[Closed] Anyone using a 1x8 or 1x9 wide range cassette?

RD-M310 derailleur, perhaps with a goatlink or similar? Has 43 capacity, but officially 34T max.

I put a 11-40 8 speed cassette on my son's bike. Works fine without a goat link.

I got one of the Sunrace 8sp 11-40 cassettes, and admittedly I'm only using the 15-34 cogs, respaced to 9sp on a Hope trials hub, they shift nicely and the quality is comparable to Shimano Deore or Tiagra.

Part of me wants to give 8 speed a go again as I remember more of a reassuring mechanical clunk to each shift, and it could be incredibly cheap these days.

My daughter has 8 speed SRAM X3 on her bike with an 11-32 cassette and looking at it the mech looks like it could strech to ~40/42t perhaps, I might just try her bike with an 11-40.
If that works then I could buy another cheap X3/X4 Mech and shifter to try 8 speed on my MTB with 11-42 or maybe even X5, 9 speed with 11-46...

Then of course there's Shimano M4000 (Alivio) which looks like it might do the job too.

All with or without a goatlink as necessary...

11-42 sunrace 9spd on 2 bikes here, standard slx/deore long cage mechs and no goat link needed.

Work well with a 30t front ring which can be got for 104 BCD cranks easy enough.

Then of course there’s Shimano M4000 (Alivio) which looks like it might do the job too.

which is what i use with my 1 x 8sp. bike

long cage will handle 42t cassette with 30/32t front ring no probs

only 25 quid and works a charm

I'm pretty sure I have an 8 speed shimano shifter in the garage too.

Has anyone stretched a 9 speed mech to fit a 46t yet or is it simply a bad idea?

Can you deffo use a 9 speed rear derailleur with 8 speed shifters?

You can with shimano.

I run 1x 11-40 9 speed on one bike.

I made this from a 11-34 sram cassette, dropped a cog and used a 10spd hope extender tickled with a grinder to mate with the 34. This was before the cassettes the OP mentions came available - if they are by SunRace I would have no heistation.

Runs perfect with a recent Alivio 9spd rapid fire shifter and circa 2000 M570 LX rear mech. The 10spd top extender in theory is the wrong spacing, but in practice the floating pulley solves it.

I used a £2 goatlink copy off ebay, which I had to modify with a dremel to fit the hanger, but different bikes are different and you may not need one.

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Yes thats a Deore XT U Brake.

Can you deffo use a 9 speed rear derailleur with 8 speed shifters?

Yep ALL Shimano road or MTB 7/8/9 was interchangeable used the same pull ratio, just match shifter speeds to cassette cogs.

In fact you can add road 10spd to that pool, so you can run road 10spd shifter with mtb 10speed cassette and 9 speed mtb derailleur on e.g. a gravel bike. Or even a road "flat bar" e.g. tiagra 10spd shifter to 10spd mtb cassette and 8 speed mtb mech.....

MTB 10spd parts use different cable pull ratio. 11 and 12 road/mtb is anyones guess.

ALL Shimano road or MTB 7/8/9 was interchangeable

With the limitation that 7 speed cassettes were narrower so an 8 or 9 speed cassette won't fit on a 7 speed hub and 7 speed derailler may not be able to shift across the full range of an 8 or 9 speed cassette, but 8 and 9 speed are interchangeable provided you have the shifters matched to the cassette.

Yep I've got both an old Alivio 8 speed and an old LX 9 speed shifter in the spares box, I even have a couple of cheap goatlink knock-offs in the spares box, So I could probably have a mech and Cassette for under £50 to experiment on.

11-46: 9 speed does actually appeal I know the jumps will be huge but then it's silly range and super cheap when compared to going 11 speed to get he same range, I'm sorely tempted now.

Thanks for the replies. I've got road 8 speed shifters in my spares pile, so am now planning a 'gravel' bodge build around an old steel frame and a 1 X 8 set-up. Just got to find a suitable donor frame... when the better half isn't watching. 🙂