campag or shimano

jonginge

jashburnham wrote:

Go into your LBS, look at the Hybrids, what are they equipped with? Yep it's Shimano. You wouldn't find Campag on a hybrid, 'nuff said.

Shimano:



Campagnolo:

mmmmmmm, bellucci.



Sorry, what was the question again?

edhornby

ok - specific question....

I'm thinking about getting a road bike and I have a choice between Xenon (10 speed) or tiagra (9 speed), but the tiagra is £31 more - which one would you go for??

itboffin

edhornby wrote:

ok - specific question....

I'm thinking about getting a road bike and I have a choice between Xenon (10 speed) or tiagra (9 speed), but the tiagra is £31 more - which one would you go for??

Xenon hands down I have Mirage, Veloce & Xenon, and Shimano 105 / Ultegra and some Suntour stuff so I think I can honestly say Xenon

Do Et!

il_principe

edhornby wrote:

ok - specific question....

I'm thinking about getting a road bike and I have a choice between Xenon (10 speed) or tiagra (9 speed), but the tiagra is £31 more - which one would you go for??

Will the frame remain the same? Also I take it this is 2008 equipment? Campag don't make Xenon anymore, the range starts at Veloce now. IME if you're gonna get Shimano, start at 105. Tiagra/Sora is pretty nasty stuff (IMHO and yes I have owned a bike that was Sora/Tiagra equipped)

.

itboffin

jashburnham wrote:

edhornby wrote:

ok - specific question....

I'm thinking about getting a road bike and I have a choice between Xenon (10 speed) or tiagra (9 speed), but the tiagra is £31 more - which one would you go for??

Will the frame remain the same? Also I take it this is 2008 equipment? Campag don't make Xenon anymore, the range starts at Veloce now. IME if you're gonna get Shimano, start at 105. Tiagra/Sora is pretty nasty stuff (IMHO and yes I have owned a bike that was Sora/Tiagra equipped)

.

Did I make you feel cheap?

-10 tart points for that admission

il_principe

itboffin wrote:

Did I make you feel cheap?

-10 tart points for that admission

As cheap as a dockside hooker. :oops:

DonDaddyD

jashburnham wrote:

Shimano:



Campagnolo:

+1 its true, but whose product is likely to work. The Asian guy who has clearly been working all night to make sure his product works right and is of the highest standard. Or the burd who has clearly spent her overtime in the managers office ...

Its the same all over the place with Italian stuff, Alpha Romeo, Ferrari even Fiat great to look and while in and of itself the build quality is great they cannot compare to the reliabilty of say a Nissan, Toyota, Honda etc. That said if I had the money and it was a purchase of passion I'd buy the Italian car and suffer the maintenance costs. However, because the Yen is so much more expensive now Campag is offering better value for money so maintenance costs are relatively cheaper as well.

With the the above logic I set upon buying my Kuota with Campag until this:

Biondino wrote:

]For the love of god, no-one buy a bike with campag shifters until you've test-ridden one. They are for freaks with thumbs in the wrong place, and the gear shifting lever slips backwards as soon as you try and press it. For anyone who has previously used Shimano, don't even think of switching without trying it first.

Regardless of what I wrote above what Blondie has said is absolutely right, I couldn't get on with Campag (albeit Veloce) so I settled for Ultegra SL and a better wheelset than I would have got if I went with a Kuota and Campag Centaur....

(Centaur would have looked better but I'm not that vain, comfort and reassurance when cycling comes first.)

il_principe

DonDaddyD wrote:

Its the same all over the place with Italian stuff, Alpha Romeo, Ferrari even Fiat great to look and while in and of itself the build quality is great they cannot compare to the reliabilty of say a Nissan, Toyota, Honda etc. That said if I had the money and it was a purchase of passion I'd buy the Italian car and suffer the maintenance costs.

Misplaced logic with Campag. Most of their stuff is completely re-buildable and you can get the parts easily. Not so with Shimano.

DonDaddyD

jashburnham wrote:

DonDaddyD wrote:

Its the same all over the place with Italian stuff, Alpha Romeo, Ferrari even Fiat great to look and while in and of itself the build quality is great they cannot compare to the reliabilty of say a Nissan, Toyota, Honda etc. That said if I had the money and it was a purchase of passion I'd buy the Italian car and suffer the maintenance costs.

Misplaced logic with Campag. Most of their stuff is completely re-buildable and you can get the parts easily. Not so with Shimano.

Conversely, perhaps it's completely rebuildable because of the initial lack of quality with each part....

One of the things I disliked about Campag Veloce is that the shifters and hoods felt cheap, cheaper than my sora set.... The shifting was obviously better.

lost_in_thought

Now now, I have to say that I think both systems are pretty mechanically sound, irrespective of Japanese or Italian roots.

+1 for Campag is the easy availability of individual parts - I was amazed that you have to replace a whole shifter on Shimano if one spring goes, although I suspect that you could obtain parts yourself that would fit if you really worked at it.

Another +1 for campag is that they haven't bumped their prices up 30% (according to Epic) in the 08/09 switch.

The Campag manuals (kindly supplied by both Epic and G66) are very easy to read, very clear.

I personally don't like the way the brake lever moves on the Shimano system, and found the shifters a bit counter-intuitive.

TBH, it all boils down to whether or not you get on with the shifters. You'll prefer one system to the other, and that's what you should base your decision on.

roger_merriman

jashburnham wrote:

Go into your LBS, look at the Hybrids, what are they equipped with? Yep it's Shimano. You wouldn't find Campag on a hybrid, 'nuff said.

Shimano:



Campagnolo:

to be fair they did try but didn't get any where, way back in the late 80,s early 90's it didn't do so well. shimano while hardly cool, seems have a lot of time and effort on R&D look back on the timeline (note shimano are older than Campagnolo) and most of the jumps that bikes have made have come from them. they are i agree though far from sexy bits of kit.

RedJohn

I've had some reliability problems with Campag. However now that they have a proper service agent in the UK (!) that should be more easily dealt with. Nice to use though, and it all falls nicely to hand even with hands like 24oz steaks.

The main reason I preferred them was the cables don't hang out in front like washing lines ... gotta get the priorities right!

(And I remember when brake cables were like that too)

greg66_tri_v2.0

RedJohn wrote:

I've had some reliability problems with Campag. However now that they have a proper service agent in the UK (!) that should be more easily dealt with. Nice to use though, and it all falls nicely to hand even with hands like 24oz steaks.

The main reason I preferred them was the cables don't hang out in front like washing lines ... gotta get the priorities right!

(And I remember when brake cables were like that too)

Didn't the brake cables used to come straight out the top of the hoods?

Shimanshouldnot run theirs out sideways. Sort of advertising: "Look, there's a massive kink in your cable* right under your hand. Neat, eh?"


*I know there isn't really

dennisn

jashburnham wrote:

DonDaddyD wrote:

Its the same all over the place with Italian stuff, Alpha Romeo, Ferrari even Fiat great to look and while in and of itself the build quality is great they cannot compare to the reliabilty of say a Nissan, Toyota, Honda etc. That said if I had the money and it was a purchase of passion I'd buy the Italian car and suffer the maintenance costs.

Misplaced logic with Campag. Most of their stuff is completely re-buildable and you can get the parts easily. Not so with Shimano.

I don't buy not being able to rebuild Shimano. All I can say is, if something can be built, it
can be rebuilt. And who rebuilds this stuff anyway? Other than MAYBE someone
doing a bit of repair work after a crash. I don't see this stuff wearing out. Oh, maybe the
occasional bad part shows up and needs fixing but it seems to me that everyone uses
these things, for anywhere from 2 to10 years, then gets the LATEST gear anyway.

Dennis Noward

greg66_tri_v2.0

dennisn wrote:

I don't buy not being able to rebuild Shimano. All I can say is, if something can be built, it
can be rebuilt.

Try rebuilding an Ergomo.

Hell, for that matter, try rebuilding a Shimano STI.

mountainroadie

for the romantics .... for the rebuildability .... for the sheer beauty and the silky smooth
shifting ...for my grandad who was italian....its CAMPAGNOLO CHORUS 8)

now what wheels to get :roll: mama mia

richk

edhornby wrote:

ok - specific question....

I'm thinking about getting a road bike and I have a choice between Xenon (10 speed) or tiagra (9 speed), but the tiagra is £31 more - which one would you go for??

I've got one of each of those & would have either again (if I couldn't afford somthing better).

However, I find the Shimano hoods more comfortable than the Campagnolo ones.

bigmat

I've had 2 campag shifters fail, the first after dopey baggage handlers trashed it (and dopier me didn't tape the lever down :oops: ), the second was brand now and just didn't work. On neither occasion were they rebuilt. First time, I realised it wasn't cost effective to rebuild a Mirage shifter. Second time, the Centaur shifter wasn't capable of being rebuilt. So I think the rebuild thing is perhaps a little overrated - only likely to be worth doing for Centaur and above.

I still prefer Campag though, run Shimano on my mountain bike and the drop off in quality between the original parts (circa 1993) and the new replacements I've bought recently is astonishing. And perhaps the single most importantthing - Shimano looks a right pig's ear with all those cables. They seem to have finally sorted it out, but have unfortunately coincided that with a series of comedy price hikes, so I'd even go SRAM over Shimano.

RedJohn

Greg66 wrote:

Didn't the brake cables used to come straight out the top of the hoods?

Yes ... I remember being a right luddite, complaining about the feel of the brake cable under the rim tape and going on about how much better it was to have the cable coming out the top!

Gazzaputt

SRAM SRAM SRAM!!!!

After running Shimano for years and a brief spell with Campy I have found SRAM to be better.

I run SRAM Force at the mo but am about to to goto Red. Shifting with Zero loss is brilliant and the double tap is excellent. Also found the hoods on the SRAM to be easier on the hands.

itboffin

So what is the deal with these sorts of statements

Although not recommended by Shimano this bottom bracket is backwards compatible with all out board hollowtech chainsets

Why & why not grrrr :evil:

always_tyred

itboffin wrote:

So what is the deal with these sorts of statements

Although not recommended by Shimano this bottom bracket is backwards compatible with all out board hollowtech chainsets

Why & why not grrrr :evil:

Risk aversion.

Blame the corporate lawyers.

dilemna

MatHammond wrote:

I've had 2 campag shifters fail, the first after dopey baggage handlers trashed it (and dopier me didn't tape the lever down :oops: ), the second was brand now and just didn't work. On neither occasion were they rebuilt. First time, I realised it wasn't cost effective to rebuild a Mirage shifter. Second time, the Centaur shifter wasn't capable of being rebuilt. So I think the rebuild thing is perhaps a little overrated - only likely to be worth doing for Centaur and above.

I still prefer Campag though, run Shimano on my mountain bike and the drop off in quality between the original parts (circa 1993) and the new replacements I've bought recently is astonishing. And perhaps the single most importantthing - Shimano looks a right pig's ear with all those cables. They seem to have finally sorted it out, but have unfortunately coincided that with a series of comedy price hikes, so I'd even go SRAM over Shimano.

My Chorus Ergo levers failed in 2003 after only two years. I had only used them during 2 summers on and off. They couldn't have done more than 800 miles. They just seized up and it "wasn't worth repairing them". So I had new ones at £160!!! My Ultegra STis have been faultless except that the levers have acquired thin snail like tracks on the front surface. No I don't have snails in my garage. My bikes are suspended anyway. These marks are only on the levers and no where else on the bike, neither on my other bikes or the Campag Chorus Ergos. Shimano's finish should be a lot more durable. The plastic caps above the levers wear so quickly. So I 'm not too pleased with either Campag or Shimano TBH. Of the two I would say Shimano by a nose or brake block. SRAM who are they? They make chains don't they?

mountainroadie

going for the campag simply for the carbon bits :shock: :shock: :shock:
shimano dont look so good in the looks dept.
high end sram looks good and probably works just as well but at the price you can get campag !
sorry to hear that your campag only lasted two summers !!!
as somebody said earlier italian bike italian components 8)