I need a very cheap NW ring to go on a friends bike I am doing up. I was looking at the £13 ish ones on eBay - are they any good? Alloy, 4mm thick. I need a 104bcd size in 32 or 34 I think.
Any other options welcome.
Also I’m putting it on an 8sp system. 8sp XT mech and chain - obv not a clutch mech. Is it going to drop the chain all the time? It will be used off road but not really rough stuff.
Thanks!
I went for it, as have others. Seems ok so far: https://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/the-5-75-narrow-wide-ring-2/
Buy cheap ebay, buy twice. At least with Chinese knockoffs. Though you might be lucky.
£20 will get you a decent alloy NW from Works Components.
£8 will get you a genuine SRAM steel narrow wide chainring, though I'm not sure you can get them in 104 bcd and being steel they're heavier (but more durable).
£20 will get you a decent alloy NW from Works Components.
£8 will get you a genuine SRAM steel narrow wide chainring, though I’m not sure you can get them in 104 bcd and being steel they’re heavier (but more durable).
Ill take a look at the Works ones - how are they better than the ebay ones?
I bought one of those SRAM chainrings but made a mistake on the BCD. I need 104 but they are 96 IIRC. So I'm sending them back!
Onza should return and made a stainless NW Buzzsaw chainring, now that's a chainring that lasted forever.
Been running a Superstar one for nearly 2 years and it's been spot on
Got a SNAIL off Amazon and it's been absolutely fine.
Just a bit sluggish.
sorry.
£6ish on Aliexpress, round or oval - seem to work ok.
Ill take a look at the Works ones – how are they better than the ebay ones?
Warranty. Not that there's much to go wrong but an early failure with a tooth snapping off, replacement easy.
Easy return as per your rights buying from UK suppliers, inc 14 day no quibble return (unused).
I can't say if the ebay ones are actually good or not. Who know how they're made and what quality cheese they're made of. Though they might actually be okay. As I say, there's not much to go wrong with chainrings. It's just durability really.
I've only ever had cheap ones, 4 bikes zero issues.
Works ones last really, really well- wouldn't want to say why but they've outlasted everything else aluminium I've used (and that doesn't just mean long life, it means keeping the retention going strong). But then teh cheap ones are cheap enough to cancel it out.
In the end it's not that much about money, over the lifespan it adds up to bugger all, it's more about fitting and forgetting, and spending more time in the happy phase where it's all working perfectly and less in the end-of-life bit where you're thinking "is this worn out". So for me, worth it to get top end ones.
But there's nothing basically wrong with the ebay ones, they do the job. And you have to love a bike product called Snail.
I've tried a few.
the gear king ones from ebay are actually OK. work well, lasted a good year on the bike.
superstar performed about the same.
AB oval lasted about 8 months.
I'd note that the ebay oval chainrings aren't clocked in the same way the AB or works are, so may not give you the advantages of an oval ring, or may, I don't know, I've not tried one of the non clocked ones, but most oval manufacturers state that they need to be clocked.
Nik
