Triple or double?

^
That sounds about right to me except for touring I would say maybe more towards a triple, but again depends on your fitness and how much changing between chainrings will spoil your day if your fitness/set up means that you will have to change a lot.

Am glad you seem to be happy with both options on your two bikes OP, but feel the calm is about to be spoilt by a vicious double v triple war :shock:

Let battle commence

A thing to remember about triples is that you get them a lot on cheaper 8 speed bikes so having 3 chainrings means you can have a closer ratio cassette (although they still seem to come with wide ratio ones).
If you have an 11 speed cassette its not so necessary for the majority of riding/riders in the UK IMO

All this talk of fitness levels and cheap bikes will upset triple owners but its not meant to be macho or show offie, its just the way it is.
They are different things for different uses and different rider preferences.
The size of the chainrings/sprockets are as important as the number of them too.

I've been riding a triple for over 3 years. I've had zero problems with it and it was the right drive train for me especially when i got started. It's still ideal on steep hills.
I've also ridden compacts several times with hire bikes on cycling holidays. These have never caused me a problem either. There's much more choice in bikes if you want a compact. They are a little lighter and narrower than triples too but I don't see those as important factors. My new bike will have a compact and I'm confident I'll have sufficient gearing for nearly all circumstances (I can put on a medium cage de-railleur and 11-32 cassette should I ever need to get up something really horrific!). What I don't know yet is whether I'm going to find it better or worse with respect to position of most often used gear ratios. i.e. will I do more or fewer chainring changes to stay in my normal cadence range on typical terrain. On the triple I spend some time in the middle ring (39) and most time on the big ring on flatter terrain. Not sure if I'll spend more time on the big ring now but with bigger sprockets or will I often revert to the small ring and a smaller sprockets. We'll see but it's not going to be a big deal regardless.

To answer your question:
Compacts/Doubles are a little lighter, a little cheaper and the chainrings may be slightly easier to set up.
Triples give more gearing options for the same cassette and in reality are not really any harder to maintain.
There seems to be a bit of a perception that triples are heavy, difficult and unnecessary (due to the availability of compacts) which has made them less popular. In my opinion they're still a perfectly good option.

HellsCyclist wrote:

What do you prefer? I have both. I prefer the triple even though my "good bike" is only a double. I like the wider range of a triple and this helps me maintain a better chain line too. Doesnt matter too much on my better bike as Im not carrying a rucksack full of crap.

Seems to me that doubles are more mainstream these days. Is this a weight saving thing?

Most bikes these days have compacts (usually 50-34 front chainrings) rather than standard doubles (usually something like 52-39). Compacts are okay for most hills, but I still like my bikes with triples as gears seem smoother and less of a jump to the big ring.

Triples are great if you want really high top gears and really low bottom gears; you can't really use the full range of the outer and inner rings, but you can use the full range of the middle, which works really well for some people.

For an extreme case, Andy Wilkinson uses 56/42/26. I plan to build a dedicated tourer at some point which will have a triple. Carrying very heavy luggage has a significant effect on my gearing choices!

Carbonator wrote:

arran77 wrote:

Neither for me, and no I'm not one of those strange single speed types, both my bikes have compact

Both your bikes are doubles then

Not standard though, but I guess the OP wasn't asking that

Nice thing about triples is that you do get a wider range of gears. More to the point you get them with less gaps. Most noticeable when you can use a smaller bottom sprocket as you have that lower than compact granny ring. Eg my 28t inner on my triple gives me a lower gear but with less gaps than my mates compact. I guess a lot depends on where you ride. I find a compact too much like hard work on the 20% plus hills round here when I am doing 10 plus miles of them in a morning. I could use a 30t low on a compact but that's gives nasty gaps.
Actually I have gone one stage further and run a 28/42 chainset with a 12/25 cassette. That covers a lot.