grolby

There were also frames with 128mm spacing during the transition period between 6/7-speed (earlier 7-speed used 126mm spacing) and 8 speed (all 8-speed was 130mm). So I suspected at first that Shimano only went to 131mm for 11-speed to allow for a "soft" transition to 135mm spacing. I still think there's still a good chance that this will happen down the road. Dave Mayer's endless drum-beating about how terrible and ruinous 11-speed is for wheel design isn't really on-point (reliability and stiffness has not been a problem for 11-speed wheels at all*), but wider spacing would obviously make for stronger wheels. But what will really push spacing out to 135mm across the board for road bikes will be the widespread adoption of disc brakes for the road. Making room for a disc rotor on a 130/131mm hub really is a bridge too far. So it's possible that, once disc brakes become UCI-approved for road racing, Shimano will release 135mm 11-speed road hubs and will say goodbye to 130mm spacing. But we'll see.

*the 126mm 7-speed wheels Dave loves so much have MORE dish than modern 11-speed wheels, but were made in an era when spoke and wheel technology was considerably worse across the board.

BoSoxYacht

grolby

Not really sure who you're laughing at. But if it's me, 11-speed has been around for a little while, and I'm unaware of any scuttlebutt about 11-speed wheels being more prone to going out of true. I would be very interested in hearing about it if I'm wrong. Regarding wheel dish from 126mm 7-speed wheels to current 131mm 11-speed, it's possible that the amount of dish is roughly equivalent rather than greater in the old wheels. But the point remains that we've been here before, when rims were worse and spokes could not be reliably tightened to the tensions we are able to achieve now. And it was not ideal, from an engineering perspective, but the world did not end.

BoSoxYacht

No, I'm laughing at Dave Mayer(again). Usually he is railing against 11 speed prices and wear rate, with bad prices and no facts to back up his wear rate beliefs.

grolby

The Impending Wheel Disaster due to 11-speed is another favorite hobby-horse.

BoSoxYacht

I don't know that I'd want 11spd, disc brakes, with 130mm spacing on a loaded touring bike, but that's not how I ride.

Dave Mayer

So I run the numbers on the 7-speed (126mm) wheels versus 11-speed (131mm wheels). Of course the opinions above are unsupported nonsense. I don't have to shill for the bike industry.

Anyway, it should have been obvious that a 7-speed wheel will have more structural integrity than 11, since the an 11 speed cassette is 41mm wide, versus the 32mm wide 7-speed cassette.

Or that the flanges between a 7-speed cassette hub are 58mm apart verus 50mm for 11. Lower is bad for those who failed math.

Even the most basic back of the envelope calculations indicates that an 11-speed wheel is significantly handicapped.

But I go one step further and run the detailed numbers through the spreadsheets. The spoke bracing angles for 7 speed are all better. The spoke tensions are more even for 7-speed.

As I expected, the spoke tension differential on 11-speed is greater than 2 to 1 between the drive side and non-drive side. Which is several percentage points worse than 7 speed.

Again, since I don't make any money on the bike industry, I don't have parrot the line delivered by the industry marketers, shills and apologists.

BoSoxYacht

And triplet lacing gets around the spoke tension issue easily, and Hi-Low hubs also help.

grolby

I may be wrong about dish of 126mm hubs vs. 130mm. That said, I am not at home to verify hub flange spacing on a Shimano 7 vs. 10-speed hub. Still, I can handle being wrong about that detail, because it's still so much fearful nonsense. For one thing, a quick Google search confirms that flange spacing is not uniform across all 11-speed hubs. Many are 50mm. Others are as much as 55. So hub manufacturer makes some difference. For another thing, flange spacing requirements between 10 and 11 speed hubs are identical. The difference is in the extra mm of dish. That's not nothing, to be sure.

But when you come right down to it, for all of your hand-waving about how "compromised" 11-speed wheels are, many thousands of 11-speed wheels are out there and are performing perfectly reliably. So much LOL. It's just not a problem in the real world. Don't get me wrong, it'll be better when the switch to 135mm happens. But it's not as though people's 131mm 11-speed wheels are folding beneath them.

This is just too rich. Now if you'll go excuse me, I have ten more piles of bike industry money to roll around in before lunch.

grolby

Dave's numbers are also off, incidentally. An 11-speed Shimano cassette is 1.8mm wider than a 10-speed cassette. Which puts the overall length at 39mm, NOT 41. Two millimeters may seem like splitting hairs, but it absolutely makes a difference in wheel dish and subsequently in spoke tension as well. It means a difference of 7 mm between 7 and 11-speed cassettes, not 9, and when the total additive difference in spacing is considered, you have a wheel that requires four additional millimeters of dish compared to a 126mm 7-speed wheel. 4mm. Given the improvements in hubs, rims, spokes and nipples in the three decades since 126mm 6 and 7-speed wheels were the cutting edge of technology, it should be apparent why Dave is the only person on Earth who thinks this is a huge problem being covered up by the bike industry and the random BF posters they're paying off to be shills.

It's worth pointing out that Campagnolo's 11-speed cassettes fit on the same freehubs as their 10-speed cassettes, and those 10-speed cassettes are very nearly as wide as Shimano's 11-speed cassettes! And Campy hasn't yet budged from 130mm cassettes. Which means, by this logic, that Campagnolo has been forcing people onto structurally compromised wheels for over a decade.

BoSoxYacht

It wouldn't surprise me if DM is cherry picking hub measurements to help prove his point. I caught him doing this when he was complaining about the high cost of 11speed components. At one point he stated a set of 6800 chainrings cost $180, but my quick search showed they were as low as $130( and a 6800 crankset for $171).

Campag4life

This is correct. Campy wheels historically have had more dish than Shimano wheels until Shimano released 11s. Some say this makes a Campy wheel more delicate or less robust, but all the Campy wheels I have owned have been rock solid. I am 180 lbs.

grolby

Yes. 41mm is closer to the width of a Campy 11-speed cassette, although STILL a millimeter too wide to be correct. It's just shameless. At least the width he gives for a 7-speed cassette is accurate.

I've heard the occasional theoretical griping about Campy wheels having more dish, but much like theoretical griping about the location of the drive side bearing in Campy hubs, it does not appear to have much bearing (heh) on the real-world reliability of these wheels. And Shimano wheels are, to this day, less dished than their Campy counterparts, if my mental math is correct. It's just not a big deal.

Dave Mayer

For all those out there who are being convinced (pressured) into 11 speed 'upgrades' by your shop or the industry, the analysis here clearly shows that this new generation of wheels is increasingly unstable, flexy and involves ridiculous workarounds in order to make an ever increasing number of cogs fit.

The hub flanges on the rear wheel are now too close together. This makes the wheels less stable. The spoke tensions between the right and left sides of the wheel are radically different, making the wheels more difficult to design, build and maintain.

Ladies and gentlemen: one thing to be aware of is that the bike industry is too small and poor to afford technical talent. Especially in retail - good lord. So a lot of the so-called developments in the industry (such as adding another cog to the cassette every 7 years) is no progress at all, but only designed to churn the inventory and create short-term hype.

Be careful who you listen to, especially those who have a stake in selling you something.

Brian Ratliff

Dave thinks if he keeps repeating himself, someone will be convinced. You've made your point, man. Others have made other points. There is no use in saying the same thing over and over. A reasonable person can come in and read and decide for themselves.

BTW, Dave, I'd like to see the work on your analysis about wheel stability. I'm curious. Have you some math or modeling behind this, or is this just hand waving about hub flange width and offset? A reasonable person might want to know just how much stiffness and stability he or she is giving up when going 11sp. It's a concern, but taken to its logical extreme, we'd all be riding single speed.

Dave Mayer

https://www.theonion.com/articles/***...-blades,11056/

BoSoxYacht

The page you were looking for is not here.

dtrain

Is Dave Meyer obsolete?

Brian Ratliff

What'd y'all think? You think Dave can deliver some actual knowledge here? Or is it handwaving all the way down?

BoSoxYacht

I think he overlooked the dishing of 7-11 speed wheels point that you raised, and complains about the "problems" of 11speed even though he has zero experience with it.

Is 11 speed more expensive? Sure, but not as much as he thinks.

He made claims about 11 speed having a higher wear rate, but has no factual data to back up his beliefs. My personal experience with 11speed has not revealed any greater wear than 9 or 10 speed.

Edonis13

The MSRP for Force 22 is less than the MSRP for Force 10 speed.

Reviewed: SRAM Force 22 shifters and drivetrain - VeloNews.com

BoSoxYacht

BI'm not positive, but some of that might have to do with exchange rates.

Someone here(possibly BDop)pointed this out to me almost a year ago.

LesterOfPuppets

It's way more expensive to me. I like my $30 cassettes and $12 chains. I even run $12 8-speed chains on my 9-speed XTR and Ultegra.

BoSoxYacht

5800 cassettes are $33, chains are about $20.

I don't worry about a few dollars here and there. One less happy hour beer is no big deal to me.

LesterOfPuppets

It's amazing how quickly they become reasonably priced. When a new cog count hits and it's only available for the top-tier stuff, it's always like $400 cassettes and $90 chains.

I'm probably not gonna spring for new brifters/gripshifts/rear wheels to hit the 11 just yet, though. Was tempted when I saw an XX1 gripshift for $100 on the CL a little while ago but glad I didn't cuz they're almost that cheap new, now.