Up Grade or Not?

Braham Power has a full carbon Orbea Liege with Shimano Ultegra equipment which is a nice set up. His question is to do with up grading from Ultegra to Dura-Ace, he wants to know if it is worth it and would he notice the difference. We give him our opinion

Question: I ride an Orbea Liege (full carbon / Ultegra group set) is it worth upgrading the bike to full Dura Ace. I am a serious weekend rider, not a competitive cyclist though.
Can the expense be justified when measured against the change in performance?
I would appreciate your opinion on this.
Thanks
Braham.

Hi Braham,

Shimano Ultegra is, as you know, not the top of the Shimano range, which is Dura-Ace. Ultegra is good enough to race on, some smaller pro teams in Belgium use it only, because if they crash it’s not so expensive to replace as they don’t get given the equipment, like the big Pro-Tour teams. Shimano use lighter materials in the Dura-Ace bits and pieces, alloy instead of steel and titanium instead of alloy, this saves weight and some times makes the feel of the gear change a little smoother, but apart from that there really isn’t much difference between the two. If you look at the SRAM and Campagnolo group sets there is a big difference in weight and performance between their top and second group sets, with Shimano the Dura-Ace is lighter, but the performance is so similar that you should be happy with it. As it wears out then you could up grade as you go along, other wise I would stick with the Ultegra.

Dura-Ace on Orbea

Shimano Dura-Ace is nice and it’s lighter than Ultegra, but it works just the same. You would not feel the difference (I think) between the two group sets. So save your money for a lighter pair of wheels. Wheels are the best way to improve your bike; you don’t say which wheels you have now, check out the weight of yours and then find a lighter pair. You will notice a few grams on the wheels before you notice any weight saving on the other equipment.

Orbea with Ksyriums

So, what I say is be happy with your Shimano Ultegra, replace it with Shimano Dura-Ace as it wears out, but save your money for a new set of wheels, they will make a bigger difference than anything else you could buy.