Postby Stoo » Wed Feb 08, 2012 10:18 pm
i have di2.
Weight.
Negligible, Loose a few grams of body fat to compensate if its really an issue.
I understand that there are many who watch every gram of weight on the bike like a hawk but in the end the bike only represents a small portion of the total "bike and rider" package. I've weighed myself in the morning and in the evening and have at times noticed a weight difference of a few kilo's (well i do like my food) over a 12 hour period. A few grams doesn't seem to be a big issue if i can vary a few kilo's in such a short time.....plus id rather have the energy to ride rather then miss out on a meal before a ride just to shave a few grams
Running out of battery?
If you can do 2500km in one go then i can see running out of power being a problem. if you ride 2500km without even noticing the various warning that will illuminate on the system then perhaps you problems may extend beyond just being cheezed of with a dead battery. I, about once a month, give my bike a good clean and check over. i also use this time to charge the battery which so i hear take about 2 hours to charge from flat......really less time then many mobile phones. my di2 equipped bike is just a weekender so i know that i do not do 2500km on it in one month and a charge of an hour would be plenty to keep it topped up.....if you could did that 2500km figure is a short time then i would assume you may spend more time cleaning and checking you bike....i would also imagine that charging the battery would just form part of you routine of bike maintenance. So for this reason i say....running out of battery.....i simply can't understand how that could happen.
Comfort
The hoods are a lot narrower then my Ultergra equipped bike....it may seem silly but riding on the hoods of my Di2 feels better then ridding on the ultergra. Also the button positions are located rights at the tips of where my fingers naturally fall, there's no fiddling around for the buttons (for me anyway....someone with meat-mits for hands may have a wee bit of trouble). Another handy thing is the whole breaking and changing gears at the same time on the same leaver becomes second nature....no effort at all.
Also I'm sure many would agree that the mech. dura-ace is a smooth system. i find the gear changes to be precise, quiet and efficient......now imagine all that with the effort of a mouse click. It really is that simple. Also the system can take a beating.....if you fanging hard up hill and you need to change gear....press that button, you won't miss a beat, it will do every thing for you.
Maintenance
It has crash protection where it will disengages the rear derailleurs servo to avoid serious damage should you take a fall. without knowing it all i believe this means it will kill the ability of the servo to hold a gear to let the rear derailleur arm move to absorb the impact as apposed to resist it(i imagine someone else can fill me in on this ). it also has a "reset" which will return the rear derailleurs servo to the last known settings / position before the fall. Handy providing you have not bent the jocky wheel arm......However you can also adjust your rear derailleur position on the fly with x15 0.3mm increments....takes a bit of practice but handy if you really need to move that chain 0.3mm to the left or right.
Auto trimming. Do i need to elaborate?
No cables, sure there's insulated wire but its not under constant tension so there's not need to adjust them to ensure smooth shifting.
Cost
I agree its costly but is not a throw away item. The way i look at it, i have a good group set that i can transfer from my current frame to another frame should i want to upgrade to a different bike.
General
When i started looking for a weekender i was not keen on the di2 as i though it would be just another thing to go wrong....however after ridding on the bike for the last 12 months i really would not want to go back to buying a bike with a mech setup. I plan to buy another bike, possibly next year and it will most likely have the ultegra Di2 setup because i really like it.
So to sum up of why Di2...because i want too.....i really need no other reason then that.
2004 Argon 18 Radon
2012 Argon 18 krypton
2010 Argon 18 Gallium Pro
2013 Argon 18 E-116