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I'm very out of date and happily riding an old 3x9 setup (44, 32, 22 & 11-34). Sooner or later an upgrade will be forced upon me and I'm looking at options.
I'm probably not a typical cyclist and ride a fairly portly Singular Swift on and off road in a sort of gravel-guise but my current gearing works well (4.38 - .71 gear inches) and although I appreciate that I could re-educate myself to something new, I'd like to stay close to this; could I get a double setup to do this?
When double chainsets first started appearing, triples seemed to have 44 tooth big rings (at one time I'm sure that XTR had 46) and doubles 42 but subsequently, although the spread seems to have stayed the same, things seem to have shifted to the lower end of the spectrum; Shimano's current triples have 40 tooth big rings and doubles 38 whilst cassette now seem to have huge cogs.
I've yet to find anything I can't spin up in 22x34 (or indeed 22x32) so have no need of a lower gear; for comparison, and looking at the new XTR 12 speed groupset on the frontpage, you could have a 28 tooth inner ring and a 51 tooth cog (giving around .5 gear inches instead of .71 - I'd expect to be able to ride up vertical surfaces, if not upside down, with this).
SRAM still lists its X5 - X9 groupsets as current on its website with a 42x38 double available, but they seem to be out of stock everywhere and there might be issues getting replacement chainrings in the future. 28x36 would give a slightly higher lowest gear too (although this might be imperceptible in real world terms) and I'm not sure if a higher that 36 tooth cog could be used as the site doesn't list rear mech. total capacity.
Am I over complicating the process and would I notice a drop from 44 teeth to 38?
Budget would be tight so I'd be looking at SLX/X5 level or second hand (3x9 & 3x10 44, 32, 22 Deore triples are still available ridiculously cheaply).
Shimano's current MTB group sets (ignoring sub-Deore sets) still offer 1x10, 2x10, 3x10 & 1x11, 2x11, 3x11 (and an imminent move to 12 speed) so options of confusing, and the bike's too portly to consider a compact CX/gravel chainset.
I've always worked this out with a gear inches calculator (Google). Your current 22/34 provides 18.7(approx) gear inches so you need to start with finding a suitable double set up that provides a similar ratio at the low range as this is more critical for mtb than the high range gears. Some thing like a <span style="font-size: 0.8rem;">26/40 ratio will provide almost exactly the same ratio.</span>
<span style="font-size: 0.8rem;">So shimano chainset 26<36 would be about right paired with a 11 to 40t cassette. Youll certainly need a long cage rear mech though..... If you rarely use the 22/34 in your current setup, you may want to think about a 11to36 cassette. This paired with a 28t chainring wouldn't be much different.</span>
You will loose top end speed, but when was that last time you span out a 50t chainring?
As for 28chainring with a 51 cassette, that's only for single ring users the spread of gears through a 10<51 is to large to accommodate a double set up. You'd need a really long chain and an xl cage rear mech which would be bashed by rocks constantly.
3×9 44, 32, 22 Deore triples are still available ridiculously cheaply
Not as ridiculously cheaply as they were in the past - £48 in 2015. Had the 48.36.26 version for the commuter. Now they're £64 I've gone 1x9. 34t chainwheel on front, and 32-11 on back (just like having singlespeed but with 9 gears). I don't do the distance or hills on it that I used to though. Sorry not much help to your situation.
I’ve always worked this out with a gear inches calculator (Google). Your current 22/34 provides 18.7(approx) gear inches
Whoops, that was a good start! [url= http://gears.mtbcrosscountry.com ]The gear calculator I was using[/url] shows ratios not gear inches, so the values in my post are ratios no GIs; sorry!
Sooner or later an upgrade will be forced upon me and I’m looking at options.
I'm still riding and buying 9 speed stuff, and even 8 speed stuff, and there's plenty of it around. I don't think you'll be forced to upgrade for a while yet.
4.38 – .71 gear inches
Surely more like 18 to 110?
Anyway, isn't the question mainly one of how often you use the top three or four gears? (And one of whether you reckon you'll actually benefit in any way from losing a chainring.)
Watch out for Shimano's latest chainsets - they've got that funky new 94/96BCD "standard". All your old chainrings will suddenly be obsolete, and it will be a pain to buy aftermarket ones.
I started by looking at this from a 1x perspective as that’s what I’ve got on both bikes.
The 22f/34r gear you have got is very spinny - I’ve always found a 32f/42r suitable for most climbs - although since I’ve gone to a heavier Enduro bike I’ve now got 30f/42r as my lowest gear. Which still isn’t quite as low as the 22/34.
So looking at doubles if you could get a 26/39 (found a Sram X5 in this configeration but it was surprisingly expensive at £70) and an 11-40 cassette hat gives you the same lowest gear but you don’t lose too much off the top end.
When it comes to rear mechs that’s where my knowledge ends though - assume it’ll need to be a medium or probably long cage mech for that gear spread.
In 10 speed the sunrace ms3 cassette is probably your cheapest option for 11-40. Chain reaction we’re knocking out the 11-42 for £15 a few days ago which is a real bargain (I bought one at that price)!
I guess a 2nd hand crankset would be your best option for a bargain double. I sold my last double Sram gxp 1000 for like £20 on eBay and it still had plenty of life left in the chainrings.
edit - it looks like Shimano Deore doubles are marginally cheaper new - but may have odd bcds and with a double the spacing is usually wrong to them swap to a single at any point (should you want to).
"forced upgrade"?
Not for years, I'm still on 8s, plenty stuff around
I also doubt you'll be forced to upgrade any time soon- like @bez I am still happily running 9 speed and always seem to find chain rings etc when I need them.
Don't forget that 29" tyres are bigger than 700x23, so a 44t is giving you practically the same top gears as a road bike, which IME is pointless, you end up cranking it round at a low RPM even downhill just to justify its existence. Even 34-11 is quite hard to spin out off road, and once you do you'd probably be quicker picking lines and tucking.