So around 6 months ago I was in need of a new chainring. I was searching all over the net for the best bang for the buck chainring. There are so many brands on the market; Dura-Ace, Sugino, FSA etc, but there was one chainring that had always taken my fancy.
Cycles Underground.These guys are an independent Aussie company that make a variety of products including Tools, Chainrings and Frame Building Parts. You've probably seen some of their products before in the form of "
Fyxomatosis Chainrings", which are essentially rebranded CU chainrings.
I don't really understand why people buy Fyxo chainrings when instead you could buy a
custom made chainring from one of 12 designs, with any tooth count, at any bcd, at 3mm or 4mm thickness, for a cheaper price, with free shipping! Fyxo chainrings are $89, CU chainrings are $70! I guess the only difference is some cleaver marketing by Andy including many pictures that have made its way into my "bike porn" folder.
So anyway, I pretty much knew exactly what I wanted. I was looking for a 49tooth chainring, 4mm thick plate using design 10.
I read this on their website:
To order simply contact us and give us your name (we like to be a little personal) and basically the sizes you are after.
eg. 42T, 130BCD, 1/8", 3mm plate, Design7, Polished finish single sideAnd so I sent them this email:
Hi, I was wondering if I could get a: 49T, 144BCD, 1/8", 4mm plate, Design10, Raw Finish. Thanks Prawi They replied within minutes, they pretty much said no probs, can I have your address and contact details. I replied, but never really heard back from them untill three days later when I came home and my chainring was sitting on my front porch before I had even payed for it!
Awesome. So I sent them email, and they said they were extremely busy and didn't get a chance to receive my payment. So I sent them the monies, and wha-lah time to put on my new chainring.
The first thing I noticed about this chainring was the thickness! 4mm, this is the beefiest chainring I have ever owned, the raw finish wasn't very "raw", it was nice and smooth and had a nice shine about it. No complaints in that department. So I went to put it on, and everything just went on nicely, there was a slight gap between the crank spiders and the chainring, ~0.5mm but I think this was part of the design process to accomodate slight descrepencies between different brands of cranks.
Next, time to take it for a spin. Wow, what can I say, suddenly my ride was dead silent and buttery smooth. Love at first ride. This is a truly quality item. Their cut is pretty unique, they claim to have a tooth profile with diameters a lot closer to the rollers on chains, which means they physically have more tooth than other brands which inevitably leads to a tighter fit minimising the chance for pre mature wearing of the chainring.
Now, from my experience, I don't really have any negatives to say about this product. I did quite a bit of research before choosing my product and I think the only thing that seperates a CU chainring to something like Dura-ace (which is more than double the price), would be material selection. Cu claim to use aluminium grade 5083, also known as armourplate. Their material selection is pretty unique, most higher end companies use 7075. So I think they chose 5083 as it offers the highest tensile strength without any additional costly processes such as heat treatment. Which is fair enough because 7075 aluminium alone is around 5 times the price of 5083. Material selection alone does not make a good chainring, to me, a rounder, longer lasting chainring is more important to whether it is 5083 or 7075. If its made out of the best material but isn't round, then it would be shit! Catch my drift? Cycles Underground claim to have one of the roundest chainrings on the market, and I'll take their word for it!
So I think I'll leave it at that because the 5083 vs 7075 debate can go on all day.. google it!
Although I don't have any personal negatives I have read complaints about their customer service. I had no problems at all, but because they are a relatively small company, I'm guessing they're pretty busy and must have a pretty large inbox. If you're interested in getting a product from them it would probably be best if you went straight to the point and asked them exactly what you want along with your contact details and address. That way, at least they'll know you're not just sending an email to waste their time.
6 months on, the chainring still feels the same as the day I put it on, I look forward to putting many thousands of miles onto it.
Overall I'd rate my Cycles Underground chainring 10/10.
