Chainring upgrade

[DieselnDust]

What was it that didn't work? 

 

 

The shifting was absolutely crap. dropped chains became a regular feature. What I discovered happens is that once there is a little wear on the teeth the chain just seems to want to hang onto the teeth longer and doesn't release reliably. 

Also there was no physiological benefit. Initially they feel great and I thought wow this is nice. But in reality it was 6 weeks of wasted effort. Not for me. Won't make the same mistake twice.

 

Have to ask yourself if an oval chainring is so good why doesn't Ducati use an oval flywheel on their twins? Of all the motorcycle companies they are probably the most likely to try something whacky.

Balancing the flywheel can be acheived so why not try?

Eccentric mechanisms work well in some applications but an oval chain ring is not an eccentric

[Schnavel]

The benefit of oval chainrings is person dependant. Some people swear by them, yet it doesn't work for others.

 

I have tried the oval route and it doesn't work for me - round rings on both my mtb and road bikes. 

 

If an oval ring makes you happy, buy an oval ring. If a round ring makes you happy, buy a round ring...

[Martin PJ]

When you train on the watt bike, they make a big display about the peanut. Round is supposed to be better and oval is bad, shows you stomp on the pedals, rather than output power evenly. The whole idea of the oval chain ring is to make you pedal faster through the area where you do not put a lot of power, and go slower where you do. So this is kind of opposite to what the watt bike is saying. I was wondering if there was some adaptation to the oval chain rings which makes the benefit less with time, i.e. since it encourages to pedal in an uneven way, your power peanut would get worse the more you use it.

 

I did notice after using the oval on the MTB, then trying the watt bike that my power peanut looked pretty bad. I have been riding for twenty plus years and pretty smooth pedaling style. Ride rollers a lot.

 

Anyway, something to think about.

[ChrisF]

When you train on the watt bike, they make a big display about the peanut. Round is supposed to be better and oval is bad, shows you stomp on the pedals, rather than output power evenly. The whole idea of the oval chain ring is to make you pedal faster through the area where you do not put a lot of power, and go slower where you do. So this is kind of opposite to what the watt bike is saying. I was wondering if there was some adaptation to the oval chain rings which makes the benefit less with time, i.e. since it encourages to pedal in an uneven way, your power peanut would get worse the more you use it.

 

I did notice after using the oval on the MTB, then trying the watt bike that my power peanut looked pretty bad. I have been riding for twenty plus years and pretty smooth pedaling style. Ride rollers a lot.

 

Anyway, something to think about.

 

People with knee injuries are typically warned to NOT use an oval chain ring ....

[scubes]

On my hardtail I had a rapide 32 oval. On my full sus now I have a rapide 34 oval all good.

 

I run 11 speed with a sunrace 11-50 cassette. Shifter is sram gx and dérailleur is sram nx.

 

Works for most trails and terrains 99 percent of the time. Shifting is great not perfect due to the 11 speed nx derailleur being at max stretch with the 50 tooth cassette.

[Martin PJ]

On my hardtail I had a rapide 32 oval. On my full sus now I have a rapide 34 oval all good.

 

I run 11 speed with a sunrace 11-50 cassette. Shifter is sram gx and dérailleur is sram nx.

 

Works for most trails and terrains 99 percent of the time. Shifting is great not perfect due to the 11 speed nx derailleur being at max stretch with the 50 tooth cassette.

 

Something you may be interested is the 11 Speed SLX derailleur will work with NX 11 Speed shifter. The cable pulls are very close. I did this to my wife's Merida Big 9 600 2017, works perfectly.