Anyone running bigger than 32 on the rear with a 105 GS rear derailleur? I know Shimano says 32 tooth max, but they're usually pretty conservative. I'd like to get a little bit lower gear and an 11x36 would be great if the derailleur can handle it.
Some bikes might be able to sneak an 11x34 or 11x36 depending on the individual bike. I ran an 11x40 with a short cage 105 in a 1x configuration for a long time WITH a Wolf Tooth Roadlink. The limiting factor becomes the derailleurs ability to manage the amount of chain needed for a 2x system and huge cassette. "Chain wrap capacity" is pretty hard to cheat. The Roadlink is the easy way to cheat max tooth size. I have run that on two different bikes and a Goatlink on a mountain bike. Never had a shifting problem.
I have a Shimano 105 5800 GS RD on my Norco Search XR steel 105. I replaced the 11-32 with an 11-34, with the stock Praxis Alba 48/32. no issues at all.
I ran 11-36 on my 105 2x for 2 years with zero issues, then started having serious shifting problems. I found out that doing this wears out the derailleur spring much faster than normal. Replaced and now run with wolfftooth roadlink. All good now.
I just put a Sunrace 11-36 on my Trek Checkpoint with Shimano 105 RD 5800 GS and everything seems to work fine. This is a 2X setup with 50/34 compact crank. I wound the B screw in and that helped.
BubbaS wrote:I just put a Sunrace 11-36 on my Trek Checkpoint with Shimano 105 RD 5800 GS and everything seems to work fine. This is a 2X setup with 50/34 compact crank. I wound the B screw in and that helped.
BS
Good to know. That's my crank and rear derailleur, so I will probably give it a shot.
