Hey everyone,
last year I was happy with a wheelset from XMCS, so I was excited to try their new carbon crankset. I bought the 165mm crankset with a titanium spindle, a carbon spider, and 52x36 chainrings and installed it on August 15th.
During the install, I immediately ran into a major issue: the chainrings aren't perfectly straight. They have a noticeable wobble, no matter how I mount them (see also
Had some challenges setting setting the front derailleur up.
). This made proper alignment extremely difficult and prevented me from following the standard Shimano setup procedure for the front derailleur. I documented the issues in some videos:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLpOdLtd9--n6iJWOi2Rnggwd_eTDubUagI was able to get around the problem by setting up the derailleur so the chainrings wouldn't touch it while I was pedaling, but this is a major hassle. There's only a tiny sweet spot for the adjustment, making the setup process a huge pain.
I reached out to Peter at XMCS directly to report the issue. He advised me to discuss it here on the forums. So, here I am.
To figure out what was wrong, I tested the crankset with a set of Rotor chainrings. The wobble disappeared. This confirmed that the crankset itself and the spider are fine; the issue is with the chainrings themselves.
The chainrings feels like a "beta test" product. I expected much higher quality. If you're considering buying this crankset with the chainrings, I'd advise caution. You might end up with the same frustrating experience I've had.
I hope this helps!