New commuter bike

Fian

I am considering replacing my Trek Valencia, which has served me well for many years. Currently it needs a new shifter, thanks to an encounter with a passenger side door, as well as probably new chainrings, cassette, cables and chain, so I expect replacement makes more sense than repairs. anyway the bike owers me nothing after 7 years of service or so.

I can get a canyon on the bike to work scheme.

I am thinking of this one:

https://www.canyon.com/en/urban/commuter/commuter-4-0.html

Belt drive, Hub gears, Hydraullic discs, Dynamo, decent price.

However I am also looking at some of the more expensive ones - e.g.:

https://www.canyon.com/en/urban/commuter/commuter-8-0.html

I am not terrible interested in having 11 speed on the commuter rather than 8 - my commute is pretty flat and I don't need a big gear range. I don't know much about the difference between the hub gears (Nexus vs alfine). I also know very little about the difference in the belt drives. I know the components in the more expensive one are the "best" I just don't know whether the components on the first linked one are decent. Would they be "Tiagra" level? This is intended to be a practical commuter, not a top end bike.

Would be grateful for any advice - particularly with regard to the difference in quality of the belt drives and hub gearing.Or anything else anyone wants to point out.

Would also be grateful if anyone knows what the "highest" gear ratio on the 4.0 one is. Trying to google that next.

thanks in advance.

saccades

Nexus is the same as the old alfine SG-500 (newer alfines have an uprated clutch mechanism), the 11 speed is oil filled as opposed to 8 speed grease. 8 speed is pretty bombproof, 11 speed didn't have a stellar reputation when it first came out - no idea nowadays though.

The weakness on the hub with the 2 I have used is the cup and cones - had the mtb one jet washed after an event and it washed the grease out and pitted the cup and cones. I'm still using it 8 years later mind (it was an SG-500), my commuter (SG-501) lasted >23K before I sold it still working perfectly.

I'm not sold on the advantages of belt drives (I've not looked recently though) - yes the belt is light and it should last an incredibly long time but you need a split in the frame to be able to fit replacements and stones and the like getting into the belt/cog interface are a pain. A chain is heavier, but a cheapo SS one will last a stupidly long time as there is no shifting to contend with and are dirt cheap. Plus changing gearing is easy and cheap too.

Gearing is 42:20 on a kojack 35mm (1.4") so I'm presuming it's a 650b (available tyres and how it looks) so gearing will be this lot:

Gear Ratio Percentage Increase Cassette Equiv. (on Chainring Fitted) Cassette Equiv. (32t Chainring) Equiv. (22t Chainring) Overall Ratio Gear Inches Metres Development Gain Ratio KPH MPH
8 1.615 13.81% 12.4 9.4 6.5 3.39 84.65 6.76 6.14 32.42 20.15
7 1.419 16.03% 14.1 10.7 7.4 2.98 74.38 5.94 5.40 28.49 17.70
6 1.223 22.30% 16.4 12.5 8.6 2.57 64.10 5.12 4.65 24.55 15.26
5 1.000 17.51% 20.0 15.2 10.5 2.10 52.41 4.18 3.80 20.08 12.48
4 0.851 13.77% 23.5 17.9 12.3 1.79 44.61 3.56 3.24 17.09 10.62
3 0.748 16.15% 26.7 20.4 14.0 1.57 39.21 3.13 2.85 15.02 9.33
2 0.644 22.20% 31.1 23.7 16.3 1.35 33.76 2.69 2.45 12.93 8.03
1 0.527 38.0 28.9 19.9 1.11 27.62 2.20 2.00 10.58 6.57
306.45%

Chainring 42
Rear Cog 20
Wheel Dia. (mm) 584
Tyre Width (mm) 25
Overall Dia. (inches) 24.96
Overall Dia. (mm) 634.00
Wheel Circ. (mm) 1991.77
Crank Length 175
Crank circ. 1.10
Crank RPM 80

Fian

Saccades,

Thanks very much for such an informative reply - I am very grateful.