One thing to consider is that the Team (and Pro) uses the BB30 while the Comp uses a standard British BB shell which gives more options if you need to replace parts. My limited t'internet research indicated that BB30 BBs tend to creak more in the wet (may be wrong 't'is only t'internet). Then again, saying that the comp did have a creak which caused me to reinstall everything anyway - it is now gone after the last CX raceAndrewBurns wrote:I've never used SRAM stuff, how does Force compare to Apex? I don't give a damn about it being a few grams less, but does it last longer or work more reliably? Being a commuter it's going to get rained on and used a lot, if the extra money was going to actually give an increase in life or time between maintenance it would be worth it...
.I am having shifting problems at the moment, probably just need new outer cables and maybe a new cassette, but until I have actually had a proper look at it (difficult with a 4 month year old baby) I can't say for certain. However, it has been through three CX races, including two with a lot of mud and two stacks (one of which was on tarmac) which both bent the rear derailleur hanger. Soooo... not unexpected.
Also one thing to consider is that I got the comp without paying any tax or duty because I had a 20% off ribble voucher which pushed it under $1000, so it was actually even more cheaper - to the point I could have probably have ordered a better groupo from ribble as well and still been quids in.
Anyway... waffle waffle. Sorry
.I'm of the opinion that you can replace an entire sora groupo pretty cheaply and experience has told me I break stuff through stacks, even while commuting (or taking a shimano shifter apart because a cable snapped inside it. Simonn, you silly silly man) more than have to worry about wearing stuff out. The odd cheapo groupset misshift makes no difference on a commute, like it would do road racing. Mud makes even the best shifters very average for shifting... then again 2 out of 3 races I've bent the hangar too anyway LOL.
The only problem I have come across with the BB5s is the stock pads. They only lasted a short time ~1500km for the front. I replaced them with some pads off ebay (I'll dig out the link if you want) which have been great (if very noisy in the wet, which is not such a bad thing). The rear still has the original pads, but I don't really use it. The main difference between the BB5 and BB7 is that on the 5 it only has a pad positioner thingy (dunno what to call it - the mechanism for positioning the distance between the pad and disc) for the wheel side pad. You can however adjust the other side with cable tension (seriously, not a big deal, I've done it on the side of the road).
