So us mortals who have no need/hope of a new DA group can look forward to the second hand market being flooded with obsolete wheels

I really cant see how campy can put an 11 speed free hub of the same old 10 speed wheel, but shimano can't!

Wasn't that what they said with the 7900 too?

I thought the spacing was going to be the same as Campagnolo? Guess there will be a run on campagnolo bodies and cassettes if that's the case with the wheels.

Either that or this is the smartest ever viral marketing for SRAM 2013 red

Of course its impossible to tell from a pre-press release, but Shimano seem to have eliminated any chance of back-compatibility - Cassettes, Wheels & Chainrings - for little or no incremental benefit? Same number of gears, new fd shift & brifter design doesnt seem to have required these changes?

Because Campagnolo had a longer 10s freehub to begin with. It is long enough to acomodate 11s, but Shimano's is not.

yeah I've heard a narrower chain (again) and a slightly longer cassette. So don't think the cassette body is going to as long as campy, but I'm not impressed with DA chains getting narrower and less durable yet again. Might be able to retro fit a new cassette body onto hubs that don't need any redishing for campy cassette bodies.

Also tighter cassette spacing makes the shifting faster maybe, but more likely to go out of adjustment as these new narrower cables stretch. However Di2 won't have this problem.
Prehapes shimano have determined their front rings are now so stiff they don't need the extra leg on the front? Maybe they are going to go to a semi compact BCD as well because thier rings are strong and stiff enough to bridge the gap without the structure from the crank?

I have been riding Dura Ace for 20 years. Over the last few weeks I have been riding my back up bike with DA 7800 and it really does amaze me what a step backwards 7900 was in terms of shift quality. Aesthetics and ergonomics okay but the shifting just isn't as good and needs much more adjusting on 7900.

It looks to me like Shimano is making a very small incremental step forward here, if at all, in mechanical shifting. Really I think they have blown their wad on electronic and are falling behind with mechanical. Almost no weight savings, if the shifting doesn't improve all they have really done is make all my expensive equipment obsolete moving forward. So does neutral support have to cary three different setups now?

I too have been a long time user of shimano but this aint sounding good at all. If true I agree we might be looking at a major exodus to SRAM in 2013.

7900 is a fine group but it does take time getting used to if you've come from the 7800. The effortless shifting of the 7800 will be missed.

Only positive of the 9000 seems to be the lighter front shifting. 7900 works fine on my road bike but sucks on my cx bike with the longer and tighter bends. I basically need to arm wrestle the dam thing to upshift.

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Sunny cycling holidays in Portugal @ Cherry Cottage Vintage B&B

I'm sure at some point there will be a fix for most popular existing wheels with a new freehub, NDS bearing shield, and a re dish, but so far 9000 is making new Sram Red look much more attractive.

Fixed to 9000 from 7900

LoL - simple then!!!

52-38 sounds good. 52-37 would be better.

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Stiff, Light, Aero - Pick Three!!

For wheels that already accept Campy cassettes (such as Zipp hubs, DT Swiss, Power Tap, etc) the fix is super easy, just a new free hub body, as they already work with the longer Campy setup. Now, there is a big IF in that the companies actually have to produce these free hubs But, I don't know why they wouldn't.

The trickier wheels are going to be Shimano branded wheels. Those would need a new freehub as well as the mentioned NDS end cap. Shimano could certainly do this, but history seems to show us they aren't likely to.

I've got two sets of the 7850 C24 tubular wheels that I would love to be able to use going down the road.... but they might continue seeing Sram use if a fix isn't made available.

^^^Thats assuming that the Shimano freehub is the same length as Campagnolos

No, it's just assuming that it won't be longer than the Campy body. It is highly unlikely they will make it longer with 130mm spacing, as the bracing angles and spoke tension would really suffer.

All the speculation here is really fun, but I think we should all remember it's just speculation.



I guess required and benefit are the two words this boils down to. Of course nothing's required to change, but if you want benefit you need to change stuff. It's anyone's guess if they made these changes to make other stuff incompatible or if they did it because they thought it worked just a little bit better and were willling to sacrifice backwards compatibility.

What I really liked about Shimano is that for a long time, IME, they just didn't care about what people were saying, they just sat down and delivered a product that worked oh so well. The only time I feel they went astray from this was mechanical 7900 where they gave in and moved the shift housing under the bar tape and most of you know what that brought us.

I for one hope they go back to where they design a complete group with a kick ass performance and then the WWs in the little companies will pick it up and add their options and we'll be happy.

Gotta remember we are a minority and they need to make the best complete group that will work best on a complete bike. How boring would it be if it all just worked out right away?

I'm really looking forward to saying "But honey, this time I really need new wheels, the other ones just won't fit."

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"Nothing compares to the simple pleasures of a bike ride," said John F. Kennedy, a man who had the pleasure of Marilyn Monroe.

So true!

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my plastic bikes, 29ers & stable of old steel