Hi

Recently bought my first DH bike, looking at swapping Iver the parts from my other. Is there specific DH cassettes?

Im running the new Saint so would you just use a 10spd 11-32?

Thanks!
TomO

I’d get a road cassette with close ratios, something like 12-28.

Road cassette from CRC, Saint wont work well with 32t- Shimano 105 about £20 or Tiagra for £13. 11-25t is what I have, still dont use top or bottom gears though.

Most people go closer on DH bikes. There’s an X01 DH cassette (and groupset), which is a 7 speed 10-24.

Personal though really.

Thanks for the info. I already have the Saint items so would like to stick with shimano.

I’ve been running saint on an 11:36, so I’m theory an 11-28 will be fine?

I’ll have a look at the road cassettes, (didn’t know they were interchangeable).

Thanks for the help!

GSuperstar – Member

I’ve been running saint on an 11:36, so I’m theory an 11-28 will be fine?

It depends on the bike- the saint mech has the range to cover the cassette, in widerange mode but the short cage doesn’t take up enough chain to guarantee working with all bikes. Frinstance my 224 is pretty chaingrowthy so it couldn’t run with a 32T (unless you were happy to have the lower gears risk pulling the mech off) but other designs would probably be fine.

I like a wide range cassette- it’s more versatile, means you’re never left with the wrong gears, good for pedalling up transitions (like innerleithen pushup with its random gradients and fireroad crossovers) but most folks don’t agree. I prefer riding to pushing even on the dh bike I suppose.

Smaller cassette certainly means better chain management.

I like an 11-32 as I pedal transitions a lot of the time, plus occasionally take the dh bike a bit of an expedition that is quicker if I can pedal it now and then

I’m most definitely a pusher lol, so by the sounds of it a road cassette is for me 🙂

Quick question, will my KMC chain work fine on a road cassette? I presume it would be worth an ask.

Thanks again.

TomO

I use a saint mech (or did until the spring broke) with a dura ace cassette, might be 11-22t or something very small. Works fine, never had a problem with it. Got a 105 mech on order as I’m
In the alps and have used one before which was flawless