Thanks to everyone for your input...the reason for asking if you hadn't figured out....I'm looking to replace my cassette(need to not want to) and before I bought a new I thought I'd get some gearing insight
To 34t or not to 34t The bigger you are and the older your knees get, the more the 34t will become your friend... Along with Twinkies.
Are you riding a hardtail or FS? You can get away with a smaller cassette on a hardtail 'cuz you can stand up on the steep climbs. I put an 11-34 on my FS to take pressure off my knees since I can't stand up on the climbs.
Without reading every post, I offer a challenge, of Ten dollars, its all I have, to be able to tell me what tooth granny gear I will install on your bike simply by going for a ride. In other words, I will install a cassette on your bike, you tell me what the biggest gear is. My bet is that I could install a cassette with a 32, and tell you its a 34, and you wont know the differnce. P.S. I run an 11/32 Sram
So basically what you're saying is that you'll put a cassette on my bike for 10 bucks? :lol: All kidding aside, I tend to think you're probably correct in that the difference would be hard to discern by the average rider.
Ha, no... Eventually I would be outting your stuff back on!!! Seriously though, mIf you had a 32, and you were told its a 34. your not going to notice, Its like syaing you can tell teh differnce between 170 and 175 cranks. I did bet a guy once about that, he told me he could absolutly tell a difference in power and clearance in cranks length. So I set his bike up, had him ride, and wanted him to tell me what cranks I put on without him looking, ha came back dead sure they were 175, seeing how he had plenty of power to climb and was smacking the pedals on rocks. Funny part is, I put a 175 on the non drive, and a 170 on the drive!!! He couldnt belive it.
