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11 SRAM Red eTap road bikes Oct 201810 SRAM Red eTap road bikes
With its lack of wires and no need to hide a battery somewhere, SRAM's eTap electronic shifting has been a big hit among bike manufacturers. Almost every bike maker has at least one eTap bike at the top of its range. Let's take a look at some of them.
Manufacturers like eTap because building a bike is easy, with no wires to thread through the frame, and it also cuts down the build time; riders like its performance and the appearance.
It seems very likely that SRAM is about to announce an updated version of eTap. Twelve-speed prototypes have been spotted at races, and SRAM has invited journalists to a product launch in January.
In this guide we're looking at rim-braked bikes.
BMC Teammachine SLR01 TWO 2019 — £7,500
For this go-faster Swiss gem, BMC has paired the SRAM eTap shifting with DT Swiss PRC 1400 Spline carbon wheels and the rarely-seen SRAM 900 direct-mount brakes. While BMC has softened the edges of its roadmachine bikes, the teammachines are still unabashed race bikes. If you can't win races or set sportive personal bests on this, it's not the bike's fault.
Cannondale SuperSix Evo Red eTap 2019 — £4,800
The excellent SuperSix Evo (you can read our review of the Hi-Mod version here) is being offered with SRAM’s eTap groupset in a £5k build that also includes Cannondale’s own Hollowgram Si carbon clincher wheels and the company’s own finishing kit.
Merida Scultura 9000-E — £7,200
Given Merida's design aim of extreme low weight for the top model of Scultura frame, it's not surprising there's a SRAM eTap edition of this bike. Merida rounds out the set-up with Fulcrum Quattro carbon wheels for a claimed weight of just 6.45kg.
Canyon Ultimate CF Evo 10.0 Ltd — £11,799
There's a Spinal Tap 'none more black' gag begging to be made about the Canyon Ultimate CF Evo 10.0, Canyon's money-no-object ultralight flagship. Its stratospheric price tag comes in part from the inclusion of components like Lightweight Meilenstein clincher wheels and THM-Carbones Clavicula M³ SRM powermeter crank, and the rest from the new, stronger carbon fibre used in the frame.
If that has your wallet quivering with fear, Canyon also offers the £2,699 Canyon Ultimate CF SL 9.0, which is currently the least expensive eTap bike available. At two and a half grand it's still a long way from cheap, but the combination of the Ultimate CF SL's superb frame and eTap shifting is compelling. (Hat-tip to commenter rcdavies who reminded us that Canyon had a wallet-friendly offering.)
Bianchi Oltre XR4 — £9,700
Bianchi's CounterVail frame technology is arguably the most advanced comfort enhancement in carbon-fibre frames, and it's a feature of the Oltre XR4 along with Fulcrum Racing Zero carbon wheels and Vittoria's highly-regarded Corsa G+ Isotech graphene tyres. Not light or expensive enough for you? Bianchi also offers an eTap build of the ultralight Specialissima for £9,200.
Boardman SLR Endurance 9.9 — £4,770
Boardman was among the first bike brands to announce an eTap-equipped model for 2016, and while the SLR Endurance carbon frame still has all the holes for a conventional groupset, there are plans for one with fewer holes in the future. Like Raleigh, Boardman also goes for Zipp 202 wheels and Zipp handlebar and stem.
Specialized Tarmac S-Works eTap — £6,250-£7,750
Because eTap is wireless it makes the traditional internal cable routing ports on a frame redundant, but so far few manufacturers have produced frames without holes. Step forward Specialized which has produced a version of its S-Works Tarmac frame for electronic groupsets, cutting down the number of holes in the frame.
This is a 2017 model, but it's still available. For 2018, Specialized's eTap-equipped bikes — S-Works editions of the Venge, Ruby and Roubaix — all have disc brakes.
>>Read more: First look — Specialized 2017 road bike range
Giant TCR Advanced SL 0 Red eTap — £5,748.99
Giant has two rim-braked eTap bikes in its 2018 range, this and the women's Liv Langma Advanced SL 0 which is essentially the same bike but in a women-specific configuration. Both models come with SRAM's Quark crank power meter, a spec combination that seems to be a bit of a mini-trend this year.
There are also several disc-braked eTap bikes in the Giant range, as the company has gone big with disks for 2018, speccing them on almost all of its Propel aero bikes.
>>Read more: Your complete guide to Giant's 2018 road bike range
Trek Madone 9.9 Project One — £9,950
Trek doesn't have an eTap bike in its 2018 range, but if you want one of Wisconsin's finest with wireless shifting there's a loophole: Project One custom bikes. It's not a cheap option though.
Orbea Orca M11i Pro — £5,081.48
Orbea has several eTap bikes of which this is the most affordable by some margin. The Orca is the company’s race bike, it’s been constantly refined and honed over the past 10 years, and is specced here with SRAM Red eTap, Vision Trimax 30 Clincher wheels and Vittoria Rubino Pro tyres.
Rose X-Lite Six — £3,447.85
Rose has several offerings with eTap, most of them with disc brakes; this seems to be the only bike in the range with eTap and SRAM's excellent Red rim brakes. Rose claims a very impressive 6.1kg weight, without pedals.
The neat thing about buying a Rose is that you can customise the specification of the bike using its easy online configurator, so you could change the wheels, handlebar, tyres etc.
Will your next bike be one of these?
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Road.cc buyer's guides are maintained and updated by John Stevenson. Email John with comments, corrections or queries.
David worked on the road.cc tech team from 2012-2020. Previously he was editor of Bikemagic.com and before that staff writer at RCUK. He's a seasoned cyclist of all disciplines, from road to mountain biking, touring to cyclo-cross, he only wishes he had time to ride them all. He's mildly competitive, though he'll never admit it, and is a frequent road racer but is too lazy to do really well. He currently resides in the Cotswolds, and you can now find him over on his own YouTube channel David Arthur - Just Ride Bikes.
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22 comments
“OOPS: "Manufacturers like eTap", Would you say a mnufacturer like Focus? instead of a mnufacturer like Ford.”
In this context, yes - as they mean that cycle manufacturers have a preference for this groupset. It’s not referring to the manufacturer of the groupset.
OOPS: "Manufacturers like eTap", Would you say a mnufacturer like Focus? instead of a mnufacturer like Ford.
Strikes me as a lot of money to avoid two cables.
this talk of simplicity by not having cable holes or guides amuses me, when a whole load of electronic complexity is introduced with motors, batteries,broadcasters receivers etc lol!
I got an Enigma Evade around new yesr, with no holes for cables, and just a simple external guide for the rear brake. Beautiful and simple beyond words.
Generally agree with some comments about customisability with changers, although I'm perfectly happy with right=up and left =down (gear not block), totally intuitive.
For info, I have two additional blips positioned under the bars where I usually hold them on hills. I can change gear while on the tops, brilliant. In my own special use case I did consider swapping the blips over so I had a downshift on the right as well as an upshift lever on the right. This is because I cycle every day for a short distance from my local Tesco/Sainsbury to home holding a bag in my left hand, so being able to change up and down with just my right hand would be useful. Difficult to achieve though without exposing blip cable.
The non S-Works Tarmac Expert eTap is currently on sale in a few medium to large sizes for £3500 and it's in the second best bike colour ever!
https://www.specializedconceptstore.co.uk/product/6181/2017-tarmac-exper...
No discs and cheap wheels! The disc brake thing may be personal (i'm never buying rim brakes again), but I can't get over people selling £3k++ bikes with cheap shallow wheels.
The frame looks nice though I'll admit
They're normally selling it for £5k!
Mason Cycles do a lovely Definition with eTap https://masoncycles.cc/products/definition-red-etap
....and how long before Shimano and Campagnolo go wireless. Holes in frames will be a thing of the past (for gears at least, until we get wireless braking)
Can't help thinking that if you're going wireless you really have to have a frame without any surplus cable stops, holes etc. And if you're spending nearly £1800 on the groupset you really should be having a custom frame... Etap and titanium looks just right.
Surprised the Canyon Ultimate CF SLX 9.0 SL doesn't make the list at £4,499
https://www.canyon.com/en-gb/road/ultimate/2017/ultimate-cf-slx-9-0-sl.html
Would be more attractive if the paddles could be customised. To me, the shifting would be more intuitive if the paddles pushed the chain in the direction of the push. Others may prefer it as it is. Fine. Give us the customisation!
I totally agree with you. What sort of a mentalist would have it the other way? There probably is an easy way of swapping these around. Any tech geeks out there know if it's possible?
If you mean you want your right hand pushing the lever inward would result in moving the chain inward, that would then flip the logic on the other side where your left hand pushing the lever inward would result in moving the chain outward. Zero sum gain, from a certain persepective.
It's like the argument of right or left handed operation of the front brake. If you've always ridden right handed front braked bikes, that is normal to you.
What do you mean: 'moving the chain inward'? What sunnyape is saying and I'm agreeing with is that the left hand pushing the lever would push the chain away from your hand (into a harder gear) and the right hand pushing the lever would push the chain away from your hand (into an easier gear). At present pushing the left lever results in the chain coming towards your left hand and vice versa. This just seems bonkers.
The brake analogy doesn't work.
I think that you're over thinking it, when you use the levers it feels as natural as can be. After all you're not really pushing like you do on manual levers, you're just tapping them.
Agree with PaulBox. eTap on my 'travel bike'. Very intuitive after an extremely short while. Back home on my smoother di2 [7970 10sp] - still miss shifting a week later. I feel another upgrade lurking.
I'd get the holes - obviously a frame with holes will be lighter due to less material being used.
Actually I'd be nervous buying a bike without the option to switch groupsets at some point in the future. If you've got a matt black frame a bit of electrical tape makes the existing cable holes almost invisible to the naked eye anyway.
I realise you were joking, but purely as a bit of geeky info, putting a hole in a carbon frame for a cable or bottle boss or similiar actually ADDs weight. Yeah, I know, doesn't make sense, until you understand that they have to add material around the hole, normally out of a stiffer and heavier carbon, in order to ensure that making a hole doesn't weaken a frame. The extra strengthening material easily weighs more than the material removed to make the hole in the first place.
If they haven't needed to add the extra material, the frame is overbuilt in the first place.
Colnago will build you a custom C60/V1-R frame for Etap with no cable holes
You can even specify if you want disc or caliper brakes
Stinner do a custom build one as well. Rides like a dream!
IMG_6715.JPG
Focus Paralane has an e-tap version. And disc brakes.