You’d have thought yes being Shimano’s flagship (ignoring the new 10 speed stuff) but I see loads for sale both here and eBay.

So I was wondering if they were the dogs dangly bits why are so many being flogged on?

Comments appreciated

Jules

Replacement rings are very expensive. They’re good, but there are better out there.

i like mine, however i have suffered from it coming loose a fair bit. the main bolt really needs to be tight… seems to have settled down now (3 months use).

tbh i prefer the mounting system of XT and below, not sure why XTR has to be different.

i run 22/36/bash, and as such have a 32 and 44t rings for sale…

Very good in my experience. The 970 takes standard shimano ring sizes so there’s no need to buy the stupidly expensive XTR ones, mine have SLX inner rings (which need spacers, couple of M8 washers) and deore steel middles But you could go with TA or Middleburn or whatever should you choose.

But, the weight of the crank arms is surprisingly high, they’re only about 40g less than XT so once you’re mucking about with rings there’s not much difference there. And functionally I can’t really tell the difference between SLX and XTR, other than that XTR is harder to remove. So not sure I’d totally recommend them but I like having them if you know what I mean.

I like them a lot. They’re stiff and light and look the business as long as you helitape the arms. I think it’s a pitty that they’ve changed the design for the 10spd version, which doesn’t look as elegant. There will be even more of them up for sale as people switch to 10spd, so there will be some bargains out there.

I used them for the last 2 years, I bought them purely because they were cheap at the time and I think they look fantastic! There were a few niggles getting sorted out to put cheaper rings on because there’s no way I can afford the XTR rings! It was a bit of a hassle setting up and spacing with the bash guard but once you’ve done it once it’s OK.

Then, a couple of months ago they started coming loose all the time. It’s noticeable because there’s a knocking when you pedal and I always tightened them up straight away. When I had a proper look all the splines on the NDS crank were deformed. Not sure if this happened because they came loose or if they came loose because this happened. Chicken and egg. Once it’s happened though you can’t stop them coming loose so it was the bin for them.

To be fair, I ride my bike 5-6 full days a week, riding big mountains and a bit of DH, so it could be said that I’ve got pretty good life out of a light crankset.

In use they were good. I don’t really like the design for the bb preload which is fiddly and tends to come loose. Not sure if I’d say stiff, no difference that I could feel between that and XT. Got Saints on now and that’s stiff!

But, the weight of the crank arms is surprisingly high, they’re only about 40g less than XT so once you’re mucking about with rings there’s not much difference there.

This was also the same with the previous generation XTR/XT. The 100g difference became 50g once both had Middleburn rings on.

I’ve the previous generation XTR, never a problem in nearly 5 years – but buy Middleburn rings, last far, far longer and far cheaper.

But they don’t work as well, 6 of one and that.

They’re very good cranks, I’ve had several sets and never had a problem with them coming loose. I converted mine to 2×9, so sold the rings for about 60% of what I paid for the chainset, makes it rather more sensibly priced!

How much for the outer ring Hungry Monkey and is it new?

Hi All,

Thanks for the comments – greatly appreciated – gives me some food for thought.

Asked the question as I am going to be building up a bike fairly soon and was thinking of getting the XTR chainset (f&r mechs & shifter are XTR) but even before the huge price hikes I thought they were expensive. I did pick up an new XT (M770) which I was going to use which at £140 wasn’t hideously expensive but I thought as the new 10 speed gear is now out I might be able to pick up an M970 at a reasonable cost.

Seems the XT wasn’t a bad decision afterall.

Thanks again for the no nonsense comments

Happy riding

Jules

Personally I much prefer the XTR M970 crank arm attachement method to that 2 pinch bolt style used on my XT’s.