When someone mentions OneUp, there's a good chance that most people think of anodized green, pie plate-sized cogs made to provide an easier gear ratio than whatever came stock on your bike. Own a chubby all-mountain machine? Legs and lungs more Kia than Koenigsegg? Then a big OneUp add-on cog might be for you. But what if you want to make a change on the other end of your 11-speed cassette, one that would result in a harder gear for higher top-end speed, or to compensate for a smaller chainring? OneUp's $45 USD Shark 10-Tooth Cluster consists of 10 and 12-tooth cogs machined from a single piece of steel, as well as a 14 or 15-tooth cog (depending on your needs) that interfaces with splines on its backside, all of which replaces the bottom three cogs of your Shimano 11-speed cassette.
The Shark 10-Tooth Cluster requires a special, proprietary (but not patented) freehub body, called the MiniDriver, that's shorter than a normal Shimano freehub. The $40 USD MiniDriver is only compatible with hubs that employ DT Swiss Star Ratchet internals, and it works with 142 and 148mm hub spacing. Together, the Shark 10-Tooth Cluster and MiniDriver freehub provide a 500% range when combined with
OneUp's 50-tooth Shark cog and Shark Cage. In case you're curious, that's the same as SRAM's Eagle drivetrain, but it comes via a highly modified Shimano 11-speed cassette and derailleur rather than a new 12-speed system.
Shark 10-Tooth Cluster Details:• One-piece 10 and 12-tooth cogs
• 14 or 15-tooth third cog
• Compatability: Shimano 11spd cassettes
• Requires OneUp MiniDriver ($40 USD)
• Adds 10% to gearing range
• Includes required lockring
• MSRP: $45 USD
•
www.oneupcomponents.com /
@OneUpComponents Depending on the stock cassette you start with, and if you've made any changes on the other end of the gear range, the four possible configurations stack up like this:
10-
12-
14-17-19-21-24-27-31-35-40 (11-40 converted to 10-40)
10-
12-
14-17-19-21-24-28-32-37-42 (11-42 converted to 10-42)
10-
12-
15-18-21-24-27-31-25-40-45 (11-45 OneUp'd Shimano converted to 10-45)
10-
12-
15-18-21-24-28-32-37-42-50 (11-50 OneUp'd Shimano converted to 10-50)
The OneUp MiniDriver is roughly the same height as an XD freehub, and 4.5mm shorter than a normal 10-speed freehub.Why do normal 8, 9, 10, and 11-speed cassettes only go down to an 11-tooth cog? There are a couple of reasons, but the main one is that the diameter of the freehub bodies that we've all been using for many, many years limits how small the bottom cog can be. So while the largest cog size has grown considerably over the last decade, things had stopped at eleven teeth on the opposite end. The notable exception, however, is Shimano's old Capreo group and stepped freehub body that allowed for nine and ten tooth small cogs, as well as a now obscure system from Moulton. The late, great Sheldon Brown has all sorts of information about those two examples on his website, just in case you want to see where we've been.
SRAM's XD freehub is shorter and slightly stepped for the very same reason, to make room for the 10-tooth small cog, and it's also why OneUp's anodized green MiniDriver freehub body is 4.5mm shorter than a standard 10 or 11-speed freehub.
OneUp's aluminum freehub body, which they say was developed via a collab with Hope Technology and is therefore also compatible with Hope's new cassette, sports the same splines as a standard Shimano HG system.
The shortened design isn't patented so as to allow other companies to make use of it, and OneUp also says that this should make ''the production of inexpensive 10T equipped cassettes a reality.'' With both major drivetrain companies pushing their new 11 and 12-speed systems, I'm not sure we'll see that happen, and a more jaded mind might assume that it isn't patented because it's been done before, but hey, it's good to see either way.
The freehub uses DT Swiss' much-lauded Star Ratchet system, which is a good thing in my mind. Yes, not everyone has a DT Swiss hub or one that uses their internals, but the Star Ratchet design is mega simple, requires no tools to service and can be pulled apart by hand, and can be configured to work with basically any drivetrain or axle system by using different end caps. When you purchase the $40 USD MiniDriver, it comes with bearings installed and the required axle end cap, but you'll need to re-use the two ratchet wheels and springs in your hub - it's plug-and-play.
The 14 or 15-tooth third cog rides on splines on the backside of the Shark 10-Tooth Cluster rather than on the freehub body.The Shark 10-Tooth Cluster is actually two cogs, 10 and 12-tooth cogs that are machined from a single piece of steel, and then a third that interlocks with the smaller two. The 10-tooth cog sits proud of the end of the freehub body, and it is the splines under the 12-tooth cog that lock it in place while an extra tall lockring reaches down through the small cog to tighten everything up. Next, there's a 14 or 15-tooth cog (14 if it's going on an 11-42T Shimano cassette, 15 if it's going on a modified 11-50T OneUp'd Shimano cassette) that interlocks with splines on the outside of the 10 and 12-tooth cluster. Got all that?
Again, this is very similar to how the Capreo system worked, and while it sounds complicated, it's simple and effective. The final product is a three-cog unit with 10, 12, and either 14 or 15 teeth, that replaces the bottom three cogs of your Shimano cassette, thereby adding 10% to the range on the high-end with a net weight gain of zero grams. Pretty neat.
Installation and SetupThe job isn't hard, but messing about with your cassette and freehub can be intimidating if you've never done it before. You'll need a lockring tool and wrench, as well as a chain whip, to get your cassette off and reinstall the OneUp'd block, but your DT Swiss freehub comes off without any tools.
Once you have the cassette removed, simply pull your old freehub body straight off with a firm tug, being careful not to send the two springs and ratchet wheels flying across your garage to disappear forever. Clean the hub's drive-ring and ratchet wheels before applying a thin coating of new grease, and then slide the inner spring, two ratchets, and outer spring back over the axle and into the hub body. The MiniDriver freehub slides on right over all of this and rotating it slowly counterclockwise as you do it will allow the ratchet wheels to seat correctly. Slide the new (and required) axle end cap over it all, push it home, and you're done in way less time than it takes to read this review.
No tools are required to swap out the stock DT Swiss freehub for the MiniDriver.The Shark 10-Tooth Cluster is even easier to install than the MiniDriver freehub; ditch those last three cogs on your stock Shimano cassette and simply replace them with OneUp's version of how to do things.
I slid the 15-tooth cog (my cassette already has the 50-tooth Shark cog installed) onto the 10 and 12-tooth cluster before sliding all three down onto the freehub body, and then tightened down the extra long lockring as per normal.
PerformanceSo, how does it all work? The 10-tooth cog obviously provides a taller gear than the 11-tooth that it replaced, and while a single-tooth difference is a change that sounds small, it's one that you can feel in your legs. The harder gear is, well, harder. But while my trails are relatively quick for the part of southwestern B.C. that I call home, I still rarely found myself down in the 10-tooth speed demon cog unless I was trucking along a fireroad at a good clip. There were definitely times when I appreciated the smaller cog, but this happened between trails rather than on them.
This is where your chainring comes into play, as well as what you may or may not have done to the easy end of your cassette. I used the Shark 10-Tooth Cluster in conjunction with two other Shark products, the giant 50-tooth cog, and the Shark Cage, and all of it came together to provide a massive 500% gearing range. For comparison's sake, a stock Shimano XT 11-42 cassette supplies a 281.81% range; a SRAM XX1 10-42 gives you 320%, and the OneUp'd XT 11-50 cassette offers a wider 354.54% range. The highly modified 10-50 Shimano cassette on my bike, with its Shark 10-Tooth Cluster and 50-tooth Shark cog, makes all those sound pretty narrow.
Eleven cogs, maximum range.Yes, I know that not everyone needs that kind of range, and also that some riders will raise their nose at such a spread; I did exactly that when I first saw the numbers, but then someone older and wiser than me (okay, it was RC) suggested that I lower myself down from my high horse and think about the possibilities. Since then I've played with chainring sizes, bouncing between 32 and 34 teeth, both of which provide both an easier low gear and harder tall gear than when I was running a 30-tooth chainring with the stock cassette. The Shark setup is all about options - run what suits you and your terrain, whether that's a larger cog, smaller cog, or both.
My favorite kind of rides are the ones that take four or five hours longer than what some riders would say is fun, and that go places that may or may not best suit a mountain bike. Sometimes that means stupidly steep climbs up old dirtbike singletrack that'd be easy with a 250cc motor under me, or sometimes that means way too much time spent on some long forgotten and nearly grown in fireroad. It's these places that the massive 500% range of the highly modified 11-speed cassette comes in handy. I could also see it also being handy for an enduro racer who wants to run a smaller chainring to spin up the transfer stages without sacrificing top-end speed.
As far as reliability goes, everything looks good so far, and shift quality on the bottom-end is unchanged from the stock setup. The freehub isn't showing any signs of gouging, and the three new Shark cogs are doing their job without complaint. My single issue with the system is that it's only compatible with hubs that employ DT Swiss' internals, which, while making sense from a manufacturing and business standpoint, does severely limit how many riders can use the Shark 10-Tooth Cluster.
Pinkbike's Take: | The Shark 10-Tooth Cluster could make more sense on your bike than you might first suspect, but riders should consider a different sized chainring, or even the larger Shark cog and Shark Cage, to get the most out of the system. - Mike Levy |
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Lo and behold, 24 hours later the article still has the same error in it...
(yeah I know it's sarcasm, but still...)
Shark 50t: $125
Shark 10t: $45
Total: $320
Eagle cassette: $420
@DandelionDan the 10t requires the mini driver at $40...still cheaper though I suspect the weight of the One Up/ XT setup will be considerably heavier.
XT is definitely closer to $150 CDN than the $65 online price you're talking about. Oh and LOL @ Eagle chain.
I'd rather go with an X.01 cassette and add a 45/46t cog.
With the eagle, one needs new chain, shifter, derailleur, and 12x specific chainring.
CTDchris has a point though. There are other options. The XT cassette starts at over 400grams.
Shark 50t: $125
Shark 10t: $45 + derail hanger is up over 500g?
e13 9-46 cassette 349 (retail) street ?
280 grams
Old X01, X11 11 speed models can be found for $220 street + 46t gets one in the same basic area(close enough).
(or GX1 + big ring)
If the e13 cassette comes down in price it'll definitely give the other a run for the money.
*Edit: kyle26354 beat me to it..
I assume that there is inefficiency in 'bending' the chain, so the tighter radius of the smaller cog means more inefficiency? Obviously there are numerous variables we can't know like how dirty/lubed the chain is, but what kind of additional inefficiencies are we looking at? 5%?
However, playing devil's advocate this will save you a few grams compared to a larger cassette (for a given range) so that *may* reduce the effect a fraction...? I know the numbers are small, but then so is the total effect on efficiency in the grand scheme of things...
I remember reading years ago about how inefficient and draggy gearhubs are and thinking "Why would anyone want one?". Then I actually got my hands on a really great gearhub... This was the beginning of me being skeptical of other peoples' skepticism. Now I try things for myself and make up my own mind instead. Maybe you DO have an 11% frictional loss with the smaller cogs, but I'm just not convinced that it matters.
Personally I do notice the difference between a clean and lubed chain (that says a lot about how often I clean it properly that it gets that bad!) so drag and inefficiency do matter. However, a 9 tooth sprocket is only going to be for going downhill fast where I've no doubt I'd never notice it. I'm not sure if I'd want that on an uphill though, hence why I'm on the fence with gearbox bikes that has 'inefficiency' across the range.
I'll hold my hand up that I've never had the opportunity to ride a gearbox bike though, so could be completely wrong...
@clownpnd Your BMX is also a single speed, with greater chain wrap, & no derailleur controlled slack, which helps with that 9t. you also aren't generally pedaling it sitting down, which is when you would notice the pulse-ey feel of a cog that small, due to polygon effect, which was why SRAM stayed with 10t (if you go look at XX1 release articles, they talk about testing a 9t & deciding against it for these reasons.)
Some people get a lot of satisfaction over arguing over how many angels can dance on the head of a pin....
Independently of your feelings friction is really bigger and it influence on your chain and actually chainring itself as a result they don't serve as long as they could. So you can answer "It doesn't matter. I can buy myself a chain every day.". And actually a agree. Chains are really cheap nowadays and buying them is not an issue.
But on my transmission I have only those gears I use really often and I made my chainline in such way that bending of my chain while my regular riding is minimal. So I change chain not often. Why do I have this kind of transmission when chains are cheap? Well I don't actually know... The first reason is because it is very convenient for me in use. And the second is maybe when I know that there is bigger friction in my transmission my imagination starting to show me a pictures of damaged metal and I become nervous
My bmx and many bmx run a half link chain, or a directional chain with extra machining to get the chain to go around the 9T driver.
Rotational moments and linear forces need to be evaluated separately. The chain tension pulls horizontally on the cassette, causing a rotational moment about the wheel's axle *and* a horizontal force that tries to pull the whole wheel towards the BB.
The rotational moment is opposed by all kind of stuff like rolling resistance, but is still large enough to overcome these opposing rotational moments and spin the wheel. So that's a very quick evaluation of the rotational stuff, but there's still that horizontal force that needs balancing, otherwise, as said earlier, the wheel will be pulled towards the BB. The chainstays, provide a horizontal force, equal and opposite to the chain tension, meaning the overall horizontal force is reduced to zero and the wheel is kept safely in the dropouts, at the correct distance from the BB.
Basically, you're always pulling on the axle with a force roughly equal to the chain tension, no matter which sprocket you're in.
Anyway, if we're talking efficiency, you'll need to consider power and energy, rather than just looking directly at the forces themselves. The idea is that energy that should be propelling you forwards is instead consumed overcoming the resisting friction as the the chain bends around a small radius and the link plates slide over each other. The tighter the radius, the more sliding, so more energy is lost to friction, leading to drivetrain inefficiencies.
Like I said, it'd be much clearer with diagrams. I feel like no-one will read this :s
Another factor that could increase efficiency with a small rear cog would be to shorten tooth/link length to limit angular pull from the chain (90 degrees from the chain to the instant centre [axle] being most efficient), however, without doing the maths, I believe this would only be a minor factor. @foghorn1 is also right in that the increased axial load of a smaller chain ring will increase bearing stress/wear/vibration etc. All this said though, someone would actually have to do the maths to work out the smallest chainring size you can go to before it becomes really inefficient, I suspect 9T or lower is really where you would start seeing a negative impact.
wrap a length of chain around a cassette sprocket, lie the arrangement on a smooth, low friction surface and pull on the chain - the sprocket will both rotate *and* slide across the surface in the direction of pull. That's what I mean - the chainstays have to provide a linear force, roughly equal and opposite to the chain tension, to prevent that translation/ sliding, to prevent the wheel being pulled towards the chainstays. That linear force does nothing to affect the wheel's rotation, because those two types of force component are separate.
You're totally on the money with the shorter chain links being more efficient on smaller sprockets. I reckon you're right about the modest potential gains too. A new hyper-efficient, "metric" chain standard, anyone? :p
That explanation's no fun though, so let's all put on tinfoil hats and that Richie Rude and T-Mo were only so dominant because they had Shimano's super-efficient, slick and speedy 11T sprockets, while everyone else was pissing into the wind on Sram's 10Ts :p
But back to a bike frame, if the dropout holds the axle from moving, the chain pull force has to go somewhere, and will rotate the wheel. This concept is the same reason why brake-jack arms work, a wheel rotates... The brake comes on, and the the forces get converted to linear movement and the suspension will compress unless a brake-arm or linkage system directs these forces into the frame, rotational energy will also be converted to heat, noise and vibration too. Please don't try to correct people when you're so far wrong
Let's take a step back, then, and I'll have another go at arguing my point, from the beginning.
My initial problem with your first post was this stuff:
"if you ran the chain... in-line to the centre of the rear axle so that it pulled directly on the axle, it would not rotate the wheel at all, you could apply pulling force on the chain, but the energy would simply be counteracted by the frame holding the axle... 9-10 tooth cogs are potentially still too close to the axles centre and you may actually be wasting pedalling energy into the frame... as your pedalling force will more greatly be trying to dislodge the axle rather than rotate the wheel"
which seems to suggest that the sprocket diameter affects the magnitude of the force being exerted on the frame, in this case the dropouts, and therefore how much pedalling energy is wasted deforming the frame, leading to the conclusion that smaller sprockets exert more force on the frame and so waste more energy. I don't believe this is right.
Here's a very simple diagram of the chain tension and its components I scribbled out:
tinyurl.com/joylkd9
Obviously, in a real-life situation there's a bit more going on and there are things to consider like the way chain tension wouldn't just be horizontal, but none of that changes the underlying principle so I've kept it simple.
You can see that the force the frame is having to exert in reaction to pedalling to keep the wheel held in the dropouts, N, is entirely independent of the sprocket diameter. Therefore, the pedalling energy wasted during the exertion of forces by the wheel into the frame/ dropouts depends only on, f, the chain tension, which is why your explanation of why different diameter sprockets lead to energy wastage and inefficiency is wrong.
As I said, the explanation that I accept is that smaller sprockets force the chain links to undergo a greater angle of rotation as they mesh with the sprocket teeth, which means more work is being done to overcome friction between the link plates and also between the chain and sprocket, which reduces the energy available to drive wheel rotation, lowering efficiency.
With 2*11 I've got a 620% gear range and use the whole spread most weekends.
I see if you replace your 29inch wheels w 26in you get a gear advantage for climbs too.
@benviebikes: my left thumb controls my seat post. maybe in the future it will adjust my suspension. Being able to do this while riding full beans is totally worth the benefit over any minor efficiency gain in a 2x10 setup
Shark 50t: $125 / adds 89g
Shark 10t: $45 / no weight change
MiniDriver: $40 / no weight change
Total: $275 / 522 grams
Not bad at all since an X01 cassette is approximately $300. The X01/XX1 cassette weight is ~270g so thats about ~0.5 lbs more than the XT/OneUP 10-50t. Sram eagle costs $360 so its out of the conversation. If you don't care about weight this is the way to go. Even if you need to buy everything all over again is still cheaper. If you pair an XTR derailleur with OneUP you will be happy only if you don't care about the extra 0.5 lbs.
And, by the way, I really love my OneUp 10 speed setup. This one just doesn't seem to have a point though.
I loved the one up 10spd stuff, it's what converted me to 1x drivetrain, but the weight of this is beginning to bother me. Hope cassette is 10-44 and similar weight to SRAM with a 10-48 on the way. 0.5lbs more than that for this and you could put your front mech and shifter back on and still save weight! I know there are other considerations with that, but I hope you see my point. There aren't many places on your bike where you can save 0.5lbs with no downsides. I think it was mentioned above but the new 11-46 m8000 cassette with one of these would be a good compromise IMO. No need for the cage or hoping up cog, but 10% higher gear top end. Just my 2p worth.
In the end prices are not so distants (german websites are a good help for that matter)
Give me a single-speed converter that works with XD driver!
www.pinkbike.com/photo/13913346