10 AND 11 speed bikes on KICKR with 1 cassette

Patrickfleege · October 13, 2018, 4:22pm

Hi, I am looking at swapping my rock and roll with a used KICKR, but my bike is 11 speed and my wife’s is 10. Does anyone have experience with using a 10 and 11 speed on an 11 speed cassette or am I better off with a wheel on.

Patrickfleege · October 13, 2018, 4:23pm

O, and my bike is 135 and hers is 130

Psychopasta · October 13, 2018, 4:31pm

If you’ll be using the KICKR in ERG mode, then you won’t change gears anyway, so it won’t be an issue. Using in non-ERG mode MIGHT be a problem, I’d suggest trying it out to see.

Patrickfleege · October 13, 2018, 4:43pm

An expensive test

Psychopasta · October 13, 2018, 4:58pm

? Doesn’t need to be. Just start carefully. For 100% certainty, you’ll need to swap cassettes. I’m an experimental learner

nico_synergy · October 13, 2018, 5:07pm

10 speed chain on 11spd block will hold fine if you stick it in the middle of the block and use ERG mode. Gear shifts wont work well though so stick to erg.

JPJ · October 13, 2018, 6:52pm

I’ve currently got a 10 speed cassette on my kickr for my TT bike and sometimes use my 11 speed road bike without issue.

Note this is in erg mode, you can change gear but it isn’t smooth and is a little bit noisy

JulianM · October 13, 2018, 8:43pm

I use a Direto but I guess the principle is the same…

I’ve left an 11 speed cassette on the trainer and have used a 10 speed bike just fine in erg mode.

stevemz · October 14, 2018, 12:07am

If it’s Erg mode and you have an 11 speed cassette, you can run 10/11/12 speed bikes. Just find a gear that is quiet in the straightest chainline and you are good to go. This also may work with a 10 speed cassette but I haven’t personally verified it.

Patrickfleege · October 23, 2018, 2:14pm

Thanks, I ended up buying a Drivo on Steep and Cheap for 45 percent off and I am crossing my fingers. I don’t know how the 135mm 130mm difference will come in to play, but I will figure that out in two days.
Thanks for the help

Jonnyboy · October 23, 2018, 4:05pm

I have a tacx flux that I’ve fitted with a 11 speed ultegra cassette.

my 10 speed campagnolo road bike works on it fine, I have to remove a spacer from the QR skewer because it is 130mm spacing but I can sit in a single gear in erg mode and the workouts are fine. there is the odd other gear that will work but its not necessary.

I can also use my 11 speed gravel bike by putting the spacer back in.

FTP tests may be a bit of a pain though

Patrickfleege · October 23, 2018, 4:29pm

Thanks. Is it a big pain to swap the spacer each time?

Jonnyboy · October 23, 2018, 6:36pm

@Patrickfleege less than 30 seconds. On the tacx it’s just a 5mm thick washer that fits into the QR. The hardest part is not losing it!

Don’t know about other trainers though, maybe search for an online instruction manual for the model you are interested in?

Patrickfleege · November 2, 2018, 10:23pm

I don’t know if all trainers are the same as far as the spacer goes, but I just started flipping the 5mm spacer from inside the dropout on my bike to outside the dropout on my wife’s bike.