[sasawpg]

I’ve have/had mech SRAM, mech Shimano, SRAM Red AXS eTap and the new Ultegra Di2. Well maintained (change cables every couple years), mech just works too and has crisp shifting. While I love electronic and won’t go back to mech on some of my bikes, mech has its place. It has not left me stranded with a dead battery and it hasn’t entered crash mode during a cross race. Mech also won’t brick a $1000 derailleur after a firmware upgrade (it magically came back to life 2 months later, after I had bought a replacement).

I do agree with your first point, I don’t see much revolutionary here.

[Steltek]

Electronic shifting is everything I don't want on a bike.

- Another battery to recharge

- Proprietary battery format making replacements difficult

- Needing an app to make simple adjustments. Hopefully it runs and is still compatible after 10+ years of ownership!

Bike components are wonders of precision machining and modern materials but conceptually, they have a beautiful simplicity. Not to get too "give up programming for woodworking" but all of that goes flying out the window the moment you add a proprietary wireless protocol and closed hardware in the middle of it.

[sasawpg]

Index adjustment on SRAM AXS can be done on the fly from the shifters. Or from the app as you ride without stopping. Try that with cables.

The battery replacement is the real issue as technology gets older. Though to be honest, at some stage it gets more difficult to find parts for any system. I started to run into challenges sourcing several replacement parts for a 8-9 year old bike that had 10 speed Shimano group set, so it got sold and replaced. Batteries are not much different really.

[jjav]

> I started to run into challenges sourcing several replacement parts for a 8-9 year old bike that had 10 speed Shimano group set

I can't say I've had any problems with getting maintenance parts for my 2004 (19 years old) Shimano XTR mountain bike.

[runamok]

Barrel adjusters near the controls are a thing though not all bikes have them.

Example: https://www.amazon.com/Jagwire-Inline-Indexed-Tension-Adjust...

[latchkey]

I haven't opened the app since I got the bike... about 2 years ago. You don't need the app to make adjustments... I also haven't made any adjustments in 2 years, so there is that too.

[wizofaus]

That anyone would think 2 years is a long time for a part not to need adjustment is a symptom of 21st century thinking surely. I'd also suspect you're not riding 100s of km of hilly terrain every week (I do, and have definitely needed to make adjustments, but no more often than on mechanical shifters).

[latchkey]

2 years of no adjustments on any bike, is pretty unheard of, regardless of technology involved. Cables stretch, e-shifting gets rid of that issue... there really isn't anything to get out of alignment there.

I've been riding and racing bikes since I was 15 years old and I'm nearly 50 now.

[latchkey]

> It has not left me stranded

Not much different than a mech cable snapping or the derailleur not being adjusted correctly by a tiny set screw and the chain ending up in your spokes.

Shit has catastrophic failures... that's never going to stop being a problem.

[sasawpg]

Mech cable snapping vs forgetting to charge the battery? Yes, end user error with the battery, but I’ve had exactly 0 cables snap and I put my bikes through hell.

[latchkey]

I've had a cable snap in a race.

[sasawpg]

I just watched a NorCal video where guy had to spend all race in little ring because it snapped at the start line. Ouch!

[wmitty]

As long as you have access to a phillips screwdriver, you aren't stuck in the little ring - you can tighten the high limit screw to pick your one gear (at least from the higher ones).

[sasawpg]

(Replying to wmitty) it happened to him at the start line. His choice was between DNS or little ring.

[skeeter2020]

I've never had a rear derailleur cable "snap"; they stretch, fray and may eventually break right at the pinch point but these are either slow delays with obvious warnings or easily fixed on the trail. Compared to a connectivity or battery issue? They don't have nearly as high of likelyhood.

[sasawpg]

I’ve seen cable breaks happen, though not frequently. I’ve also seen chains break a lot more frequently, I know of 5-6 instances where it happened last year alone locally. All of these were a result of complete lack of maintenance as you point out, though I suppose it would be possible for a newer component to not show signs of wear and still fail.