Ultegra 6800 or Campag Centaur........

btiratsoo

Ignore the 11speed and 10 speed difference. If you had the choice between either full groupset, what would you go for and why?

Ben

ugo.santalucia

Centaur = Veloce. Save your money and get Veloce if you want Campagnolo.

btiratsoo

The only two options are those above. Isn't centaur carbon cranks and levers whereas veloce is aluminium cranks?

ugo.santalucia

There is centaur and centaur carbon. Carbon levers and cranks make no difference to a groupset... I am not even sure they are lighter.

btiratsoo

Forgive my ignorance Ugo. I am just going on the advice of the bike shop. I asked for Ultegra 6800, they suggested I try Campag Centaur. I am now wondering whether I have made a mistake.......The build has been delayed and is giving me time to question my judgement!!

Calpol

I have Veloce on one bike. It works well, is reliable and easy to service. On my other bike I have a mix of Athena (mechs) and Chorus. Chorus ultrashift is nice. In fact the whole setup is more tactile and feels more sophisticated but it does the same thing. I like Campagnolo and am now invested down that route so won't go Shimano in a hurry however I would venture that Ultegra 6800 > Centaur > Veloce. If its your only bike then Ultegra will be great.

btiratsoo

Yes it is my only bike and its a full custom build from a well known shop. They seemed to champion Campag over Shimano. As I mentioned, the build has been delayed a little bit and now is giving me time to stew and mull over the decisions! Doesn't help that I had to sell my bike to pay for it....bikeless for the time being which is even more shitty!

I think a trip to the local Decathlon for a Triban temporary bike might be in order!

bmxboy10

You can get Athena for the same money as Centaur if you shop around but otherwise its as Ugo said IMO.

mattythemod

I have Carbon Centaur on my Condor , carbon cranks look lovely ..the shifters are only carbon skinned i am led to believe....questionable as to performance benefit and on my winter / hack bike i have Veloce which works just as well as Centaur imho ....so i guess it comes down to looks and a little weight difference between the 2 groupsets .

btiratsoo

Nice one Matty. That's what I thought about the shifters. Is yours Centaur with the red highlights. I bet that looks lovely on the Super Acciaio you have. How is the bike?

mattythemod

btiratsoo wrote:

Nice one Matty. That's what I thought about the shifters. Is yours Centaur with the red highlights. I bet that looks lovely on the Super Acciaio you have. How is the bike?

Yes mate its the Carbon Red black edition ..bike is lovely feels really great ...get a lot of surprised looks when i tell people its steel .

russyh

I have centaur carbon on my bike, it looks smart, but I miss shimano. Only because it's what I am used too. I am sticking with it as I'm hoping my mind will change over the summer and because I can't be arsed to change.

Cheshire Cat

I have Centaur on my Cinelli and 11 speed Ultegra on my Cervelo...the Campagnolo groupset gives more feed back and lets you know that you have shifted a gear, Shimano is very smooth but doesn't not have the same tactile response as Campagnolo. Either groupset takes the same amount of effort to shift gears; the Ultegra are a slightly broader lever whilst the Centaur is easier to rest your hands on. Personally, as much as I like my Cervelo and the extra gear provided by the extra sprocket, I wish it had Chorus 11 speed.

btiratsoo

Excellent. Thanks for all the replys guys. Much appreciated.

rolf_f

mattythemod wrote:

I have Carbon Centaur on my Condor , carbon cranks look lovely ..the shifters are only carbon skinned i am led to believe....questionable as to performance benefit and on my winter / hack bike i have Veloce which works just as well as Centaur imho ....so i guess it comes down to looks and a little weight difference between the 2 groupsets .

Centaur levers used to be carbon but the Powershift ones are, as you say, only carbon skinned. That said though, the primary benefit of either is not any weight issue but the fact that if you do scuff them, the carbon can be sanded down and re-lacquered very simply - and it looks no different to the factory finish. Try that on a metal finish lever and see how long it takes/how messy it looks!

But otherwise Ugo is partly right - Veloce is really as good as Centaur. But Chorus is worth the extra spend if you can afford it.

MisterMuncher

Shimano 6800/9000 brakes are the best rim brakes I've tried, and I don't think that can be underestimated in making your decision.

gsej

btiratsoo wrote:

Ignore the 11speed and 10 speed difference. If you had the choice between either full groupset, what would you go for and why?

Ben

Personally I'd go for Ultegra. I've got Ultegra 6700 on one bike and Centaur on another, and I prefer the the way ultegra feels when shifting. Another thing to consider is that if you ever want to remove your cranks, the power torque system on centaur makes it a lot tricker - to do it easily and reliably you need to buy special tools (http://velonews.competitor.com/2013/04/bikes-and-tech/how-to-remove-campagnolo-power-torque-cranks_280400)

MattC59

If you can ride them both and don't get caught up in the "you must have Campag, it suits your bike" argument. Buy whichever works best for you. I have Ultegra on two of my bikes and it's great, very smooth and only needs adjusting if I change wheels. I tried Campag for a week last year and just couldn't get on with the shifter placement. IMO, the thumb shifter placement is just plain stupid, it's simply in the wrong place. Yes, I got used to it, but that doesn't mean it's a good design. (That will no doubt upset the Campag fans )

As I said, try both if you can and choose the own which suits you best.

rolf_f

MattC59 wrote:

I tried Campag for a week last year and just couldn't get on with the shifter placement. IMO, the thumb shifter placement is just plain stupid, it's simply in the wrong place. Yes, I got used to it, but that doesn't mean it's a good design. (That will no doubt upset the Campag fans )

As I said, try both if you can and choose the own which suits you best.

The point is that it doesn't matter which of the three main options you choose because you will get used to it if you give it long enough and maybe a week wasn't long enough in your case (and, I would say that combining the brake lever with the shift lever is, in engineering terms, just plain stupid. That should upset the Shimano fans*) - choose your system based on the comfort of the hoods because getting that wrong is far more important than trivialities over where levers are.

Obviously, there are other ergonomic issues. If you have really stumpy thumbs you might have problems with Campag thumb shifters and the excessive size of Shimano hoods causes a few people reach problems.

* the Campag thumb shifter is an excellent piece of design - keeps each action to its own control. The only aspect of Campag shifting that does irritate me a bit is the upshift on the front mech which requires an excessive sweep; 3 clicks worth of movement with what feels like the same angular shift as the nine on the back.

btiratsoo

I'm going to give the Campag a try. Seems that you can get Ultegra 6800 for a sensible price on line. If it all goes wrong, then I will hopefully be able to afford to change.

Rolf, the comfort issues was one of the reasons that Campag was recommended. It will be interesting to see if it really is comfortable.

Once again, thanks for all the advice and comments.

How Far is too Far

I guess I am either lucky or unlucky depending on how you look at it. But on my 3 main bikes I have 2010 Sram Red, 2012 Ultegra 10sp, and 2014 Campy Athena.

Out of the 3 groupsets I would rank them
1st Red
2nd Athena
3rd Ultegra

I generally will ride all 3 of these bikes each week and the shifting is fine, once you used to a system you just change gear without even thinking. The Red brakes and the most effective but the Athena is also very good (did Hardknott pass the other week on this bike with no problems) I find the Campy huds to be very comfy and the Ultegra ones to be big and clumsy in comparison. I guess there are pro,s and cons to each as already said get what you like the best they are all good. For me I would go with and 11 speed groupset though as the extra ratio keeps the gaps between gears smoother.

Rich...

I would like to try the new RED and Record to see what I prefer, maybe that is for another bike next year :-)

Calpol

btiratsoo wrote:

I'm going to give the Campag a try. Seems that you can get Ultegra 6800 for a sensible price on line. If it all goes wrong, then I will hopefully be able to afford to change.

Rolf, the comfort issues was one of the reasons that Campag was recommended. It will be interesting to see if it really is comfortable.

Once again, thanks for all the advice and comments.

Good man. another Campag convert
The hood/lever design I think is really good. The lower tier of Shimano (which is all i have experience of) definitely are better suited to bigger, stronger hands especially if braking from the hoods. I don't have massive hands and can easily downshift from the drops which is sometimes a criticism of the thumb shift design. The excessive sweep required to shift the front mech that Rolf refers to is much less evident in Chorus/Athena than Veloce.

rolf_f

Calpol wrote:

The excessive sweep required to shift the front mech that Rolf refers to is much less evident in Chorus/Athena than Veloce.

That mildly confuses me! My shifters are Centaur Ultratorque. So the same as Chorus but different to current Centaur, Athena and Veloce.

You need to be more explicit - Athena, year on year has always been the same as Veloce but when it was the same as Chorus, it was also the same as Veloce. I'm sure I have really clarified the issue!

Calpol

Rolf F wrote:

Calpol wrote:

The excessive sweep required to shift the front mech that Rolf refers to is much less evident in Chorus/Athena than Veloce.

That mildly confuses me! My shifters are Centaur Ultratorque. So the same as Chorus but different to current Centaur, Athena and Veloce.

You need to be more explicit - Athena, year on year has always been the same as Veloce but when it was the same as Chorus, it was also the same as Veloce. I'm sure I have really clarified the issue!

I have Athena (new) front mech and Chorus 11 speed shifters. What I notice is that the shift feels much more assisted on the Chorus lever whereas on my Veloce setup it feels like I and really having to manoeuvre the chain onto the outer ring. Not explained very well!

Veloce = a bit more brute force shove
Chorus - click, click, click and you are there

rolf_f

I guess my Centaur matches more your Chorus which is what I'd expect - but my point was not so much that you need a lot of effort but that the paddle has a long arc of travel - sometimes, eg if I am going from a climb to a descent, if I want to go all the way across on the front (ie passing the micro adjusts) I have to shift the lever twice. It's a nice movement - just a little too long.

twgh

If Ultegra 6800 is anything like DA9000 then you have to go with it. Just ridden my new bike with DA9000 and the shift is absolutely godly. I had to look down to begin with to make sure the front shifts had worked.....so quiet and quick I didn't feel / notice the shift!

cycleclinic

Centaur carbon cranks are very light much lighter (by 100g or so) than the alloy counterparts. Still the weight difference is not why you will buy them they just look good.

rowlers

Having just moved from 2010 UT centaur/chorus mix to Ultegra 6800, whilst I liked the Centaur the Ultegra is so far ahead in terms of ease of shift and shift precision its unreal. But the Chorus chainset was far sexier and I think the hoods were more comfortable and I liked the thumb shift.

If money was no object and I kit both my bikes out with the same group, I'd go Shimano, the shift really is that good.
But each to their own