You may not see why SRAM is garbage, but as a shop manager, I do.

Their customer service is excellent, but so is Shimano's, and their components don't break nearly as often a SRAM's.

I had two right rival shifters break. One was about 3 years old and sram still replaced it. both times with rival and not red.

In my experience it seems Force and Red don't experience the same problems that the Rival and Apex shifters do. I'd assume they are mostly all identical except for the Red's, but maybe not.

I've had this happen to me as well at about 8,000 miles on my original shifter. I still much prefer the SRAM style of shifting and feel compared to Shimano and Campy, so will continue to use their products.

Yup, had a rival left side do that before. Switched to Red after I got the replacement from SRAM.

Also had a Campy Centaur crap out of me on, but it was the right side.

Things that are made to be light yet durable tend to fail more than heavy and durable.

They had me my new Force within 2 days no problem. I have a difficult time with the hoods on Shimano and really just prefer the feel of SRAM.

I've 70k miles on my Ultegra 6600 shifters, and have never had a problem.

Buy SRAM if you want to. It keeps my mechanics busy.

Well I had a Shimano 105 left shifter crap out on me and while my Ultegras worked great for 3 years they look like crap. The clear coat they put on them crazes and then with the way I sweat down here the finish just corrodes. Also the clamp and screw that holds them to the bars just rusted out completely. Just switched to Red so we will see if they hold up better or not. One thing I have found riding in S. FL with the way I sweat CF holds up better than anything that can corrode.

I believe the lower level Sram uses plastic in the levers instead of carbon. They also take more force applied to shift. I haven't had a Sram shifter break on me but I can see where they might. The only shifter I've had break was a Campy Record actually.

I think your problem might be due to the salt air. I ride regularly in 110+ temps, and never se a rust problem on any bikes, unless they came here from California or the northern states.

Every product can potentially fail. Fwiw, I have thousands of miles on both Rival and Red without issue.

It depends on where you live, however. Where you are, you are doing a lot more shifting that I am in the midwest.

FWIWII...I've had more Shimano stuff fail that anything else I've ridden....but that does not make SHimano or their products bad. S&&& happens.

Rival has carbon shifters. Ever looked at Tiagra and Sora? And I know folks that have years of riding on the same Tiagra and Sora equipment without an issue.

Your post reminded me of something my 1st boss in the cycling industry said to me.

"It's all crap, everything can break. We just get what we can for it."

Similar experience, but I was two weeks under 2 years and it was an eBay dealer. SRAM told me I had to go through my dealer. I thought there was no way it would be covered, even if I could find the guy. The eBay guy was an upright dude and one week later, to the day, I was back on the road.

FWIW I just had my right hand Force Shifter do the exact same thing to me on Friday, I called SRAM on Monday (I work at a shop) and they basically said "Oh, okay, we have a replacement on the way". Got it today. SRAM even replaced an Avid brake for me once that was defective, no questions asked. They are quite good about that warranty and customer service is ace.

I deal with SRAM's warranty department far more often than any other company's.

They are great, and always cover their products. The thing that kills me is, one day the guy on the phone acts surprised(like he's never heard of such a problem), but the next day the rep is finishing my sentences for me(like he's heard about the problem a million times).