Has anyone had the chance to use both?

I’m wondering if there’s any difference between them, other than the Saint’s threads being deeper and being gold. I recall someone on these forums once mentioning that the bearings and the spacers used on the XTRs and Saints being different.

I know it’s hard to go wrong with either but this question has been bugging me for some time! 🙂

Thanks

Saint uses the old 44mm interface, whereas XTR is now 41mm (I think those are correct, XTR is smaller anyhow), which means that nowadays there’s a bigger difference as XTR got lighter again.

Can’t say that I’ve noticed much difference having used both. They both seem to last well.

XTR is now my default choice because I don’t want hold cups.

I thought the ‘newer’ saint BB was basically a XT/Six but in Gold seem to recall they dropped the longer threaded cups to reduce weight.

had both (older versions) and didn`t had any problems with them..
finally decided for the saints because of the deeper threads..

there was an thread on mtbr about the saint bb some time ago
stating that the bearings are different to xt/xtr ones ..
no idea if this is true , always thought that there is only a difference between the xtr bearings and the rest of the shimano range

There’s a few bearing/sealing differences through the range- deore uses cheap, XT/SLX uses decent, XTR is slightly different but seems to perform identically. Saint is in the same ballpark as those and won’t give drastically different results imo even if the parts are actually different.