SRAM GX AXS T-Type Derailleur [Rider Review]

Our "Rider Review" article series features the honest reviews from verified purchasers of Worldwide Cyclery. They contain the photos, thoughts, feedback & overall review you are looking for.

The SRAM GX Eagle T-Type AXS offers a whole new level of durability and crisp shifting all at a more budget friendly price point.  See what one of our customers thinks!

Overview

In 2021 I bought a used 2019 Cannondale Topstone Sora on Facebook Marketplace. I was looking to get more into gravel riding and the used Topstone was a great low-cost introduction. I slowly worked up my weekly mileage and eventually did The Last Best Ride race in Montana in summer 2023 on the Topstone and had a blast. I learned a ton about bikes over that ownership period. As an engineer, I wanted to understand not only how everything on a bike worked and what components were good, but I wanted to know WHY those components were good, and what quantifiable attributes made frames and components strong, reliable, and robust. Being told “company X is the best” wasn't enough.

After the race, I convinced myself it was time for an upgrade. The Topstone Sora had been through the wringer, and it was beginning to become the limiting factor (instead of me) on performance, comfort, and dependability. It did its job in getting me into gravel biking; it was time for something else that would allow me to push my skill, endurance, and comfort further. Over the next six months I compiled a mental list about what attributes I wanted my next bike to have.

The Criteria

Long story short, after narrowing it down to two contenders, I finally settled on the Fezzari Shafer during a Black Friday sale. The Shafer would come stock with SRAM Rival AXS components, which is a 1x system (no front derailleur). I liked this idea because it basically took out a failure mode compared to 2x systems. One less thing to break, rust, bend, and maintain. But, a few spreadsheets later, it became apparent that the hit I would take on gear range (compared to the Topstone) by moving to the 1x Rival was too great to ignore for my purposes. I ride in areas with lots of long, steep, and sustained climbs. I needed more range if I wanted to comfortably tackle the combination of terrain and distance that I was aspiring to. A smaller chainring wouldn't have addressed it; I wanted the range that only a cassette (on a 1x system) can address that would allow me to do both faster road rides and slower hill climbs. Thankfully, SRAM’s AXS family makes it super easy to mix and match (most things); moving to a 10-52T AXS derailleur would fix the range issue and would be compatible with the Shafers existing AXS shifters. Next question: Eagle Drivetrain or Eagle Transmission? Both could give me a 520% range. Both systems would be compatible with the Shafer’s Rival chainring, so that wasn't a determining factor; I needed to replace the chain, derailleur, and cassette either way. The XDR hub could also stay, just with the addition of a 1.85mm spacer. A few things steered me towards the Transmission over the Drivetrain: (1) the cost between the two was pretty similar, but I happened to find a great deal on a new-but-no-packaging GX Transmission derailleur at Worldwide Cycles, (2) the Transmission did away with the derailleur hanger, and (3) the mechanical design of the Transmission was clearly made to be modular, repairable, and easily installable. Points (2) and (3) were huge for me, and (1) pushed it over the edge. Perhaps counterintuitively (since it is pretty high-tech as derailleurs go), the Transmission reduces the number of parts and complexity in the system, and likewise made it more robust to failure and easier to maintain. That is what I wanted on a bike that I intended to keep for a long time. The Transmission won this argument. Now, which Transmission? I went with GX because it was the cheapest, and there weren't many obvious (and meaningful) performance gains from the other Transmission models besides weight, which I didn't really value much. I wanted to maximize the performance-per-dollar and robustness-per-dollar.

The Build

I got the Shafer and started installing everything right away. Fezzari is direct-to-consumer, so everything comes partially constructed in a box and I needed to install some of the drivetrain myself. I started to install the Rival components first before I moved to the GX ones, just so I could ride it around a bit and make sure the bike fit well. But, a defective derailleur hanger broke at ~75% of the recommended torque (not my or Fezzari’s fault, and their top-notch customer service sent me a replacement hanger immediately). For the first ~0.148 seconds after hearing the “snap,” thoughts of being forced to wait weeks to ride my new bike flooded my head, along with the adrenaline from hearing a “snap,” regardless of what it was from, near a carbon frame. Thankfully, after that initial terror, I remembered that I already had my SRAM GX Eagle T-Type AXS Rear Derailleur from Worldwide Cyclery, plus a hot-waxed T-type chain and 10-52T GX T-type cassette, and they didn't need the hanger! I switched gears (ha, ha) immediately. I opened the SRAM Transmission installation tutorial on YouTube that I had bookmarked weeks ago and I went through the process step by step, pausing the video briefly after each step. Another beautiful thing about the Transmission - there aren't that many steps! You really don’t need to be a bike mechanic to install it, as long as you have a few basic tools like a torque wrench, hex tools, cassette tools, some grease, and YouTube. Plus, the derailleur is mounted directly to the frame (keep in mind, you need a UDH compatible frame to do this), and consequently there are no additional knobs or cables to adjust once the derailleur is set up (electronic “micro-adjustments'' are available if you want to improve shifting to one side of the gear range or the other). My adrenaline subsided, the Transmission was installed, and I was ready to ride.

The Ride

Jeez, that thing is smooth. Shifting is effortless and quiet in all terrain and strain scenarios, and I have MORE range than my Topstone Sora. I am able to tackle the same hills that I had done before, just now a little easier, and I have yet to spin out on the downhills (my comfort at high speeds on a relatively new bike is still the limiting factor). Yes, that gear range is now “locked in” as long as I stay with that 10-52T cassette, but the nature of the 1x system allows me to easily (and at a pretty low marginal cost) move that gear range around towards more uphill- or downhill-friendly zones in the future by changing out the chainring. Modularity, adaptability, and robustness for the win.

Final Thoughts

One criticism I had heard about the Transmission quite a bit before buying was people not liking the size of the “skips” between gears, or the time delay between button-press and gear-shifts. While recognizing this as a valid concern, it has not bothered me at all. I probably wouldn't have given it a second thought if not for reading about it on a few Facebook posts ahead of time. The amount that you may notice this factor will depend on your riding style, your endurance, what bike drivetrain you are coming from, and what type of terrain you are used to. While this may not be a completely satisfactory answer, the only helpful thing I can say is that these were non-issues for me, moving from a mechanical 2x drivetrain. For my criteria on cost, riding topography, and ease of maintenance, moving to the GX Transmission was the right move for me. At the end of the day, the net price difference after buying the GX T-Type RD, cassette, and chain, and selling the same group of Rival components that came stock with the Shafer is only about $200; by my criteria, definitely worth it given the benefits described above. This step-change from my previous setup will allow me to continue growing as a cyclist and stay comfortable while exploring new areas.