7 reasons why you should get electronic shifting

Shame on you Roadcc for pushing this shit.  It isn't free, so any advantages of an electronic system are negated BY THE COST! At least a grand.  I could buy a whole road bike and whole mtb for that which would give years of perfectly good service.  I could go secondhand and buy a fantastic road bike and fantastic mtb for that.  Or I could just ride more sensibly and get fitter on the bikes I have. Stop pushing these micro benefits so ex golfers have something more to brag about...

Tried the first iteration of Ultegra di2. Once I got over the initial "shiny new toy" feeling, I found that I really didn't like it. Mechanical Chorus feels better to me. Electronic shifting is not for everyone.

To follow up on my post of 2 years ago, my Di2 is still operating flawlessly. I still don't need it, but I still appreciate it on every ride.

Not that I have the slightest desire to change my bike, but if I did for some reason have to buy another top end transmission, and certainly if I was building the bike, then I would go wireless.

Main benefit to me is the shear effortlessness of changing gear, especially towards the end of a ride when my hands are cold and tired.

Only criticism would be that the battery must be unnecessarily large and therefore heavier than it needs to be as I only have to charge it every 1000 miles or so.

Continue to be perfectly happy with mechanical shifting on the 5 bikes in the family. Admittedly one is a SRAM hub gear that I wouldn't have a clue about how to adjust (I'm guessing it's just tweaking on the cable tension like any other system). Taught my son how to use the barrel adjuster to get his rear shifting working, that was a pretty cool moment. There's something very rewarding about fine-tuning a precise mechanical system that appears to be highly complicated. 

Still tempted by eTap, but they need to bring it down to Rival level before I'll seriously consider it.

Switched to Etap recently when I replaced my old mechanical worn out groupset. It's utterly brilliant. A doddle to set up, shifts perfectly,  no chain rub in any gear, no missed shifts, no cable stretch, silent and on the whole, just lovely.

Do I really need it? No. Would I take it back and go back to mechanical? Hell no! Converted to Electronic? Yes. However, if I wasn't fortunate enought to be able to have it, would I feel I was losing out by sticking with mechanical? Nope. 

Have Etap on one bike, SRAM mechanical (bits of Red/Force/RIval) on other bikes in the stable.

I like Etap, have had no problems with it at all in 2+ years of use and probably will stick with it on "best" bike in future. But not sure difference in use to well maintained high end SRAM (and I assume Shimano) mechanical is all that much. So IMO you spend a lot of cash for not a lot of performance benefit. Doesn't mean you shouldn't do it if you want to spend your cash in that way but the difference is pretty marginal (which is probably to be expected). 

Reluctant to shift (excuse the pun) to more economical Shimano stuff because, well, wires. Also, I've never used Shimano (used Campag forever until I switched to SRAM about a decade ago) and on the few occasions I have ridden a Di2 equipped Shimano bike I estimate I have shifted in the wrong direction approx. 40% of the time. I imagine you get used to it after a while.

Specifically on Etap: would be ideal if they brought out a slightly cheaper Force version of etap, a la Ultegra Di2. Love the blips (remote shifters) on the tops/under bar tape for shifting when climbing/on dodgy surfaces when you are on tops. Another benefit to Etap is ease of removing rear mech for travel (reduces risk of mech hanger getting bent).

If you're paying for the upgrade Road.cc they I'll take it.
Otherwise, way too expensive.

If you're paying for the upgrade Road.cc then I'll take it.
Otherwise, it is still way too expensive.

Change to wireless because I just must have another thing that needs charging, I can’t fix myself and will stop working after you upgrade the software about 2 months after the warranty runs out. 

Simplify yo’ life, keep cables. 

up down flappy paddles and a 3x10, 4x9, 5x5 or whatever makes the most sense from a weight perspective.

One of  fastest riders in my club uses a mechanical 8 speed cassette, downtube shifters, ally rims, no computer and he is over 60. I would like to go as well as him!

One of  fastest riders in my club uses a mechanical 8 speed cassette, downtube shifters, ally rims, no computer and he is over 60. I would like to go as well as him!

One of  fastest riders in my club uses a mechanical 8 speed cassette, downtube shifters, ally rims, no computer and he is over 60. I would like to go as well as him!

Chris Boardman described electronic shifting as 'a solution looking for a problem' and I'm inclined to agree. Face it, most of the advantages of electronic shifting make very little or no difference to the actual speed of most people's bike rides. Virtually all the performance advantages of electronic shifting will only make a difference to closely matched professionals who might be looking for fractions of a second in races, the results of which can be the difference between gaining or losing next year's contract and income. For these men and women - who, crucially, don't own their bikes - there is no cost to consider. When the stuff breaks they give it back or throw it away.

I think if we're honest, the only thing most people like about electronic shifting isn't the fact that it could mean a fraction of a second career-defining stage win in the Giro, (or even the the local amateur club crit), but that it offers lots of extra, hugely expensive and mostly superfluous gadgets and features. Most of these we will never properly benefit from and some of us, as is the way of these things, may even never get to work properly anyway.

I think if you're into cycling for the long term, electronic transmissions could prove even more expensive than they first appear. For me, and probably many others on this forum, a key feature of running several bikes over many years (three decades in my case) is the building and rebuilding of machines and the mixing, maintaining and re-using of parts. For me this is an important part of owning, maintaining and riding and racing bicycles. It's efficient and hugely satisfying.

For tiny and mostly irrelevent gains, I see the development of electronic transmissions as a threat to cycling, not a benefit, with its emphasis on non-user-seviceable parts and built-in obsolesence  and with servicing and repairs and their attendant costs entirely in the control of the manufacturers.

Electronic has minimal maintenance?  hmmm, will maybe that's because the home mechanic doesn't know how to fix it?  What's considered minimal? battery has to be replaced every 2 to 3 years?  And some people only got a year out one; and the battery costs around $120, lets compare that to mechanical, what gets replaced with those? the cables, how often, some do it every season but mine typically lasts 5 to 8 years, how much does cable cost? $25 for top of the line cables.  Firmware upgrades needed on electronics not on mechanical, and a lot of people get upgrade issues after they did it.  Mechanical can go out of adjustment and supposedly electronic won't but I heard that did happen a lot of times in the TdF, and , but regardless I've have a lot of mechanical derailleur systems and they rarely go out of adjustment.  What else does maintenance mean? Some say the gears and chains don't wear out, that's not true, they wear out the same and have to be replaced.  What about maintaining the battery charge?  there is no need for that with mechanical.  And of course the battery won't work at sub freezing temps.

Shifting under load?  I hear this all the time which strikes me as odd because I use to ride mountains of So California and found a friction derailleur back in the day called Suntour Superbe Tech that could shift under massive load, while it did sounded like something broke because it would shift with a bang under load when it shifted it was simply shifting fast and nothing broke, I also had mid and high end SIS that would do the same thing, my most modern 105 briftor system does as well as it should since it's nothing but an SIS system with the shifters moved to the brake levers.

The only real advantage that I found significant with electronic shifting is how fast the front derailleur shifts, no mechanical system ever worked well for the front, but now that may be negated with manufactures slowly doing away with the front derailluer.  

Cost? of course the electronic is going to be more expensive but who cares? if you can afford it then it doesn't matter.

On a recent cycling trip our bikes where stored in a hotel storage room. My friends bike was moved slightly by the hotel personel, so that the DI2 shifting lever was slightly pushed on during the night. No shifting possible the next day, battery completely drained. Best day of the trip ruined. Big advantage.

I would not even be considering electronic shifting if I could get more than a year out of the rear shift cable (with its sneaky hidden destruction inside the shift lever assy) and the front derailleur follies drama.  Maybe I could handle one or the other, but dealing with both issues has pretty much pushed me over the edge into to going electronic and being done with it. 

I've only read two pages of comments, so it may have been said.  My Di2 sends info to my head unit to tell me what gear I'm in.  I'm no pro and sometimes I lose track, and cycling in the steep Spanish mountains its good to know if you need to "man up" or if you have another cog left.

I also, ultimate sin of sins, use the function that shifts my rear two up or two down when I move the front, it saves me a few "clicks".

Having tried Di2, I can see why it is popular and why it is to be desired.. 

To me personally, however, a bike that needs charging in order to  fully function somehow misses the point of what a bicycle is  to me it is a mode of transport, a device that enables you to get from point A to point B completely independently, and with no additional energy input other that that produced by your own body! It is fully independent! Each to their own though (and yes, I'm aware that lights fall into rechargeable territory, however a bike can operate without them, plus lights can be connected to dynamos which follows the same ethos)

Having tried Di2, I can see why it is popular and why it is to be desired.. 

To me personally, however, a bike that needs charging in order to  fully function somehow misses the point of what a bicycle is  to me it is a mode of transport, a device that enables you to get from point A to point B completely independently, and with no additional energy input other that that produced by your own body! It is fully independent! Each to their own though (and yes, I'm aware that lights fall into rechargeable territory, however a bike can operate without them, plus lights can be connected to dynamos which follows the same ethos)

Its all progression, and business. How many of us would love to go back to lever shifting over two sprockets and cane rims???

road.cc wrote:

Take SRAM’s eTap system. When you move from the small chainring to the big chainring, the cage overshifts slightly to help the chain make the jump. Then a fraction of a second later, once the chain is up there, the cage moves back inboard to its standard position.

When you’re shifting from the big chainring to the small chainring, the cage moves inboard in two stages.

Wow, just like all my Campag mechanical groupsets. Amazing.

"With complete electronic-shift bikes costing from around £2,400(link is external), should you be thinking about making the move?"

I think the price excludes me from answering that question.

.. there's only one reason people need to move to electric shifting.. 

When the front derailler moves it sounds like your bike is from Cybertron. 

'VOOOOO' - never gets old.