Monday, February 6, 2012

ST or CT?

Here we go again.
Time to ponder the age old question.
Compact or standard?
Tell you the truth, I kinda like both.
Well, I only like half of one, and the whole part of the other.
See on a compact ring set, I make use of pretty much both rings.
Okay, I'm mostly on the small ring, but I do try to use the The Big Ring(TBR) on the second part of my ride.
I use mostly the 34/15-16 to spin around, and instead of going down the 14 and getting dangerously close to cross chaining, I jump up to TBR and down shift a couple of gears.
Which puts me back in the middle of the cassette.
Which is where I sort of like to be.
Probably an OCD thing, knowing that I'm like right in the middle or at least close to it, and that I got a selection of gears going both upwards and downwards.
Symmetry and all that sort of thing.
Which is why I like a standard ring set too.
Oh I never use TBR, but the 39 lets me use the whole cassette and I'm mostly on the 17 or 16 cog.
Not quite in the middle, but close enough.
Besides, I never use them bigger cogs.
Them are for sub sonic speeds don't you know.
Well anyways, one of the cranksets I got is bigger than the other, one is a 170, the other 172.5.
I thought it wouldn't make a difference, but I think it does, at least a little, especially in the spin.
I like the shorter arms.
So now it's like what to get?
The good thing about matching rings is that everything is the same, gears, shifts, etc.
Variety is also nice.
I mean I kinda like having bicycles with two different chain ring sets, but I think I'd be happier if both were the same.
The thing is on the ST, I'm kinda missing the 18 cog, I use a 12-25, and Campagnolo only puts a 18 on the 12-23 or a 13-26 which means having two different cassettes.
Or I could change everything and go 11 speed, which at this time, is not out of the question.
I'm sort of leaning towards the CT, I mean it's getting sort of difficult to find Ultra Torque Centaur cranks so changing that one out would be difficult.
Then again, if I change out the Veloce cranks, I'd have to go with the new Power Torque stuff.
Using a standard ring set is sort of growing on me, but I rarely use the 53.
Boy, I wish I knew more about that rumoured Campagnolo 50/36 that is supposed to come out.
This is all sort of a secondary dilemma to the primary dilemma so when I get tired of thinking about the primary dilemma, I switch over to this one just so the first one doesn't make me crazy.
Or crazier.
Or something.
Maybe I have to much free time.
Or maybe if you have free time, you can vote on the poll thingy in the upper right of the page.
Just something I'm testing out for later.
Maybe.

7 comments:

Steve A said...

I like the compact gearing on my cross bike. I use the big ring on the road and the small ring off the road.

TrevorW�� said...

Surely it depends more on the type of terrain you ride on most....
In this area with all the 20-25% gradients we have, there is no way that I could ride successfully with a standard - for me it has to be a compact.

-Trevor

Scott said...

Or you could use the standard and replace the 53 with a 50. I've been doing that since before compacts came out - I hardly used the 53 so I thought I'd try something smaller. TA and Stronglight make 135mm 50t rings.

limom said...

I read someplace about troubles trying to replace the rings on the Centaur cranks.
something about the bolt on the crank arm needing a spacer?
How are those other rings?
Shift okay?
The other idea was to go ST and replace the inner ring with a 36, though I haven't heard of that being done.

Scott said...

Hmmmm...The inner ring on a 4 arm crank (old Record) needs a spacer but not the outer ring. But if you have a complete crank now then the spacer is there.

I've never had any complaints with the shifting and I think it's actually better/faster since there's less of a difference size wise. The newer Stronglights have pins on them so that helps too. If you look close at my Pelizzoli pic you'll see a Stronglight; the Ciöcc has an old QBP ring on it that's been there a long time.

limom said...

Yeah come to think about it maybe it was the inner ring.
To be honest though, I really dislike the thought of changing out the stock ring for aftermarket.
I hear rumours of a 50/36 coming out this year?

Scott said...

I can see your point but I don't think I've ever had anyone notice that the big ring wasn't a Campy...at least if they didn't they didn't comment.

I've heard that rumor as well. Also, Campy makes a 36T CX chainring that would fit though those don't come cheap. I thought about going that route on my latest but after spending a bit of time on it I came to the conclusion that I prefer square taper cranks to external BB ones so the UT crank will be replaced, likely with another 50/39, though I do have a Campy MTB (normal 110) crank which might end up there - and it has a 36T Campy ring on it.

And here's one more option. Regular 110 rings won't work because one hole on the Campy rings is 112mm. People have posted on different forums that they simply used a dremel or file to make the hole on a regular 110 fit the Campy crank with no problems.