I am fortunate enough to have a buddy who is a very reputable pro bike wrench. I asked him today about any news on 10 spd gripshiters, and he said his boss just came back from a SRAM dealer thing. Apparently there are no plans for 10spd gripshifters at this time.

I am not holding my breath either. It would be just stupid to say we'll never make them, because, well you never know what the future brings. But it seems that if they were serious about they would have brought them to market by now.

Thoughts?

Rich

What ever became of that guy who was making ultra-light third party gripshifts? Is he still around?

The general vibe in the industry is that gripshift is on its way out. Niche of the niche now pretty much.

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http://worksrider.wordpress.com/

Yeah, I have a few things to say to that, that I really shouldn't say in public.

This is probably also the same part of the industry that I refuse to buy a new road bike from because they won't stock any of them with Campy, which I ride and for good reason.

Just type "10 speed gripshift" in google and you will get pages of threads in forums pleading for 10 spd gripshifters. It seems, if they were truly niche of niche,the threads would be much shorter. But, I am biased.

In the german IBC forum (www.mtb-news.de) in the lightweight section you can find the user fantic26 doing overhaul of gripshift to 10speed.
I have no personal experience with this as I run XTR970 shifters, feedback seems to be very positive though.

in Italy many guys rides fantic26 tuned shifters

i think 50 or more pairs came in Italy in the last months ( pairs i know ... )

i had on 3 sold bikes

i have on my actual bike

shifting performance : 100% , simply fantastic !!

search on youtube too , ebay.de too

fantic 26

Sven for the friends , his name

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http://eliflap.wordpress.com/

I spoke with a SRAM rep last week and they said mid summer there should be a 10 speed grip shift out. I mean grip shift is their roots!

Yes, and someone in the MTBR forum talking like he belongs to the SRAM organization said they would be showing them at Sea Otter. But after that the dealers were told there were no plans. I think there maybe some wishful thinking on the part of a few at SRAM, but I have lost faith.

I really don't see SRAM abandoning gripshift. Like you said, it really is the product that put them on the map and I have a hard time believing they would leave it behind.

Market it to death and make all their pro riders use it and it will make a comeback, haha.

So how important is a ten speed cassette? I'm running 2 x 9 with X.0 grips with a SRAM XX crankset and front derailleur, 10 speed chain, X.0 rear derailleur and XG-999 cassette (http://www.sram.com/sram/mountain/produ ... 9-cassette). All works flawlessly. I could always go with an XTR 12-36 cassette if I really need the lower gearing but so far I haven't. The XG-999 cassette is the same technology as XX but even lighter due to fewer cogs.

I was a big fan of the X.0 gripshift (9sp). But when building my 2011 mtb, it was really simple:
if sram won't sell me 10 speed gripshifters, i'm buying XTR 980

here is his ebay profile http://myworld.ebay.de/fantic26/?_trksid=p4340.l2559 , have just orederd a set from him. think i does them for shimano to.

but what did you won on that? the shimano isn´t gripshift either and the xx trigger is for sure as good as the xtr one sound more as a protest against sram

The Sram triggers are lighter, but the XTR triggers are way better!

but thats a matter of taste to me, the xtr trigger feels more "flimsy". not as "crisp"

by the way, i just got my twister from fantic26, fantastic service form him. realy fast shipment. as i understand it, he does them for shimano derailleur to