After constantly dropping chains and having gear shifting issues I decided to move up with the times and convert my 2016 Giant Reign 2 to a 1x system. But since those were hundreds of dollars I scoured Trademe to find a good condition second hand setup that would get me most of the way there. What I ended up with was a compatible Shimano Deore XT rear groupset with long cage derailleur and shifter. To get the the best setup I had to change the front chain ring to a single narrow-wide ring as I was also going to drop the crappy MRP chain guard at the same time. I ended up swapping out new pedals, a rear rotor and the dropper post at the same time as they were all pretty worn out.

The old parts i took off were so worn out I wasn’t even worth keeping them, but i did do a $1 reserve on trademe incase they were of use for parts to someone else in the community.

Unfortunately, I didn’t get many progress photos as it was incredibly dirty and frustrating to get all the parts off. The rear groupset would not budge, it seems that the steel groupset slots had bound up and galled onto the alloy hub leaving me no choice but to attack it with fire and a hammer, The only way to get it off was to dismantle the hub itself, heat it up and bash it with a dead blow hammer and a socket to push out the carrier. It  was pretty wasted after that but I ended up cleaning it up with a file and the new groupset fit onto it fine. As for the front, The chainrings were absolutely seized onto the cranks that I had to drill out the bolts just to get them off.

All said and done, I ended up with a new-to-me 1x conversion, new disc rotors, new dropper post and new pedals. It turned out pretty well and all my issues riding went away immediately, not to mention the bike was so much quieter now the front chain mech was missing.