Heat the chain up before to loosen the tolerances. You can do that in the oven or leaving in the wax for a while. See if that fixes it.
EDIT: should of read the entire thread. What they said above me.
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Dead thread, but new ideas. I just got a Venge Pro with the Force AXS group. I stripped the factory lubed and re-lubed with Rock-n-Roll gold.
Chain sounded like a pepper mill and it’s gotten better, I’m in Indy and know some SRAM guys. They told me the cassette has a coating that takes some miles to break in, I’m finding that it’s still a tad loud and is really easy to cross-chain. Every once in a while I’ll get that nitty-gritty feeling in the chain. We’ll see what another 200-300 miles does for it.
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In searching for noisy force chains on goggle I came across your post on here. I too have the same problem. (2020 Venge Pro with SRAM Force eTap AXS) I am just about fed up with the noise that I get from the rear cassette.
So I joined the page here and was wondering if you could give me some answers if you have any?
In all honesty I’m getting to the point where I just want so S***can the whole group set and move in a different direction. Please help me
I did not solve it and ended up moving to DI2.
DI2 is rad though!
Sorry Fartstorm.
I have the Red eTap AXS group (running with it for 3+ months) and don’t have the chain noise (similar sound to my Di2). Perhaps calling SRAM and ask them? Perhaps you may consider replacing your chain with the SRAM Red 12 speed chain (pending SRAM’s response)? Perhaps your LBS can diagnose (if noise is not related to the chain)?
I have been working with my LBS shop to figure out what is going on. They have been in touch with SRAM and have the ball rolling on getting a new chain and cassette through the warranty process. (Fingers crossed)
It is really just a total head scratcher for me because it is really loud in some of the cogs in the back and has a “normal” sound in others.
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The 10 was super loud for me.
I bought trek concept tri bike last wk with sram axis etap. 12 speed. Noise was unbearable. They spent 3 days trying to quiet it. Got better but not gone. With so little tolerance on 12 speed one piece cassette I was also worried about down the road noises later. So I returned bike and ordered di2. Although all the reviews online talk about how quiet it is seems like the noise issue is not uncommon. Good luck.
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Are others getting the noise on Sram AXS in MTB applications?
I may well be wrong, but the MTB application is very different than the road 12-speed, because it maintained the same basic cog spacing and chain width. It could do this because of how the large cog (50t) overhangs the hub and snuggles up to the spokes.
The road one can’t do this because the largest cog size (33t and such) is unable to hang over like the MTB version. This required a new and narrower chain compared to the MTB 12-speed.
To make room for the 10-tooth cog, you’ll need to use the XDR freehub body, which is widely available on a number of hub brands. XDR is their road specific version of the XD driver that was introduced with the wide-range mountain bike groups years ago, and the difference is that they’re 1.85mm wider. This extra width is necessary to provide the right clearance for the cassette next to the spokes since road cogs aren’t as big and can’t dish like a 50-tooth MTB cog can.
To accommodate all of the gears in the system, they had to make the chain thinner. Which raised concerns about strength. By adding the material back at the top of the plate, as opposed to using the usual figure-eight shape, they gained back any strength that was lost to reducing the chain width. And it’s the same weight as the prior 11-speed chains.
These are the reasons I think there may well be more issues on the road side vs the MTB.
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I think the 12 speed seam axs MTB is good. Jonathan and Brandon have it at work and it’s the same eagle chain I believe (?). It’s quiet and they like it.
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How many miles did you put on the chain/cassette? I have the same exact bike, Venge Pro 2020 w/ Force AXS.
My chain was incredibly loud for the first 100 miles, but eventually got better and it doesn’t bother me at all now. I live near Indianapolis and have buddies at SRAM, they said that the cassette coating has a sort of break in period for some of the coating to wear off onto the chain before the noise quiets down.
The only noise I get now is from cross-chaining. A new chain/cassette might only make the noise worse for you.
I’m currently riding a Canyon Ultimate w/AXS and started with waxed chains on my gravel and mtb about 6 weeks ago. Last weekend decided to try waxing AXS chain after reading this thread.
Bought brand new chain to have 2 and rotate. Stripped in gasoline, mineral oil, then isopropyl alcohol. Dried for a few days in the warm Sacramento sun (ok… hot, really hot sun), and then sat overnight in the crockpot on high with molten speed wax. Hung only long enough to be able to work with it without burning bare skin, and put on the bike. Have to say, it’s quieter than the RocknRoll Gold chain that came off the bike. I was actually really surprised - typically a new chain on a used (even if only for a few hundred miles) chainring/cassette would be a tad loud until they set-in together. Not in this case.
I can’t explain it, but that was my experience, and I am pretty sure I’m not imagining it. And actually now that I think about it, I changed to a larger/more foothill friendly cassette about 200 miles ago, so it’s almost new.
Can’t explain it, but happy now having all my bikes on wax. Doubt the friction gains make much difference, just like how clean it is!
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I found this old thread on google as I was googling if others also have issues with noisy chains and cassettes on force axs etap.
I have similar issues like others here; noisy in some sprocets, fine in others, with the occasional “rattling noises” coming from the back.
Currently I have about 800 km on the bike so the cassette should be “bedded in” – did anyone else find something that helped?
Mechanic in a bike shop that has historically sold a tonne of Sram here…
I’ve now had 6 Force AXS bikes in the stand, 2 that I have built, 1 bike brand demo bike and 3 that were referred to me by other bike shops because we are ‘the sram guys’. All exhibit ‘noisy in some sprockets, fine in others, the odd rattle’ noise symptoms. Disappointing, really… I’ve spent hours now fiddling, adjusting, trying to find fixes but nothing really helps, including upgrading to Sram Red cassette, trying KMC chains, rubber O ring behind cassette to reduce vibration at XD mounting interface…
The function of the groupset is fine but it irks me that Sram marketed this as ‘super silent’!!!
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Thanks for your reply.
That’s super strange. Looking at some youtube videos the groupset seems very silent, that with SRAM’s marketing was what made me get Force Axs on my new bike, now I’m just sitting here with a loud bike with one more sprocket than what I had before.
One “sollution” for me was to lube it up much more and much more often than needed, after about 4-5 cycles (lube every 50km for about 250-300km) it went some what quiet, but that’s not really much more than a band-aid fix as I’m super OCD about my drivetrain beeing clean and efficient.
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Has anyone in this topic have experience with and SRAM chain and KMC for example? Since all the complains in this topic are about the SRAM 12 speed.
I’m just curious if the a waxed KMC chain is less noisy then a waxed SRAM chain.
Good info about AXS and Eagle chains in this article. I don’t know if the tight tolerances in SRAM 12 speed chains are causing the noise though. Interesting read Finding the best bicycle chain: What over 3,000 hours of testing revealed - CyclingTips
Does anyone know anything about the factory lube/grease that comes on the new AXS chains? The guy in the shop when I got my new bike told me that it was supposed to last 1000 miles (obviously not in the conditions I subject it to in CX) and be very very fast. Sounds like a bunch of marketing hype to me.
According to the article on Cyclingtips it is horrible