Rotor present a 1×13 drivetrain – 13 gears with a 520% range!
That was quick! Not too long ago the two shifting giants introduced their latest 1×12 drivetrain and now Spanish underdog Rotor has just dropped a bombshell with a new 1×13 drivetrain with a 520% gear-range. But that’s not all! The shifters rely on hydraulics rather than on a classic cable system.
Rotor is familiar with electronic circuit components. The Spanish brand became popular with its oval chainrings and has been offering a hydraulic groupset for some time – you might have heard of the UNO racing groupset. Using all of the knowledge they acquired while developing the UNO model the Spaniards have now created a brand new 13 speed drivetrain.
This wasn’t just designed to be used with road and gravel bikes but also mountain bikes — a number of different cassettes and shifters make this possible. All of the drivetrain-versions share same rear-derailleur.
Rotor 1×13 M1TB cassettes
Rotor offers two cassette options for mountain bikes. A finely graded 10-46 version and a 10-52 model with an incredible 520% gear range. The cassette consists of two parts with seven steel sprockets in the higher gears and six aluminium sprockets in the lower range. Despite the incremented gear ratio the cassette is up to 30 g lighter than any high-end cassette from SRAM or Shimano — Rotor claims.
The rear derailleur on Rotor’s 1×13 group set
Just by looking at Rotor’s new rear-derailleur you can tell that it’s different from everything else you’ve ever seen on a mountain bike. The hydraulic unit sits in the large box behind the parallelogram. Unlike other drivetrains the indexing of the individual gear steps happens in the actual derailleur. A pin in the rear-derailleur allows you to manually lock it into any gear in case you’re stuck with a mechanical defect in the hydraulic system.
Rotor’s 1×13 shifter
The shifter might be the most understated part of the entire Rotor 1×13 groupset. Since Rotor got rid of the lever ratchet the system is super-minimalistic and allows you to shift either a single gear or a number of gears in one go.
Special hubs for Rotor’s 1×13 drivetrain
This is probably the biggest drawback of Rotor’s new 1×13 drivetrain: the cassette only works with Rotor’s own hubs. The reason? There is not enough space on a standard Shimano HG freewheel body, so to accommodate the 13th sprocket the freehub body is moved further inwards. Logically this causes the spoke angle to steepen slightly – it’s still uncertain how this will affect the stiffness and stability of the rear wheel.
Prices and availability for Rotor’s 1×13 drivetrain
Rotor’s new drivetrain should be available from mid 2019 and will be in the same price range as its SRAM and Shimano equivalents.
Our take on Rotor’s new 1×13 drivetrain
Straight away Rotor’s new 1×13 groupset looks like a real revolution. More gears, more range, less weight and all of it accompanied by a smooth hydraulic shifting system. The concept reflects Rotor’s superb know-how. However we still have to wait a little while before we can put the drivetrain through its paces in a practical test — how good is the damping and the clutch in the rear derailleur? How reliable is the hydraulic system? Perhaps Rotor’s 1×13 system is yet another solution to a problem that never existed. As far as we’re concerned we never thought that the gear steps on SRAM’s Eagle and Shimano’s XTR were too big or that the gear-range was too small. However we’re sure that Rotor will find many riders who will fall in love with their new drivetrain and forgive the fact that it’s not yet compatible with conventional hubs.
For more information, check out rotorbike.com
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