Awesome reply!!! I recently done UK L’Etape with my 50/34 x 11/32. I found myself grinding when the low drags went up into the high teen %
Ideally I’d like to be able to spin more without blowing up. So I guess my main focus would to be improve the climbing while being able to stay strong on the flats.
As I mentioned though. The rides generally have 2/3k ft of climbing with hills avg 4-8%
Thanks
Looks like a great ride!
You should come to California to do L’Etape here . . . ~4k meters of climbing :). I didn’t do it, but recently did 2 of similar distance/vertical and loved having the 33/33 for them.
Good luck with your decision and LMK if you have additional questions.
Yeah, and a team mate of mine had noticed his Di2 battery flatted on the day of a race. (He had charged it the night before.) And it was a huge pain to find a way to charge it up, starting from the location of the battery to the need of a proprietary cable.
IMHO these are edge cases, of course, which are very rare. But nevertheless, that should also be included when you talk about reliability. Since I don’t own eTap, and the one team mate who does, seems happy with it, let me ask you: do you find eTap’s wireless communication protocol unreliable? Do failure occur frequently?
Regarding eTap batteries: Incredibly simple to charge. 5 seconds to take off the bike, pop into a charger for an hour, 5 seconds to reinstall. If you were really concerned, you could buy extra batteries and carry them in your pocket. While they last numerous rides, I would imagine the pro team mechanics have lots of extras. Having said that, one of the guys I do a suffer fest group ride with had his eTap rear derailleur battery fail last night. I got the sense that he hadn’t charged it in a long time so he was stuck in his 27 tooth cog not able to access the 30 and 32 tooth for the remainder of the intervals.
Regarding the eTap wireless protocol, it is very reliable in the rear derailleur. But I find it less reliable with the front derailleur. It’s hard to say how often failure occurs (i.e. doesn’t shift exactly when you shift), but I’d guess its about 5-10% of the time. But the key point is that the Shimano wired shifting is always reliable 100% of the time.
btw: I can visualize your teammate’s Di2 battery failure and the challenge of recharging it. It’s pretty challenging doing so even in my garage finding the port; more difficult on the road. A friend of mine had his Di2 battery completely fail so he had to bring his bike to the shop to have it replaced. Not an issue with SRAM.
Why didn’t he swap the batteries between front and rear derailleurs?
I’ve been using the 11 speed eTap for the last month, not exactly what’s being asking. I haven’t had any issues once she’s been set up. Shifts everytime I provide input. I had 8050 series Di2 previously and had missed shifts up and down on the rear or skipping gears, front was good. This was using the fast setting.
Hi,
I assume it makes sense to provide my recent experience here.
Last Saturday I was handed over my Specialiced Tarmac Pro 2020 with Force Etap Tarmac Pro Disc – SRAM eTAP | Specialized.com
Before that I was riding a Roubaix with manual Ultegra only. That said the overall upgrade is pretty significant.
Nevertheless, I only get outspinned with the 10 tooth cassette at 75+ km/h or more. That is not an issue for my kind of riding.
Interestingly the overall drive train is a little louder than the Ultegra one I am used to. Since indexing is done properly I assume the chain etc is just a little louder.
That’s a very good question. I don’t know. I didn’t think of it at the time, but I will plan to ask him on the same ride we are doing next Tuesday.
Yup, that is the intended use for road applications.
Will only work for Eagle AXS if a person has an AXS Reverb dropper too, but that can be an active backup when that is true.
btw: He may have thought about it. It was our 17th of 19 intervals when it happened, and decided he’d just muscle through the last 2. But then again, like me, he may not have. We were literally all draped over our bars at the top of these climbs gasping for breath. The wait time for those in the bottom 3rd (us) is literally seconds to 1 minute before we descend and hit the next hill . . . just enough time to take a couple of guzzles and/or slam a gel into us. Sound like fun 
?
I have an S Works Venge Etap AXS and I’m having issues with both brakes. So far I’ve replaced the caliper, rotor and the pads and still they’re super noisey. What issues were you experiencing and were you able to fix it.
Overall, I would say “advantage Shimano” if I had added braking to the Shimano/SRAM comparison I provided earlier. While I like the larger braking surface area of the SRAM (160mm vs Shimano’s 140), the SRAM were definitely noisier. Mostly the noise is gone now. There are two things I did to reduce/eliminate it - I’m not sure which one was the most effective as I did both:
The front brake was sticking and then making an horrendous noise. The solution came when SRAM replaced the entire brake, pad and lever! They were very reticent to talk to me as they in theory only deal with your bike shop. To be fair, it took many weeks to resolve but all is ok now! I hope your issue has been resolved.
Hi,
Random questioning my apologies if some one did it already I am still catching up with the forum.
Can I use a Shimano chain and asset with the new force etap?
I know is 11 vs 12 but since I have so many Shimano wheels is worth the try.
Currently building and OPEN U.P with sram force etap.
Nope, simple no
No on Shimano cassette, but you may look at some of the aftermarket 12 speed cassettes that work with Shimano freehubs. I know there are multiple options out there for running Eagle (wide range), but I don’t know if anyone makes one small enough to work with a force AXS RD (which is officially limited to 33 teeth or 36 teeth depending on version).
Also, many modern wheels/hubs provide an option to switch from a shimano freehub to a SRAM XD or XD-R freehub (which is required for AXS road cassettes). The freehubs are usually under $100, so a lot cheaper than a new wheel set or having a new hub laced in.