Groupset Choice

Eyon

New build soon, got everything but groupset.

Narrowed it down to Sram Rival, Sram Force, Shimano 105, Shimano Ultegra.

i've used 105 and ultegra, but not sram. What is everyone's opinions on these 4 groupsets? 105 is a bit ugly and ultegra is quite common, I like the idea that SRAM is both better looking (IMO) and less often seen, but there are mixed reviews on the feel of Srams shifting? I love the feel of sram's MTB bolt action shifting, but how does the double tap feel in comparison to shimanos smooth shifting?

So, opinions please

Ian

noiseboyfeetman

SRAM Force @ Merlin £649.85. Campagnolo Chorus @ Merlin £675.00. I'd pay the extra £25 and go for Chorus myself. But as there's no Campagnolo option on your list I assume you've already ruled them out? What is the build by the way?

sloppyschleckonds

What else was considered to narrow the list down, and what frame is it going on?

Cubic

I was also considering Force for my new build. Like you I though it looked cool was a bit different and a bit lighter than Ultegra.

Speaking to the guys at my lbs, though, convinced me to go with Ultegra. They reckoned that while Force is very good, Ultegra was more reliable, cheaper and easier to service.

Bike is still being built up, so can't tell you how ultegra is yet (compared to 105, which is on my old bike).

Eyon

Have thought about campag but to be honest I cant get hung up on the whole "its italian" thing. The hoods are comfy but i really dont like the thumb shifters. I have to admit, they do make the best looking chainsets!

The build? A cheapy Chinese carbon frame in my custom paint. They get rave reviews on RBR so I bit the bullet and bought one. Its not the dogma copy, its a FM015-ISP, the design and geo has a lot going for it, and for £350 it was a no brainer for me. I have all the gear to finish in my shed, spare wheels, bars, stems, saddles, the lot. Just need a groupset and in theory i'll be getting a £800-£1000 carbon bike with good groupset, aksiums (not great but better than most at this price) with nice bars and saddle with no upgrades needed. The closest spec I could find is the Cube at 1500-1800 (spec depending), so its a good saving. Actually, if you look at the cube lightning, the FM015 is very, very, very similar!

Ian

Eyon

As for what made me narrow it down...

Price, I dont want bottom of the range but I cannot afford Red/DuraAce/Record. Weight, SRAM is lighter than Shimano, Campag is lighter still. Shifter style, dont like Campagnolo thumb shifter, sram/shim not sure on this one. Looks (dare I admit that?) made a difference too. 105 is ugly, Force looks great! Materials? Sram has carbon levers even on rival, bling for blings sake.

Anything is an upgrade from my current bottom end 2300 groupset, I want a good upgrade but within a certain budget.


Also, forgot to mention, the setup will be 175mm cranks, 53/39 and a 11-23 cassette. This is a decided thing, no compacts needed!

noiseboyfeetman

Fair enough, if I were you i'd get out on a bike that's got SRAM fitted and see how you get on with the double tap and take it from there. They're all decent groupsets and you probably wouldn't go wrong with any of them, personally though if you've ruled out Campag, i'd go for whatever you prefer out of Ultegra and Force.

giant_man

Eyon wrote:

Have thought about campag but to be honest I cant get hung up on the whole "its italian" thing. The hoods are comfy but i really dont like the thumb shifters. I have to admit, they do make the best looking chainsets!

The build? A cheapy Chinese carbon frame in my custom paint. They get rave reviews on RBR so I bit the bullet and bought one. Its not the dogma copy, its a FM015-ISP, the design and geo has a lot going for it, and for £350 it was a no brainer for me. I have all the gear to finish in my shed, spare wheels, bars, stems, saddles, the lot. Just need a groupset and in theory i'll be getting a £800-£1000 carbon bike with good groupset, aksiums (not great but better than most at this price) with nice bars and saddle with no upgrades needed. The closest spec I could find is the Cube at 1500-1800 (spec depending), so its a good saving. Actually, if you look at the cube lightning, the FM015 is very, very, very similar!

Ian

That's not what it's about. Campagnolo make quality groupsets and perform much better than anything that japanese outfit brings out. Don't get me started on that other bunch .....

Eyon

giant mancp wrote:

Eyon wrote:

Have thought about campag but to be honest I cant get hung up on the whole "its italian" thing. The hoods are comfy but i really dont like the thumb shifters. I have to admit, they do make the best looking chainsets!

The build? A cheapy Chinese carbon frame in my custom paint. They get rave reviews on RBR so I bit the bullet and bought one. Its not the dogma copy, its a FM015-ISP, the design and geo has a lot going for it, and for £350 it was a no brainer for me. I have all the gear to finish in my shed, spare wheels, bars, stems, saddles, the lot. Just need a groupset and in theory i'll be getting a £800-£1000 carbon bike with good groupset, aksiums (not great but better than most at this price) with nice bars and saddle with no upgrades needed. The closest spec I could find is the Cube at 1500-1800 (spec depending), so its a good saving. Actually, if you look at the cube lightning, the FM015 is very, very, very similar!

Ian

That's not what it's about. Campagnolo make quality groupsets and perform much better than anything that japanese outfit brings out. Don't get me started on that other bunch .....

True, but many people are! Things not made in Italy can be good, yes they don't all have that perceived "soul" so many talk about, but many get hung up on this fact and dont see beyond it.

I've only tried campagnolo on a turbo, not whilst riding and would be willing to give it a second chance. Centaur is in my budget and does look good, but in 2012 will they move to 11spd? Sad thing is there is nobody that I know of in north essex (around Saffron Walden) who has Campagnolo, this is a very shimano-y area! A question re: campag though, can you use a shimano cassette (for my shimano hub)?

Basically the thing I'm trying to find is the best balance between and foremost the price, the performance and weight. Names don't fuss me, hell, I bought a Chinese frame! Just want the best VFM

pbt150

If you have a Shimano hub on your wheel, you can't realistically look at Campag because the cassettes won't fit on your wheel (bodges aside...)

IMO SRAM Rival is very good value, perhaps with Force shifters if you've got a bit of spare cash.

lostboysaint

Shimano wears out, Campag wears in.

mfin

Got no idea why a bike shop has told you Shimano is easier to service than Sram, funny the things people say, god knows why. In fact, Id like to see the average LBS take apart an STI Lever and put it back together (same for Sram), that said, Campag are actually quite serviceable apparently. When it comes to servicing though, surely we're talking the odd bit of cable tweaking or re-cabling and thats about it.

As youd said if you love the mtb sram stuff compared to shimano, you'll understand the 'positive feel' sram gives, this applies to the road stuff too.

You hear of lots of shimano users who move to Sram and love it, far more than you hear going from Sram to Shimano, certainly on here.

Srams lighter, you can mix and match any of the mechs and shifters across the groupsets they make too, so you can mix it up a bit if you buy things separately, I run Red shifters and Force Mechs on one of my bikes for instance.

Personally, I wont have shimano on a bike again, but each to their own, I just dont like the feel of it, or the aesthetics for that matter.

Campag on the other hand, dont look past a good deal on Chorus if you try it out again and see if you get on with the up-shift button.

Evil Laugh

Can't anyone make their own mind up what groupset they want?

Go and try them, make your own decision. They are all good, they all change gear and brake, just do it in slightly different ways. It comes down to a thing called personal preference. Some people couldn't be bothered what they ride as long as it works, others will get irked by the slightest discomfort in using a particular system, me included, but it doesnt really help you decide as you're you.

Consider before going to 11 speed Campag that you'll be unable to ride various wheelsets especially the fantastic range shimano make. Not saying Campag wheels aren't good either but they are usable on shimano/SRAM.

asprilla

I've got 2011 Force on one bike and Ultegra SL on the other. I can't think of a single way in which the Ultegra SL is better than the Force, although there is a few years between them.

noiseboyfeetman

mfin wrote:

Campag on the other hand, dont look past a good deal on Chorus if you try it out again and see if you get on with the up-shift button.

And with Chorus you get Ultrashift so can move up 3 spockets and down 5, which personally I find great on my 2010 Athena levers.

mfin

Evil Laugh wrote:

Consider before going to 11 speed Campag that you'll be unable to ride various wheelsets especially the fantastic range shimano make. Not saying Campag wheels aren't good either but they are usable on shimano/SRAM.

...thats very true... the current Shimano wheelsets are so damn good for the money... this week Ive been looking into wheels for Campag for my brother....

...on weight for instance, try looking for a Campag free-hub wheel that comes close to the weight of a set of DuraAce 7900CL24's which are £499 in CRC at the moment, its bloody hard to find that kind of value for Campag.

Looked at Mavic, Campagnolo and Fulcrum wheelsets (was always gonna be factory built) and ended up going for Fulcrum Racing Zero's which cost £170 more at similar weight.

RS80s same sort of thing applies really. Brilliant value.

Mind you, I am in awe of the Super Record 11 complete groupset he's got on his new bike!!

winterdancer

I've campag and like it, but have some experience trying to put in new SRAM cables for someone else and they were a right PITA (the cable routing through the levers, not the other person!) - and had a really low tolerance (we were trying to put in a gear cable that was 0.08mm too thick... so I don't like SRAM :-)

Frank the tank

Ultegra if I was buying, but I've always had Shimano on all my bikes so I can't offer any comparisson anecdotal evidence.

sloppyschleckonds

Frank the tank wrote:

Ultegra if I was buying, but I've always had Shimano on all my bikes so I can't offer any comparisson anecdotal evidence.

So did you vote Sram Force 'cos it looks the best?

rozzer32

I run Sram force on my Cervelo. It is fantastic. Very easy to use, shifts very well and the only time I've had to adjust it was due to cable stretch. Fantastic groupset.

Eyon

Looks like SRAM is the winner and backs up my original thoughts. Will have to give it a shot first.

The big question is, is Force worth £200 more than Rival? Its a few hundred g less weight, but apart from that I cannot see much in the way of a difference?

Thanks
Ian

Paul E

giant mancp wrote:

That's not what it's about. Campagnolo make quality groupsets and perform much better than anything that japanese outfit brings out. Don't get me started on that other bunch .....

Yeah they don't perform well on any of the grand tours, if they didn't, top teams would go elsewhere, stupid throw away comment.

geebee2

The big question is, is Force worth £200 more than Rival? Its a few hundred g less weight, but apart from that I cannot see much in the way of a difference?

That's pretty much it. Depends on your gram / £ budget.

I generally reckon that spending a £ to save 1 gram is about right.

If you want a light bike, I'd go ahead an spend the extra, if you have it.

Otherwise in a year's time you will probably regret not having spent the extra £200.

Better to have a cheaper pair of wheels in the short term and then upgrade them when you can afford it ( since wheels don't last a long time in any case ).

rozzer32

I think it is worth getting Force over Rival. Is it worth getting Red over Force, I don't think so.

Force is much closer to Red than it is Rival.

drawblood

I run 2 bikes so I like shimano as I can swap stuff between them and upgrade as I want - I have mostly 105 on the winter / training bike and ultegra sl on the posh carbon bike.
no problem swapping over wheels and other bits as all the shimano stuff works together well.

thecm

I went for mostly Force on my Canyon self-build after previously being a Shimano man through and through. Takes a bit of getting used to when swapping between bikes. Can't beat the function/weight/price of Force I reckon. Try Fudges Cycle Store SRAM mix and match. I specced the long cage Rival rear mech so I can run an ultra-wide cassette for Lakes hills. No regrets on the move here.