I had a to get my shifter on my GR9 group replaced. 80 Designer store sent me another and I paid shipping. They had the typical timezone delay on responses.

i was thinking about the additional bar tape, but then I would end up covering the CR2032 battery port of the shifters.

On my other bike with Ultegra shifters, I did switch to a -17° stem and while that extended my reach slightly, it put less pressure on my grip position. Though I'm not sure if it would help since my main issue is slim grip design that's causing discomfort.

It's definitely concerning to hear about the ER9/X RDs just dying. By any chance do you have a bar code on your RD? Joe from China Cycling said it should say the manufacturing date. Reading the first 6 digits, mine says 250123. If that's dd/mm/yy, that means I have an RD from early last year. 

I'm not sure I would take the ER9 groupset as my travel bike either. Luckily I have other mechanical bikes for travel. I'm just wondering if there's a way we can narrow down the problematic groupsets or if they're all ticking time bombs!