Chain drops w/ FSA 'Megatooth' chainring - options?

B

bdl

Squid
My son's Merida One-Forty 7.900 has a 1x11 setup with an FSA Afterburner 386 crank and 'megatooth' chain ring. The bike's only ~3-4 months old, and he's had issues since day one with chain drops, worsening over time as the chain ring wears. Adding a chainguard has helped a little but not solved the problem.

We're pretty much at the point of consigning the FSA chainring to the bin; but it seems that FSA's 3-bolt chainring is proprietary, as is the 'MegaExo' bottom bracket. So we're up to replace the whole front of the drive train :-(

Any suggestions for a cheaper way out of this?

Ben

PS: anyone interested in a slightly-used FSA crankset? :)
 
Last edited:
Jeffgre_6163

Jeffgre_6163

Likes Dirt
This may be a stupid question but you are running a clutch type derailleur aren't you"
I assume so since you said 1 x 11
 
W

will2

Likes Dirt
Sram yes? is your clutch tight? Do you have too much chain?

Even with an upper guide you are still having issues? That does seem odd, upload a few pics of the drivetrain in high and low gears, might help a few of the brains trust sort you out.
If you really need to start again at the front, your best best would be to get second set of cranks probably Shimano as they will get you best bang for buck and a BB to suit. Two options then either a new narrow wide ring. (absolute black are the cheapest from memory).
Or you could get a cheap full guide here in trading section and a cheap single ring to suit, you can get them for like $15. That would be total security.
 
B

bdl

Squid
Clutch derailleur: yes, it's a SRAM X01 11s. Seems to be working fine incl. clutch, has been given the all-clear by two LBSs.
Chain: the chain was too long out of the shop, with the derailleur actually being just slack at the end of its travel; the #2 LBS pulled a link with a confident "that'll be the problem"; except it wasn't; it was possibly better but still dropped.

Guards: the bike doesn't have ISCG mounts, so we're kind of limited on chain guards (right? happy to hear otherwise...); we fitted a E 13 TRS+ ST Chain Guide but the chain still comes off (and now gets stuck between the guard and ring...).

Re. speaking to LBS #1: they're inconvenient to get to, and surprisingly to me they can't / won't take the bike out for a test run - so it would have been a number of trips back and forth with them tweaking something and us testing the result. I gave up on that after the first iteration. Would've been a different story if they actually could identify a real problem, but "couldn't see any problem but we twiddled something to see if it helps" doesn't gel with me. Well, not when an hour round-trip's involved.

I've done a fair bit more reading, and have almost decided to ditch the FSA entirely and go with a SRAM GX - mainly on recommendation of LBS #2.

Will take some drivetrain pics with decent light in the morning... it all "looks fine" to my inexperienced eye, would love to see if anyone can spot a problem!
 
B

bdl

Squid
To close this out - we bought a SRAM GX-1400 crankset (+ bottom bracket), and so far it's been great. No chain drops on the 100% SRAM drivetrain so far, which is a huge improvement over the FSA.

(sorry about not providing photos - my son had disassembled the FSA crank to check dimensions/etc, and it never went back on)
 
B

bdl

Squid
Six-ish months later, not a single chain drop on the SRAM crankset. Chalk and cheese compared to the FSA.

I also note that Merida have ditched the FSA on the 2016 model in favour of the SRAM.
 
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