Drop bar CUES groupset leaked

[EB]

This happened last month and I guess I missed it. This will be the replacement for Tiagra, Sora, and Claris.

https://www.bikeradar.com/news/shimano-cues-drop-bar

The images confirm that the cable pull ratio matches the flat bar components - the bike is equipped with the exact same derailleur as a flat bar model. Cassette is an 11-50 LinkGlide model. I’m sure many more options including 2x will surface.

I wish we could have same kind of cable pull compatibility on Shimano’s higher end gear, but perhaps they’ve got their sights set on wireless in that part of their product line.

[Wakatel_Luum]

Disc brake only?

[EB]

Originally Posted by Wakatel_Luum

Disc brake only?

Who knows, it’s just a leak, so we don’t know what the full product line looks like. Knowing Shimano and knowing this part of their product line is aimed at cheap erm I mean AFFORDABLE bikes, I’d be surprised if they were hydro-only. A lot of the OEMs these parts are aimed at like to spec cable disc brakes, so if only for that, I’d bet at least some SKUs are for cable operated brakes.

Buuuut… Flat bar CUES is hydro-only, at least for now. So maybe yes?

[AngryScientist]

Interesting.

The first road bike I ever bought new had a Sora drivetrain, early days. It was truly awful. My buddy at the time spent up and got an Ultegra bike, and his shifting was worlds better than mine.

Fast fwd many years later and Sora was actually decent kit, a lot has/had changed for the better in the lower tier Shimano groups.

I assume a consolidated low end offering like this will be heavy, a little imprecise but work pretty well.

I would agree that they will almost certainly keep cable actuated braking, which naturally lends itself to mech disc or rim braking.

[mhespenheide]

That looks cool. PathLessPedaled has talked about CUES before, if you're curious.

I still hope that Shimano releases an 11-speed Tiagra that's backward-compatible with their earlier 11-speed road components.

[benb]

They need to do something as it seems like more and more lower priced manufacturers are coming out of the woodwork to make lower end mechanical groups.

Realistically on the performance side I think they should have more to fear on the electronic side. The mechanical parts of cycling are esoteric but also very old and mature.. but on the electronic side there are lots and lots of people with expertise (especially in Asia).

I will have to go check out the Path Less Pedaled stuff on Cues. My son has an Altus (I believe) 8-speed rear setup on his mountain bike and it seems to be totally fine. It is noisy on singletrack, but that's almost completley down to it not having a clutch, that's about all.

I noticed looking at the Wilde bikes yesterday at least one of them had a CUES option to keep the price down. It was a huge cost savings over Rival or GRX or whatever the higher end build kits were.

[jds108]

Originally Posted by benb

They need to do something as it seems like more and more lower priced manufacturers are coming out of the woodwork to make lower end mechanical groups.

Yeah, I have some Ltwoo parts and they're good, I'd say 105 level. I just checked and a brifter, FD, and RD package is now $137 on aliexpress. Those are 2x12 parts with carbon levers and RD cage.