle-style brifters, but I have tried them out on a friend's bike, and I was not impressed that the design is inherently better. I like how the opposite directions of the brifter-lever vs thumb-lever help my intuition of whether I'm "pushing up the gears" vs "slipping down the gears" with the derailleur (just like mtn trigger shifters are on opposite sides of the handlebars and worked by thumb vs fingers).

Is the advantage of the paddle-style just that you can reach all the controls from drops and tops?

8 speed is alive and well in the moderate price point range,

its the upper priced lines , 105, & etc that you have to seek old stuff at online auction ..

all else go back to bar end shifters..