Advice/opinion/unfounded speculation please!

The cranks on my commuter appear to be going at the splines. As the cranks on my CX bike are the entirely worthy but fairly chunky CX50s I thought they could ‘trickle down’ and the nice bike get something newer, lighter and shinier.

They’re going to be run 1x so a direct mount option is a ‘nice to have’ in the looks department and yes I know I’m being shallow. Skinny press fit BB so no 30mm axles.

At the moment the options I’m looking at:

Ultegra (last gen)- sensible bottom bracket, I have a longstanding faith in shimano cranks, heavier than force (?), looks odd run 1x.

Force- light, can run direct mount rings for looks/mud shedding, annoying BB, potential for smashing on things off road, really quite expensive.

Rival- as Force, but cheaper and heavier.

Any obvious options I’ve missed? I’ve always taken the view on the MTB that carbon cranks is a lot of money to save weight that is low down, central and likely to get worn by shoes and smashed by rocks. The line seems a little closer here- more weight saving for less price difference and I’m not in the habit of ploughing the CX bike over rocks in the same way.

Rotor 3D24. Not direct mount but loads of 5-bolt 110bcd rings for them, including ovals.

As you say, 4-bolt Ultegras look odd run 1x.

SRAM Red 10 speed. THe last set I bought off ebay cost me about thirty quid.

Deadly light and the GXP system is way better than Shimano. If you get a set for thirty or forty quid then you’ll have loads of money spare for a BB that doesn’t disintegrate 😉

130BCD ones seem to be cheaper aswell. You can still fit a 38T ring on them.

Running exactly that . Took awhile to get the 38T sent from absolute black, but a great set up when running. I paid £50 for the carbon cranks

“and the GXP system is way better than Shimano”

oh I beg to differ there….

I’d be interested to hear the justification for that too- I had always understood SRAM bbs to be fairly shocking so I had planned a wheels manufacturing thread together one, but I must admit I thought the gxp standard was more or less the use of a non-standard bearing to get round some sort of patent.

I’d not thought of rotor- they look good but are even more expensive than Force. I’ll see what the older reds have to offer too. Thanks!

Useful info on the SRAM red cranks. I’m currently running 105 1x but agree they do look a bit odd…

Have you looked at the Middleburn crank, look good and you can run a single ring spider or double if you wish.

Hmm. Middleburn I’d forgotten about. I think they’re probably going to fall foul of the same thing that’s putting me off the rotor- even more pricey than the already expensive Force and a direct mount standard that limits where you can buy rings.

I’m afraid I also don’t like the looks. Well, on some bikes, but not this.

Funny thing about GXP is that some people fit them and have no problems, other people find they disintegrate in weeks.

I’m going to go out on a limb and suggest that maybe it’s just another item where fitting it as per Shimano causes it to fall apart because that’s not how it’s designed.  The preloading approach is quite different.

For the sceptical on the above, Upgrade have Praxis M24 GXP BB’s to fit 68/73mm inbound…  Currently on backorder at £35…

I have been running a Middleburn X-type uno for years with the direct mount ring. Last time I changed the ring it was cheaper to buy a 4 bolt spider and fit a hope ring. So now I have a big choice of chainrings.

I run a SRAM Force 1x setup.
With a direct mount chainring. Looks the biz and light.
Its excellent and I dont see why I would not go the same route again.
(although stones chip the gloss coat well easy so helitape it from fresh, dont leave it like I did.)

oooh, I like that. Going to pepper you with questions now, sorry

Are you using a standard SRAM BB- The on one is threaded, right?

Do you know what offset you have on the chainring?

I see you’ve not bothered with any crank boots, any marking on the ends of the arms?

Yeah it looks great, very minimal.

BB: SRAM GXP BB. 68mm threaded on the Bish Bash Bosh. Nice and simple.

Offsets: no idea I am afraid. The Chainring was direct swap for the standard SRAM ring and spider and works perfect on my Force 11 setup. According to the spec of the ring, it has a 6mm offset for GXP, not sure if that helps.?

Marks: Yes. I have some chips on the cranks from flying stones. In hindsight I should have covered them before I started using them but after the first couple of chips the shock and worry has worn off. I have had some real big rocks hit them with zero damage to anything other the clear coat. It seems they are pretty hardy. Booties and full helitape would be the best bet I guess.

Ebay, NeutrinoComponents was the seller of the ring..

I have used Sram Red on my CX race bike, with a range of Superstar 1x rings in different sizes for different courses because I’m that sort of geek. Stuck some cheap ceramic bearings in when the original BB30s died and they’ve done 2 seasons of being power-washed in the pits with no issues, and the arms have survived me stamping on them and missing my pedals with massive mud spikes with nothing more than superficial cosmetic scuffs.

Excellent, thanks guys. That offset is what I was looking for.

I suspect I’d be taping the cranks ends at least- the BB on the new bike is fairly low and I’ve felt quite close to scraping on things a few times