OK, before I start I’m sure this has been covered before but I’m beggered if I can find any reference to it either here or on the interweb.

Simply put – Will a Shimano 10 speed shifter (e.g. SLX) work with a SRAM 10 speed rear mech (e.g. X9)?

I’m sure I’ve read somewhere that Shimano & SRAM 10 speed shifters & mechs are interchangeable unlike their 9 speed versions, but can’t find it anywhere and didn’t want to incur the extra expense to find out it doesn’t work.

It works.

http://www.pinkbike.com/forum/listcomments/?threadid=148662

Err, ok but isn’t that article talking about mixing 9 & 10 speed?

I don’t want to do that I want to use 10 speed Shimano with 10 speed SRAM

🙄

I doubt it otherwise those of us using a Shimano 10 speed for the clutch with our 9 speed SRAM shifters would have chosen a SRAM mech if they were even slightly similar.

9 speed Sram mech will work with 10 speed Shimano shifter.

Just run all Shimano.

Yes, but I don’t want to run 9 speed shifters or with 10 speed bits.

I already have a 10 speed SRAM rear mech. I’m just about to put a 10 speed cassette on my bike. Can I use a Shimano SLX 10 speed shifter with it?

I don’t understand where you’ve got the 9 speed thing from? I couldn’t care less about 9 speed as I’m trying to go 10 speed.

I’m getting the 9 speed thing from what kit works with what.

9 speed Sram rear mechs work with 10 speed Shimano shifters (god knows why you’d want to do it, though). Giving you 10 speeds.

What you’ve got won’t work, so get rid of the rear mech and buy the correct piece of equipment. The Sram 10 speed mech couldn’t care less about working with 10 speed Shimano shifters.

Sram and Shimano have never worked like for like, why would they start now?

OK, thanks for clearing that up munrobiker. As I’ve already got the rest I’ll just buy an X9 shifter in that case.

Cheers.

They definitely work.
Sram and Shimano are almost totally interchangeable, if you keep to the same gear amount of indexing (The cassettes and shifters have to be the same as in all: 8, 9, or 10.)
But they fall into two main groups:
9 and 10 speeds. everything interchangeable between brands
7 and 8 speeds. everything interchangeable between brands

front mechs (too hard to type derailleur) are totally interchangeable only depending on pull direction.

You can’t mix 9-10 with 7-8 speeds as they are completely different in size. (teeth size and spacing).

An important point to remember on rear mechs is the hanger distance and the cage length.
The hanger distance is important so that the rear mech is far enough away from the smallest tooth on the cassette for it to clear. This is bike specific.
The cage length is important so that it can take up chain slack. On MTB nearly all cages are long as they are used on bikes with three front chain wheels although not always called “long”. So as a rule of thumb, a rear mech used on a bike with three chain wheels of 9/10 speed are interchangeable. A rear mech used on a bike with two chain wheels of 9/10 speed are interchangeable. The same goes for the 7/8 speed group.

Road bikes call this triple or compact and Shimano say they’re cages are GS and SS (GS: medium but is actually large in old money)

Obvious to say that manufactures design their gear to run on their own equipment and thus will get best result if you don’t mix and match, but you would hardly notice the difference.
I personally stick to Shimano, but I have no good argument as to why, just a personal preference

I have three bike like this all interchanged at some point with Sram and Shimano, Mostly because of cost or what was available as a spare at the time.

But 8 & 9 speed Shimano shifters have a different pull ratio to SRAM, i.e. 2:1 rather than SRAM’s 1:1.

As that’s the case how can Shimano’s shifters be interchangeable with SRAM’s rear mechs? 😕

Back to the OP’s question… to put it very simply no. As said above the ratio on SRAM and Shimano rear mechs are different. The SRAM grip shifters that are named eg Rocket will work with Shimano rear meachs. SRAM grip shifters that are numbered eg X9 will not work as they have the same ratio as all the SRAM trigger shifters.

But they fall into two main groups:
9 and 10 speeds. everything interchangeable between brands
7 and 8 speeds. everything interchangeable between brands

Are you on the catnip? thats so far from true you might as well be on the MOON!

Francis66… Nope. Shimano 10 speed isn’t even fully interchangable with Shimano 10 speed, never mind 9-speed, or SRAM.