Rubbish rubbish rubbish GXP bottom brackets..

Bought the Bionicon new… the BB has lasted me about 125 miles… and ‘click, click, click’
Tried the pedals, still the same… so decided it was the BB.

Jumped onto Merlin and 18 hours later, it arrived for £21 🙂

Happily, the issue is now resolved and it’s silent again… but FFS, 125 miles ? surely they should outlast that !!!!

Happily i tried some spare Shimano stuff and despite being told it doesn’t fit the Bionicon it quite clearly does 🙂

Sadly i only have 10 speed cranks here and a 9 speed chain/shifter/cassette. Will move to a new Shimano crank running 9 speed when i get back from Morzine…

but for the life of me i can’t understand how SRAM get away with such rubbish BB’s… This isn’t the first crap one i’ve had !!!

9 and 10 speed chainsets are compatible.

elaborate mate…

I can run a set up of
Shimano SLX crank with 10 speed rings
X9 rear shifter 9 speed
9 speed chain
9 speed cassette
?

I have had 1 gxp BB . It lasted about as long as yours. Merlin were doing Deore HT2 cranksets with BBs for 50 quid at the time so I bought one of those instead.

You can use Hope BBs with GXP cranks, they do an adaptor. Mine’s holding up nicely so far after hundreds of winter miles round a gritty, soggy Peak District.

Agree they are pants. Had one on my hardtail that lasted 3 1/2 years, seemed good so I got another when it ran out of bearing.

Well, my new £20ish gxp from Merlin lasted circa 3 months. Went to the lbs and got a massively expensive Hope as I couldn’t be bothered to try and resurrect it. On the basis it was £60ish and has lasted at least 9 months, the value for money seems ok to me.

I used up 4 GXP BB’s in a year, they are utter crap. Bought a new SLX crankset with BB included for £100 and am well pleased that I can now forget about the bloody thing for a bit.

If your GXP BB fails in under 12 months simply take it back and get a warranty replacement.

Yep, that should all be fine. I think Shimano 9 and 10 speed cranks are exactly the same.

Gorehound – Member
If your GXP BB fails in under 12 months simply take it back and get a warranty replacement.

POSTED 12 MINUTES AGO # REPORT-POST
sambob – Member
Yep, that should all be fine. I think Shimano 9 and 10 speed cranks are exactly the same.

Complex as it’s nearly 400 miles to dealer…. so won’t be doing that.

Thanks Sambob, i’ll leave it on until it dies and then fit the Shimano item i have here. Need to get a shimano lock-washer jobbie as i only have the one on my other bike and need that for that bike lol.

I have two bikes running GXP and they are still running the original BB’s two years on, however I do wack in loads of grease under the outer seals and after bad winter rides remove the cranks to clean out any filth. So maybe they need more maintenance than Shimano or Hope but at £20 can’t really complain.

My first gxp bb was duff quickly but ran for ages dry and loose. Eventually got a superstar one which lasted a few months. My new SRAM bb has also died pretty quickly. Chances of a warranty on a bb are slim unless it is more or less new. Shimano ht2 do seem better but square taper is vastly superior so far as longevity is concerned. But bbs that go on and on never made a bb manufacturer rich.

square taper – it is the future…

In Chipp’s editorial this month he ruminates on how bikes are improving one way and another. Is it in fact the case that BB technology is succeeding in progressively making the BB worse?

what DanCake said… after two BBs on my GXP I went for a Deore HT crankset and BB from Bike Discount De – was less than £50.

I will go Shimano… honest… Just that this month with all the money i’ve spent out for the PDS, also a bucket load of money on motorbikes including a new fairing today well, i couldn’t afford the expense.

My GXP BB lasted a similar time. I replaced it with a Hope with GXP adapter and it’s done two years and a few thousand miles so far, in all weathers.

The GXP on my road bike is nearly 3 years old and is as good as new. Obviously they are not sealed well enough for MTB use. I’m sure Enduro do a version.

Mine lasted 6 months and I replaced it with another GXP thinking it was maybe just a duff unit. If the new one lasts a similar time then I will probably replace it with a Hope.