Mechanical Shimano Front Derailleurs--do they just suck? EDIT: No, I do

[Spinner]

Originally Posted by vespasianus

Honestly, I think they suck. At least the 9,10 and 11 speed stuff I have used. Very heavy action and go bad quickly.

My 9-speed Dura Ace and Ultegra FDs have worked great for 20+ years and thousands of miles.

[NHAero]

Originally Posted by Carbonita

Coming from 10s to 11s a few years back, I remember having fd problems, as tolerances are quite tight with 11s. As noted before, follow instructions carefully, and YouTube freetoride was a good walkthrough.

Edit: get spare cables, you'll need them within a year when the cables fray in the shifters.

On cables - my two cents is to toss the coated Shimano cables, which lose the coating into fuzzy detritus, and replace with Jagwire polished cables.

[robertbb]

Originally Posted by phishrabbi

All Front Derailleurs suck.

Unlike the rear, which is a marvel of engineering, the Front Derailleur uses force, under load to wack the chain. They suck.

1x is the way.

Agreed with mechanical FD's, but the exception is Di2 front derailleurs. Amazingly good.

[tellyho]

This topic is fascinating to me because my experience is exactly opposite the OP - I've never been able to get SRAM FDs to work very well. I jokingly assumed they went all in on 1x for that reason. In general, I find FD setup and tuning to be one of the most finicky tasks on the bike but Shimano's have always worked. I have a 9spd DA shifting 10s 26/46 happily on a bike right now

[mattscq]

I’ve never used a SRAM mechanical FD but from my limited experience with campy, shimano mech and di2, electronic aside, it seems like so far my fav mech front is shimano. The fact that you have the entire lever to push makes the action lighter as you have your entire hand sweeping over to actuate the cable pull while with campy it’s just this smallish paddle that doesn’t feel as stiff. That said, my experience with campy front is a bit limited so far.

[Flinch]

I (stupidly) ordered the long arm 11 spped derailleur, and set it up just like the directions said, and suffered HARD shifting. My left hand got muscles from pushing the 1,487 pounds force required to shift!

Then nirvanna hit when I replaced it with the short arm version - kept the same slick cable. Even though the set-up was finicky, it now shifts 85% as well as the 9-10 speed Ultegra derailleurs of old. Why did Shimano have to change a perfect design?

Summary - if you have the long arm version, it's range is about 25 yards if you throw it real hard. Get the short arm one!

[Carbonita]

Jagwire doesn't fray fail? Awesome if so!

Originally Posted by NHAero

On cables - my two cents is to toss the coated Shimano cables, which lose the coating into fuzzy detritus, and replace with Jagwire polished cables.

[NHAero]

Originally Posted by Carbonita

Jagwire doesn't fray fail? Awesome if so!

Our forum compadre dddd says excess tension and not allowing some rear derailleur movement at the large cog stop puts the forces on the cable in the shifter that causes the cables to fray, so I also follow that advice in my setups. I've had no issues since using Jagwire Pro kits.

[Carbonita]

I'll give jagwire pro's a try, thanks. Of course I just bought 4 inner Shimano optislick's as spares, since my FD-r9100 also frays at the spool in the 105 r7000 shifter, in addition to the RD rx800 (clutch not used). I thought it was the small diameter spool that fatigue stressed the cable.

Originally Posted by NHAero

Our forum compadre dddd says excess tension and not allowing some rear derailleur movement at the large cog stop puts the forces on the cable in the shifter that causes the cables to fray, so I also follow that advice in my setups. I've had no issues since using Jagwire Pro kits.

[bikinchris]

I have NEVER EVEN ONCE had any trouble setting up a SRAM front derailleur on road or MTB.
Of the thousands of Shimano front derailleurs I have set up, I have had some hair pullers. 6, 7, 8 and 9 speed were all fine. The finicky 10 and 11 speed etc. can be a seriously delicate thing to set up.

[camelbackkid]

The latest mechanical Shimano FD's are awesome but as mentioned require a different process to set up.

First result on a Google search explains it well and worked for me:

https://cycling-obsession.com/instal...nt-derailleur/

[Gummee]

Originally Posted by bikinchris

I have NEVER EVEN ONCE had any trouble setting up a SRAM front derailleur on road or MTB.
Of the thousands of Shimano front derailleurs I have set up, I have had some hair pullers. 6, 7, 8 and 9 speed were all fine. The finicky 10 and 11 speed etc. can be a seriously delicate thing to set up.

The set up isn't bad. Too bad Sram front derailleurs don't shift very well.

...and haven't since they bought Sachs

M

[pdonk]

Originally Posted by rothwem

Horses for courses. 1x is great for dirty stuff, but if your bike is going to mostly clean, 2x is better. Unless you bought a Shimano mechanical derailleur and didn't set it up correctly.



I've got no complaints about my SRAM Yaw Front Derailleurs. Are they notoriously bad or something?



Hahah, looks like we're in the same spot! FWIW, it works great in the stand, its just clunky while riding.

I put mine down to user error doing the install. It was on another bike for 8000km and worked perfectly. I'm sure next time I do it, I'll be quicker.

[bigbill]

My first experience with the newer style Shimano was with a 9100 FD. 8000s were on backorder at the time (2017) so I went with what was available. The cable install was not intuitive but once I figured it out, it was easy and I haven't adjusted it since 2017 other than to replace a cable. My Lynskey and my son's bike have 8000 and I can't complain.

The Red AXS front derailleur on my Open was a PITA for a while, but it's been mostly dialed in for almost a year now. And I have no current intentions of a 1X roadbike.

[Gummee]

Originally Posted by NHAero

On cables - my two cents is to toss the coated Shimano cables, which lose the coating into fuzzy detritus, and replace with Jagwire polished cables.

The brown coated cables did that fairly quickly but the green coated cables don't seem to have the same problems.

The Jagwire Pro or Elite polished cables are great. I've got them on most of my bikes now.

I do the 'cheap SOBs are us' method of changing cables: the new cable goes on the rear derailleur side, moving the old rear derailleur to the front derailleur side since the front isn't nearly as important as the rear. Both sides get new housing since that's relatively inexpensive.

Speaking of which... I need to recable a few bikes here soon

M