The End Of Campagnolo?

So, what are your opinions - are we witnesses to the end of Campagnolo? Is it as far as it goes for Vicenza?
New 2022 Shimano offerings seem to be real killers & SRAM is also a super formidable player these days. What are your general thoughts on Campagnolo? Will they survive 2022 and open a new chapter in 2023 with some new stuff?
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Comments

  • Ncovidius
    Ncovidius Posts: 229
    edited September 2021
    tt11 said:

    So, what are your opinions - are we witnesses to the end of Campagnolo? Is it as far as it goes for Vicenza?
    New 2022 Shimano offerings seem to be real killers & SRAM is also a super formidable player these days. What are your general thoughts on Campagnolo? Will they survive 2022 and open a new chapter in 2023 with some new stuff?

    They’ve really only just got the 12 speed hydraulic SR road and 13 speed gravel Ekar sets established. There’s no way they are going anywhere soon. Personally I prefer my brake levers to not have to multi task, and for the set to be at least slightly reliable, so I will keep backing Campagnolo for the foreseeable future.
  • gethinceri
    gethinceri Posts: 1,671
    Well, they are the “Johnny come latelys” in comparison to Shimano so, yes, they’ve got no chance.
  • slowmart
    slowmart Posts: 4,516
    Shimano reliable, well manufactured with strong product design behind them
    sram, IMHO , not as robust or the product design of the above.
    Campagnolo, I get what they do and there seems to be a rich vein of riders who appreciate the design, beauty and functionality of their kit whilst willing to pay a premium over Shimano.

    I doubt Campag shareholders are lying awake at night wondering what the competition are doing. They have a strong product line and a wealth of in house expertise for future development.
    “Give a man a fish and feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and feed him for a lifetime. Teach a man to cycle and he will realize fishing is stupid and boring”

    Desmond Tutu
  • elbowloh
    elbowloh Posts: 7,078
    slowmart said:

    Shimano reliable, well manufactured with strong product design behind them
    sram, IMHO , not as robust or the product design of the above.
    Campagnolo, I get what they do and there seems to be a rich vein of riders who appreciate the design, beauty and functionality of their kit whilst willing to pay a premium over Shimano.

    I doubt Campag shareholders are lying awake at night wondering what the competition are doing. They have a strong product line and a wealth of in house expertise for future development.

    I have Chorus 12 and Ultegra mechanical groupsets.

    When I bought the Chorus set it was significantly less than Ultegra and imo, functions better.
    Felt F1 2014
    Felt Z6 2012
    Red Arthur Caygill steel frame
    Tall....
    www.seewildlife.co.uk
  • pblakeney
    pblakeney Posts: 27,424
    edited September 2021
    I remember a time when you could go years without anything new of note being released. Simpler times.
    The above may be fact, or fiction, I may be serious, I may be jesting.
    I am not sure. You have no chance.
    Veronese68 wrote:
    PB is the most sensible person on here.
  • imposter2.0
    imposter2.0 Posts: 12,028
    Suntour ftw...
  • dennisn
    dennisn Posts: 10,601

    Well, they are the “Johnny come latelys” in comparison to Shimano so, yes, they’ve got no chance.

    Nothing lasts forever.
  • dennisn said:

    Well, they are the “Johnny come latelys” in comparison to Shimano so, yes, they’ve got no chance.

    Nothing lasts forever.
    How about cold November rain?
    left the forum March 2023
  • elbowloh
    elbowloh Posts: 7,078
    Or twinkies... apparently.
    Felt F1 2014
    Felt Z6 2012
    Red Arthur Caygill steel frame
    Tall....
    www.seewildlife.co.uk
  • elbowloh said:

    slowmart said:

    Shimano reliable, well manufactured with strong product design behind them
    sram, IMHO , not as robust or the product design of the above.
    Campagnolo, I get what they do and there seems to be a rich vein of riders who appreciate the design, beauty and functionality of their kit whilst willing to pay a premium over Shimano.

    I doubt Campag shareholders are lying awake at night wondering what the competition are doing. They have a strong product line and a wealth of in house expertise for future development.

    I have Chorus 12 and Ultegra mechanical groupsets.

    When I bought the Chorus set it was significantly less than Ultegra and imo, functions better.
    Exactly - I don't get why some people assume Campag users only choose it for the looks or the heritage - some of us just prefer it to the equivalently priced competition.

    Fwiw IF Shimano do abandon mechanical at the top end far from killing Campag it should be a boost.
    [Castle Donington Ladies FC - going up in '22]
  • amrushton
    amrushton Posts: 1,312
    Its becoming a boutique groupset. This isnt bad just means that some people like Toyota/Honda others like Ferrari. Ferrari doesnt sell lots of cars like others but is a niche maker. Someone would snap Campagnolo up if the price was right just for the history and the catalogue. Who doesnt want a set of Bora wheels?
  • amrushton said:

    Who doesnt want a set of Bora wheels?

    Technically, I love them. Unfortunately the G3 lacing has come to represent the ‘look at me’ brigade, however, I’m not one of them, so yeah, love them.
  • davep1
    davep1 Posts: 837
    Ncovidius said:

    tt11 said:

    So, what are your opinions - are we witnesses to the end of Campagnolo? Is it as far as it goes for Vicenza?
    New 2022 Shimano offerings seem to be real killers & SRAM is also a super formidable player these days. What are your general thoughts on Campagnolo? Will they survive 2022 and open a new chapter in 2023 with some new stuff?

    They’ve really only just got the 12 speed hydraulic SR road and 13 speed gravel Ekar sets established. There’s no way they are going anywhere soon. Personally I prefer my brake levers to not have to multi task, and for the set to be at least slightly reliable, so I will keep backing Campagnolo for the foreseeable future.
    I loved my Campag stuff when I had it, it was a mix of Veloce and Chorus. The levers in particular were well shaped. However, the left side crank arm fell off one time, when I was almost home. It took me 2-3 weeks to get the parts and get it back on the road, and I always thought if that had been Shimano, it would have been 2-3 days max. From my experience, they are not immune to reliability problems.

    My current bike has Ultegra, which is fantastic too. I was going to say it has been faultless, but the crank suffered the de-gluing/.oming apart issue that is quite common, and I had a bit of a struggle to get them to replace it as it was outside the 2 year warranty. They did come round to my way of thinking eventually.
  • davep1 said:

    Ncovidius said:

    tt11 said:

    So, what are your opinions - are we witnesses to the end of Campagnolo? Is it as far as it goes for Vicenza?
    New 2022 Shimano offerings seem to be real killers & SRAM is also a super formidable player these days. What are your general thoughts on Campagnolo? Will they survive 2022 and open a new chapter in 2023 with some new stuff?

    They’ve really only just got the 12 speed hydraulic SR road and 13 speed gravel Ekar sets established. There’s no way they are going anywhere soon. Personally I prefer my brake levers to not have to multi task, and for the set to be at least slightly reliable, so I will keep backing Campagnolo for the foreseeable future.
    I loved my Campag stuff when I had it, it was a mix of Veloce and Chorus. The levers in particular were well shaped. However, the left side crank arm fell off one time, when I was almost home. It took me 2-3 weeks to get the parts and get it back on the road, and I always thought if that had been Shimano, it would have been 2-3 days max. From my experience, they are not immune to reliability problems.

    My current bike has Ultegra, which is fantastic too. I was going to say it has been faultless, but the crank suffered the de-gluing/.oming apart issue that is quite common, and I had a bit of a struggle to get them to replace it as it was outside the 2 year warranty. They did come round to my way of thinking eventually.
    I agree, no Groupset is an island, but I still prefer the exceptional feel and function of my Campag kit, to my Shimano kit. I’m no bike snob, I look for function over form, and value real world reliability. My experience is that Shimano is cheaper ( for the most part) but goes wrong more often. Shimano is easier to source ( especially at present ) as well. So I keep my winter ( relatively higher mileage/ effort ) hacks Shimano shod, and my best ( summer / good weather only ) bike, Campag shod.
  • slowmart said:


    I doubt Campag shareholders are lying awake at night wondering what the competition are doing. They have a strong product line and a wealth of in house expertise for future development.

    Agreed, but they are a privately held and family owned/run company and aren't beholden to shareholders.

  • gethinceri
    gethinceri Posts: 1,671
    Privately held doesn’t mean there are no shareholders.
  • thegreatdivide
    thegreatdivide Posts: 5,807
    edited October 2021
    It’s Shimano that’s totally f@cked it.

    Expect yet another groupset leap from Campagnolo in the new Year.

    As for 1x systems, Campagnolo can’t make Ekar fast enough. They’re selling sh%t loads!
  • slowmart said:

    Shimano reliable, well manufactured with strong product design behind them

    Not in my experience. Got Ultegra 8000 and its been unreliable (needed new shifters and chain ring in under 2 years) , shifts worse than my early 2000s chorus campag and just feels cheap and crap also in comparison. The quicker I can get rid for some campag the better.

    P.S. Why this thread? Are Campagnolo in financial trouble then?
  • No. Not in trouble at all. Just a thread started by a troll who’s never been seen since.
  • MattFalle
    MattFalle Posts: 11,644
    thiscocks said:

    slowmart said:

    Shimano reliable, well manufactured with strong product design behind them

    Not in my experience. Got Ultegra 8000 and its been unreliable (needed new shifters and chain ring in under 2 years) , shifts worse than my early 2000s chorus campag and just feels cheap and censored also in comparison. The quicker I can get rid for some campag the better.


    this

    compared to the 9 speed Veloce I've wittered on about in another thread 8000 is plastic junk.

    lets not compare 8000 to 9 or 10 speed Record for fear of me laughing so hard i fall off the couch.

    Campag is just lovely - design, function, build quality, everything - compared to Shimano.
    .
    The camera down the willy isn't anything like as bad as it sounds.
  • I have 10 speed Record on two bikes and it is the best products I have every used. My third steed has DA 11 speed. It is nice, don’t get me wrong, but the Campag looks feels and works just perfectly.
    I have 2 spare square taper BB’s 3 or 4 bcd135 chainrings and 2 x10 spd Chorus cassettes as spares so should last me donkeys years.
  • DeVlaeminck
    DeVlaeminck Posts: 9,107
    Unfortunately there's this myth that people buy campag because of the heritage/image/aesthetics. These are generally people who have never tried it because most of us buy ready built bikes these days and very few come Campag equipped. I've got Ultegra on my best bike for that very reason - it's good enough but it's not quite as good as the Chorus I had previously.
    [Castle Donington Ladies FC - going up in '22]
  • super_davo
    super_davo Posts: 1,228

    Unfortunately there's this myth that people buy campag because of the heritage/image/aesthetics. These are generally people who have never tried it because most of us buy ready built bikes these days and very few come Campag equipped. I've got Ultegra on my best bike for that very reason - it's good enough but it's not quite as good as the Chorus I had previously.

    This is 100% the problem Campag have. As bikes get more integrated, complex and less user servicable its much less attractive to build your own. At club level 10 years ago there was a good core of the best riders that built their own bikes and swore by Campag. Now the same sort of riders just buy the bikes as a complete package from someone like Canyon or Giant, where you keep don't even need to change the wheels from stock. As those bikes rarely have Campag is only one or two of the older guys that cling on. So from having "heritage / image" its sort of become fogeyish. Ekar can help turn that round, as will the Pogacar / UAE pro race wins, but I can't help feeling what they really need is an affordable electronic groupset that gets specced on OEM bikes to get a new generation of riders using it.

  • PMark
    PMark Posts: 160
    For the people that say Campag is noticeably better than Shimano R8000, it would be help to specify what exactly is better. Because it isn't as though Campag haven't made substandard group sets before. For example, one of the previous 10 speed group sets had parts in the shifting mechanism for the front derailleur made out of plastic (these are generally made out of metal or carbon). So they would sometimes break when changing gear, instantly converting your bike into a 1x setup.

    Unless things have changed now and Campag is just using more expensive materials than Shimano, I don't see how one high end mechanical setup can be better than another. Shimano have very good quality control/consistency and do over engineer their components, to the point where even the highest level products aren't always the lightest, but will generally last a lot longer.
  • masjer
    masjer Posts: 2,702
    For me, I like Campag because it allows me to change gear and stop. I also like Shimano for the same reason. The rest of the never-ending comparison is "blah,blah,blah".
  • MattFalle
    MattFalle Posts: 11,644
    PMark said:

    For the people that say Campag is noticeably better than Shimano R8000, it would be help to specify what exactly is better. Because it isn't as though Campag haven't made substandard group sets before. For example, one of the previous 10 speed group sets had parts in the shifting mechanism for the front derailleur made out of plastic (these are generally made out of metal or carbon). So they would sometimes break when changing gear, instantly converting your bike into a 1x setup.

    Unless things have changed now and Campag is just using more expensive materials than Shimano, I don't see how one high end mechanical setup can be better than another. Shimano have very good quality control/consistency and do over engineer their components, to the point where even the highest level products aren't always the lightest, but will generally last a lot longer.

    what is better, offhand, because its late and I want to go to bed is:

    design/functionality
    shifter size - smaller
    shifter shape
    hood material
    smoother gears going up
    smoother gears going down
    far better multiple shifting
    lighter over all
    complete aesthetics of the groupset
    better brakes
    doesn't feel that its made of plastic
    more reliable - doesn't fall apart like 8000
    serviceable
    rebuildable
    no pointless design features for no reason like the 8000 front mech
    far nicer and more pleasurable to work on and use

    the barrel adjuster on the rear mech by itself is far nicer designed, far better aesthetically and miles ahead in functionality than the whole of the 8000 groupset by itself.
    .
    The camera down the willy isn't anything like as bad as it sounds.
  • DeVlaeminck
    DeVlaeminck Posts: 9,107
    PMark said:

    For the people that say Campag is noticeably better than Shimano R8000, it would be help to specify what exactly is better. Because it isn't as though Campag haven't made substandard group sets before. For example, one of the previous 10 speed group sets had parts in the shifting mechanism for the front derailleur made out of plastic (these are generally made out of metal or carbon). So they would sometimes break when changing gear, instantly converting your bike into a 1x setup.

    Unless things have changed now and Campag is just using more expensive materials than Shimano, I don't see how one high end mechanical setup can be better than another. Shimano have very good quality control/consistency and do over engineer their components, to the point where even the highest level products aren't always the lightest, but will generally last a lot longer.

    Yes they did make a Veloce group where the small lever was plastic and snapped.

    But taking my Ultegra - it's noticeably noisier than the previous chorus - you may say that's down to set up but I've read a fair few comments in forums about the same thing.

    I change gear cables more regularly than I would otherwise because they snap in the shifter - another known issue.

    Apart from that I prefer the multishift on the chorus and the lever shape agrees with my hands more. It's small things I admit - I'm not trying to push Campag on anyone rather reacting to the sometimes expressed view that people choose Campag for sentimental reasons rather than practical ones.
    [Castle Donington Ladies FC - going up in '22]
  • MattFalle
    MattFalle Posts: 11,644
    MattFalle said:

    PMark said:

    For the people that say Campag is noticeably better than Shimano R8000, it would be help to specify what exactly is better. Because it isn't as though Campag haven't made substandard group sets before. For example, one of the previous 10 speed group sets had parts in the shifting mechanism for the front derailleur made out of plastic (these are generally made out of metal or carbon). So they would sometimes break when changing gear, instantly converting your bike into a 1x setup.

    Unless things have changed now and Campag is just using more expensive materials than Shimano, I don't see how one high end mechanical setup can be better than another. Shimano have very good quality control/consistency and do over engineer their components, to the point where even the highest level products aren't always the lightest, but will generally last a lot longer.

    what is better, offhand, because its late and I want to go to bed is:

    design/functionality
    shifter size - smaller
    shifter shape
    hood material
    smoother gears going up
    smoother gears going down
    far better multiple shifting
    lighter over all
    complete aesthetics of the groupset
    better brakes
    doesn't feel that its made of plastic
    more reliable - doesn't fall apart like 8000
    serviceable
    rebuildable
    no pointless design features for no reason like the 8000 front mech
    far nicer and more pleasurable to work on and use

    the barrel adjuster on the rear mech by itself is far nicer designed, far better aesthetically and miles ahead in functionality than the whole of the 8000 groupset by itself.
    Campag also lasts longer because its better engineered, serviceable and all parts are available as opposed to the disposable nature of Shimano.

    .
    The camera down the willy isn't anything like as bad as it sounds.
  • rick_chasey
    rick_chasey Posts: 75,660
    edited November 2021
    MattFalle said:

    MattFalle said:

    PMark said:

    For the people that say Campag is noticeably better than Shimano R8000, it would be help to specify what exactly is better. Because it isn't as though Campag haven't made substandard group sets before. For example, one of the previous 10 speed group sets had parts in the shifting mechanism for the front derailleur made out of plastic (these are generally made out of metal or carbon). So they would sometimes break when changing gear, instantly converting your bike into a 1x setup.

    Unless things have changed now and Campag is just using more expensive materials than Shimano, I don't see how one high end mechanical setup can be better than another. Shimano have very good quality control/consistency and do over engineer their components, to the point where even the highest level products aren't always the lightest, but will generally last a lot longer.

    what is better, offhand, because its late and I want to go to bed is:

    design/functionality
    shifter size - smaller
    shifter shape
    hood material
    smoother gears going up
    smoother gears going down
    far better multiple shifting
    lighter over all
    complete aesthetics of the groupset
    better brakes
    doesn't feel that its made of plastic
    more reliable - doesn't fall apart like 8000
    serviceable
    rebuildable
    no pointless design features for no reason like the 8000 front mech
    far nicer and more pleasurable to work on and use

    the barrel adjuster on the rear mech by itself is far nicer designed, far better aesthetically and miles ahead in functionality than the whole of the 8000 groupset by itself.
    Campag also lasts longer because its better engineered, serviceable and all parts are available as opposed to the disposable nature of Shimano.

    Tbf the parts are available as there are only a small amount of people who will pay those prices.

    😜

    Do the shifters still have that protruding thumb switch?
  • MattFalle
    MattFalle Posts: 11,644
    At club level 10 years ago there was a good core of the best riders that built their own bikes and swore by Campag.

    but I can't help feeling what they really need is an affordable electronic groupset that gets specced on OEM bikes to get a new generation of riders using it.

    Top para:
    club bore. snoooooze. ignore.

    Second para:
    rubbish.

    what everyone needs to realuse is that well set up mechanical is as goos as electronic and for 80% of riders a far far better option and stop deep throating the marketing hyperbole.
    .
    The camera down the willy isn't anything like as bad as it sounds.