This meant a whole drive train upgrade from my trusty X0 3x9 setup, which I ordered all online with the gripshifts. I ended up going for the XX rear derailleur, cranks and front derailleur with the 1080 cassette and 1091 hollow pin chain to seal the deal.
A week later I received my goodies and that evening I installed the drive train and shifters. I have done enough cable changes on my X0 9 speed gripshifts and got the cables through to the derailleur in no-time. The gripshifts and handlebars combines to form a unit that locks onto the handlebars with a lock ring before the shifter and a lock ring on the handlebar, torqued to 3Nm. Setting the derailleur were quite simple, with fine tuning taking a bit of time to get 100% right. I managed to get out on the trails on Saturday and Sunday to get a real feel for the new shifters.
The shifts are precise and crisp and the XX derailleur seem to respond to my small moves of the wrist almost telepathically. You get a very nice "click" as the gears shift, but the shifts are much lighter than what was the case with the previous generation. Dumping gears are even easier than before due to the ease of which the shifting is done. I have not done any accidental shifting, but have overshifted once or twice as the spacing between shifts are shorter than with the 9speed setup. The front shifts as easily as the rear, but SRAM did away with the "micro adjust" functionality they had with the 3speed front derailleur (essentially you are able to make small adjustments on the shifter barrel to accommodate small front adjustments required). I suspect that these adjustments are now judged to be superfluous as you now have only 2 options.
Another omission on the new shifters are number dials to indicate the gear you are currently riding. This is a small annoyance in the daytime as a quick glance or simply counting gear shifts will always help you to know which gear you're in. I like to train certain climbs in certain gear ratio's from time to time to gauge my form and will now have to get used to not having the gear displayed on the shifter as before. Night riding is also easier with knowing in which gear you are (especially on the front).
The integrated shifter / handlebar combo also means that I had to ditch my trusty Ergon grips and bar ends and probably means that I will have to revert to bar ends for the longer rides. Hopefully SRAM or Ergon will come up with an after-market grip with a bit of a bar end as it feels wrong to destroy the classic look of the shifter/handlebar with bar ends at this stage.
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