Weight is pretty much it. The Dura Ace might be stronger but not to any substantive degree.

http://www.power2max.com/...ossamer-power-meter/

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Kat Hunter reports on the San Dimas Stage Race from inside the GC winning team
Aeroweenie.com -Compendium of Aero Data and Knowledge
Freelance sports & outdoors writer Kathryn Hunter

105 It won't look as cool. It might weigh slightly more. It could be a little less stiff, so when you sprinting at 1000W expect a few thousands of a mm more flex. When you bike gets run over by a car, a duraace might survive where the 105 cracks in 1/2. OF course that's not a serious problem when the rest of your bike is in 20 pieces.

The only legitimate difference is that if you take it on/off a lot, it's possible the splines may wear out sooner on the 105.

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TrainingBible Coaching
http://www.trainingbible.com

What about Ultegra. That's what I have, never checked the pricing, just went with it as that is what the rest of the bike components are.

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BC Don
Pain is temporary, not giving it your all lasts all Winter.

So how do they justify the enormous price difference? They think people with dura ace already have enough money?

From the prices I've seen, they just seem to be reflective of the price differences between the cranks. I believe there is only a $100 diff between the Ultegra and DA Stages PM, no?
Or are you referring to Shimano's MSRP price diff from 105 to DA? In that case, yeah, you pay a lot for the prestige of owning the DA cranks. Performance wise, no real diff IMHO. I went with the Ultegra stages, as I like the way the Ultegra 6800 crank looks, and I didn't want to pay for a new DA crankset to get the drive side, big price diff between a 6800 crank and a 9000 crank. I got the 6800 crank from Ribble for 180.

The prices I have seen are (in the UK) £599 for 105, £799 for dura ace, and the whole chainsets cost £85 and £280... I just dont understand how the single crankarm demands a bigger price jump than the whole chainset

Well, in Canadian prices (sorry!) it looks roughly like:

Stages Ultegra - $879
Stages DA - $989

Ultegra Crankset - MSRP $309 (again, cheaper from UK mailorder with coupons...)
DA 9000 Crankset - MSRP $639 (probably $450 mailorder from UK, or less with coupon)

So from Canada, the diff between the Ultegra and DA stages is only a little over $100, much less than the difference in price for a whole crankset.

Of course, if you already own a shimano crank, just buy the matching stages arm. In my case, I was on SRAM Red, so was starting from scratch and needed to buy both the PM and the matching crankset...

Hmm, so I have dura ace 7800, so the closest aesthetic match is the 105 crankarm, guess I'll just have to scrub off the "105" on it!

Nah, use it as an excuse to sell the 7800 group and upgrade to an 11 speed group!! :)

I have a DA9000 rear derailleur, I like my bike to look rustic, on that note, maybe I get a black crankarm?

that's actually a huge lie, it's an ultegra 11 speed 1