We have several bikes in the family and they get ridden in reasonable rotation. They are cleaned every ride and we use a Park chain cleaner and some Virosol degreaser and then lube them up. This seems to make the drive train last a long time.
Yesterdays outing on my Orange Gyro was a marred by grumbly transmission. After my usual clean i checked the chain and it was worn beyond 0.75 but not quite to 1.0. The 30t NW chainring has some slight but noticable wear to the driving face of the chainring. The teeth no longer look symmetrical.
I run a 10sp XT cassette with a 17t removed and a 40t expander ring. The aluminium 40t also looks worn.
So, how to proceed?
A new 10sp chain to see if it works with the wear on the sprockets?
A new chain and reverse the NW chainring?
A mew expander ring too? A new cassette?
Or go 11sp? 12sp? Or give it all away and buy an Occam?
Currently spending less money would be good and i do have some new 10sp dribe train parts in the garage.
Regards
Ian
I'd try a new chain. If it works, crack on (but be aware that it might wear faster than the last one).
Then I'd run that chain/cassette/chainring into the ground, then replace as a set.
If you've still got the removed 17T then check the profile of the rest of the cassette against that.
Try a new chain first then if it skips change the cassette, no need to do the XT cassette with extender these days with the availability of wide range cassettes. I'd only change the chainring if you are getting chain suck.
Reversing the chainring might work but you might alter the chainline, depends on the chainring. Some only fit "one way" so you wouldn't be able to do that.
Ok thats great. Im not getting chainsuck and the NW part is still working as i have never dropped the chain in it.
I have a little stockpile of new expander sprockets and 10sp cassettes.
If you have a stockpile of 10 speed stuff then try a new chain first. If that works, great. If it doesn’t then I’d replace the cassette / expanded ring and use that with a new chain. You might get away with the NW ring as it is, but they’re cheap to replace so I’d just replace it at the same time.
I’m on all steel cogs on my drivetrain front / back and I’ve yet to wear out a cassette or chainring so they won’t take a new chain. I could probably save a chunk of weight off both bikes going to alloy chainrings / fancier cassettes but that would just make my hobby more expensive for minimal gain.