Had my orange crush now about 4 months, it’s currently set up as 2×10 From new, looking to go 1×10, ride trail centres and natural trails to, NYM, guisborough woods etc etc.
So would a 32 or 34t suit me best?

Are you putting a cassette expander on? I’m set up 32/40 on both my bikes and never struggle on climbs.

So would a 32 or 34t suit me best?

I dunno does this shirt suit me?
What gears do you run, what ranges? How does it feel? Are you a strong climber?
I started with 34 but now settled on 32 for 1×11 10-42 we have some big hills here but I get up them. The main thing is learning when not to pedal down or flat when it’s not needed. Anyway buy one and try it

I found with a 32 I spun out rather quickly at times, if you’re getting an expander on the cassette then definitely go for the 34.

I run a 32-42 and still struggle up the climbs.
Might be cos I’m fat and unfit though…

I still spin out (though 32-10 is a lot better than 32-11) In a lot of ways unless it’s miles and miles of flat road (we don’t tend to have those here) then I’m probably pedalling because I think I should at that point. These days if it’s one spin of doing nothing on the cranks then it’s time to concentrate on technique over brute force.

Figure out which gears that you have now, equate to the gears you’re thinking of fitting with your 1×10. You can totally duplicate it to try out.

If in doubt go lower, srs. If you go low, you can always just pedal like ****. If you go too high, you’ll find yourself in the bottom of a valley somewhere unable to get out, and bears will eat you. I thought 34T was ideal for me til practice day at the ews, at which point, BEARS. It was awful. It just took ever so slightly more out of me, all the time, til I got et.

Sorry yeah I’m running 24-32 and 11-36, quite a strong climber. Current set up is enough to climb easily but under geared when flying down/along fire track.

the trusty calculator

24F/32R is 0.75
32F/42R is 0.76 so about the same
If that feels low anyway then a 34 will probably work well, I never had problems on good gradients but as NW says it can get you in the end. Though it’s taken a while to readjust my brain and style but as above spinning out isn’t a massivly bad thing on it’s own, but going for 10-42 a 32-10 gives me a higher gear than 34-11

I’m about to drop from 34T to 32T on a 9 speed set up.

Buy both chainrings then you can move between the two. I do this on my 29er (though 30T & 32T in my case) and change things according to where I’m riding, a long hilly ITT will have the 30T for example, but if I put 650B+ wheels on then the effective gearing sits between the two.

You could always get two different sizes from http://www.planetx.co.uk/i/q/CROOTHTH/on-one-ringmaster-chainring for £26, not much more than the price of one better known n/w brand to experiment. I’m sure you could easily find £24 of useful purchases in the current sale to get free postage, plus go there via topcashback to get 3.15% back off your basket less vat. 😉

On One ringmaster are £13.00 at the mo!!.

I’m running a 32 on 10 speed 11-36 on a 29er and its fine round Guisbrough – quite a few of the climbs are winch up or are fire roads.
I’ve only wanted a smaller gear a few times – but that’s only when there is limited traction. Have to see how it fairs in the winter mud.

No matter my gearing I’ve never managed to get up ‘secret path’.

I found with a 32 I spun out rather quickly at times, if you’re getting an expander on the cassette then definitely go for the 34.

I run 32/42 with 650b wheels (1×10). My theory is you can always freewheel downhill, but the only option other than pedalling uphill is walking.

For the record, rides are fairly saw-tooth profile affairs, and this is the bike I’ll take to ‘proper’ mountains.

i’ve currently got a 32t on an 11 speed 10-42, and the lowest gear will get up nearly all my ascents, but i’m gonna go down to a 30t, so i can spin my wheels in a lower gear, rather than grind out the uphills, I had bought a 28t but decided that may be overkill (although in winter when its wet, muddy and lose rubble then i may try it), i’ve noticed my legs have been really aching alot recently i put that down to not having the granny gears. (doing circa 110km, 2000 metres ascent a week)

as always depends on terrain, fitness, and climb in metres etc

Spinning out is very relative tbh, I thought 36/11 was too low for me but over time I realised I was just naturally stomping a high gear, and shifting down was actually better- faster, less tiring, less satisfying initially but I got to like it. So there’s definitely a riding style thing here. When you consider that this is the sort of gearing range dh bikes generally use, it looks a bit different.