Kommisar89

Yeah I know, that's not exactly a C&V question but I figure most of the Campaphiles hang out here and if I posted on the road forum I'd just get abuse (come to think of it, most anything you post on the road forum results in abuse but I digress). Anyway, in the interest of stimulating interesting and thoughtful discussion...

Back in the day I will certainly admit there was an anti-Japanese bias. Only the most enlightened cyclist knew or cared that the Japanese were making some seriously nice components that in many cases were better than their European counterparts. Then the Japanese blew into town like a hurricane and when all was said and done much of the European bicycle component industry was gone and even the once mighty Campagnolo was hanging on by a thread. From a technical perspective when the dust settled from the Campy vs. Shimano wars it was really a draw. Campagnolo had survived long enough to redesign their product line and build products that perform as well as their Shimano counterparts. But out in the cycling world today, the impression I usually get is that Campagnolo makes overpriced crap that only old timers and poseurs use. You can start a pretty lively discussion about the merits of Shimano vs. SRAM but throw Campagnolo in there and you get anything from blank stares to derisive comments that to me at least seem out of touch with the actual technical merits of the products.

Could it be that the real result of the 80's Campy vs. Shimano wars is really a generation that no longer takes Campagnolo seriously, ignoring the technical merits of the products, and essentially displaying the same bias that the Campaphiles once displayed against Shimano (and SunTour)? What do you think?

For the record, I don't see any particularly notable difference between the offerings of the big three - Campagnolo, Shimano, SRAM. In any given year one of them might introduce a new feature or improvement but the other two will quickly catch up so it really seems to come down to whose integrated shifter/brake levers and aesthetics you prefer.

SweetLou

I wouldn't say Campagnolo is crap, but I don't care for it. I would much rather have Suntour. For today's bikes, I would rather have Shimano. Is there a bias? For me there is, but not because of some prejudice against Italian components. It is because I believe Suntour of the past and Shimano of today make better equipment.

miamijim

Personaly, I think Campy got off very easy for a long time. They were given a free pass forever.

My experience with Campy began in the early to mid 80's. For arguements sake lets say things were equal amongst the big 3 or 4. After Shimano blind sided the cycling world with the vastly superior New Dura Ace in 1985 in took Campy until 1992 to have a reliable group.

For 7 years they had unreliable indexing systems that were simply under engineered. How do you tell a customer who just purchased a $2500 bike that they have 'deal with it'? Shimano's entry level 'Z'/light action derailleurs blow Campys '85-'91 index offerings out of the water. Period.

Fast forward to 200X and Campy is still having issues. I recall recently reading about issues with play in their cranksets. Enough is enough, place good quality components that work into the market place or 'deal with it.'

Lets face it....the NR crankset is notorious for cracking yet people still drool over them and pay top for then on ebay. Have they gotten a free pass for too long? Yes.

onetwentyeight 

With my customers I see a lot of people really liking modern campagnolo equipment, but being unable to justify the extra cost. Shimano is winning the component war at least here in the US due to being really good quality, and relatively affordable for what you get. As bike prices seem to be steadily increasing, and the economy steadily tanking, I dont forsee a reversal of that any time soon.

Each of the 3 main component manufacturers make really great groupsets, I would have a very hard time saying one is better than another, they just work differently and have their own merits to them. After a certain point it becomes personal preference. As you said in the original post, feature wise there is no real stand out between any of the 3, and lever ergonomics and function are the real difference that most people see.

I am a big campy fan, I like their stuff but they do have a lot of idiosyncracies that drive me up the wall (ask me about their non standard bcd's on their compact ultra torque cranks!). I also wished they supported cyclocross better.

Shimano I dont like that the shifters aren't rebuild able or repairable, and the lever bodies are huge, which makes it difficult for smaller handed folks.

and with SRAM i just dont like how double tap works. (and there are reported problems with the Red rear derailleur cages not holding up)

disclaimer: i work at a bike shop, and my most ridden bike mixes Record and XTR.

Kommisar89

I wouldn't call that a bias as long as you have some reason behind why you feel Shimano is better today. Everyone is free to weigh the facts and make up their mind and you chose Shimano. But most of the people I run into have never used modern Campagnolo equipment and yet dismiss it and declare that Shimano or SRAM is better.

B17

I do wish Campagnolo had continued to issue cantilevers and friction bar-end shifters and not used black on any of their components, but beyond that, I don't see any reason not to prefer it to Shimano or Suntour. It's really a matter of brand love and aesthetics. The original reason I liked the Ergopower stuff better was that the cables were neatly tucked beneath the tpe for a cleaner look, and because the brifters look better and their shape matches anatomic bars better, IMO. Now, I just automatically use Campagnolo as default whenever I can find what I'm looking for and Shimano as a backup plan.

Grim

The Japanese are VERY good at making a quality part at a very reasonable price and marketing them in such a way that they can produce them at a very high rate further lowering the cost.

I have as yet to own anything Campy. I really look forward to the day I do find something so I can see what the "Campy" hubb bubb is all about. Tha said I have had experiance with Suntour and Shimano and even the cheapest parts work as promised. I'd be really pissed off if a part that cost twice as much performed half as well.

The Europeans have that tendency. You look at Jags, Ferrari, Lambos etc and while a beautiful product they all have reliability issues when compared to the average bottom of the line Japanese vehicle or even today's average US manufactures. Hell my buddy is driving a Chevy truck with 275,000 miles on it with it's original transmission. It uses no oil, Starts first try and the A/C will freeze you out and he wouldn't think twice about driving it cross country tomorrow. One of the people we work with had a Jag and it seemed to be in the shop once a month. Finally dumped it and got a Lexus.

They are all riding on their name and they exclusivity. From a performance and reliability standpoint you could put a top of the line Corvette against ANY exotic and it will be as fast if not faster, cost less and be 10 times as reliable and more friendly to drive regularly and it would actually get 25+mpg with the A/C on comfortably drive it 1000 miles and have a conversation with the passenger without shouting when driven sanely. You can pull it into any podunk Chevy dealer and get it repaired or serviced at a reasonable rate. Yeah a Veyron will be faster top end but its not often you get to open anything up to run 200+MPH. In the real world day to day driving it is a wash if anything the Vett is much more civil. The Vett just doesn't have that European mystique and visually it is not as eye catching.

The Bike industry mirrors that exact same tendency. Its brand recognition more so then the quality being better.

scozim 

Interesting topic. I started riding a lot in the mid-80's on Peugeot's with Simplex components. Then my dad got into cycling and he was all about Campy. Shimano hit the market so hard that I just avoided their products and gravitated to Campy when I went to my Bianchi - the only problem I have had in 12 yrs with Campy is a vibration in one of the ergo shifters. I love those components. My dad even gave me most of his old Super Record group and I'll eventually find the right frame for them.

Now, as I've started gathering older bikes to work on and ride I've begun swapping original parts (Simplex and Ofmega) with Suntour (and I really like them). Some of the older Campy stuff has been priced too high for my budget. Heck, even some of the Shimano 600 stuff gets up there in price. Suntour seems to be readily available, even some NOS items, and is definitely reasonably priced.

So, no, I don't have an anti-Campy bias but, instead an anti-Shimano bias.

onetwentyeight 

campagnolo's cantis were never that good anyway, the best ones have always been from 3rd parties... Mafacs originaly, now Pauls (imho)

they still offer bar end shifters, I'd be surprised if (like shimano) you cant switch between indexed and friction, but I do not know for sure.

Kommisar89

I'm not arguing with you there Miamijim - the 80's were a bad time for Campy and they probably only survived because of their prior history and reputation. But did that ruin their reputation to the point that people today ignore their current products regardless of their technical merits? I read about the guy complaining about their new cranks over on campyonly.com but you could log onto just about any site and find somebody complaining about something whether it's Campy, Shimano, SRAM or anything else so I'm not putting much stock in that as of yet.

Grim

But you also need to take into account that you hear about and remember problems. You don't hear about much when it all works as promised. You also need to take into account even the most popular Campy items is out sold 100 fold by Shimano of the equal hierarchy part.

sced

Shimano, SRAM, and Campagnolo all know what the are doing ,so today it's just a matter of taste. Same with old equipment because it's just used recreationally. Buying today's Campy from distributors in the UK has made it much more affordable and competitive with the other makes. Campagnolo won how many TdF's before Lance came along? Their stuff was always good, if not always the very best functionally. I think that in addition to their unparalleled racing legacy, the reason old Campy sells for so is much on Ebay is that a lot of it is really aesthetically beautiful and makes for a sharp looking classic bike.

cb400bill

Speaking of Lance, he raced with Dura-Ace during his TDF winning days. But, now that he is back, he and his new team are racing with SRAM.

Except Lance is still using his Dura-Ace pedals.

onetwentyeight 

If SRAM made road pedals he'd probably be using them. Yay sponsorship!

subroc

I work at a bike shop restoring or building vintage bikes. I have an apreciation for both camy and suntour. Shimano i like as well but not as much as these other two. As another said above me Campy pretty much had it easy for years and years until the Japanese discovered how to make a better shifting derailure. I think it was about the time that suntour superbe groupo came out that Campy got scared. I have superbe on my lotus and would not trade it for campy record. Why? cause its different and shifts better than old school campy record. Better design. Is it as pretty. Not really. Italians knew how to make a beautiful bike with beautiful components. A quote i remember from Sheldon Browns website "campy derailurs are built very well but dont shift well...result..they shifted like crap forever"...or something along those lines.

Kommisar89

Now that's funny.

When it comes to vintage stuff I usually don't concern myself too much with how it works. If I were worried about that I'd ride a modern bike. Probably the only exceptions to that are with freewheels and pedals. I'll typically use a Shimano or SunTour freewheel to get better shifting performance and better choice of gears than I could with Regina. Once it gets a bit of grease on it, it's not very noticeable anyway. For pedals I like my Look clipless and run them on all my road bikes except for my commuter.

B17

I've had two sets of the black Olympus cantis ad they were fine. I won't debate your statement about other brands being better, but I've never had a situation where I felt that I needed Paul of Mafac cantis instead.

Wrt Campagnolo's recent bar-end shifters- AFAIK they have no friction option. What really pisses me off is that Paul hasn't come out with a set of thumbies that will accept Campagnolo DT or B-E shifters without a lot of kludging. It's like everyone just jumped into cahoots with Shimano for the $$$. Yeah, I know- they're businesses.

Picchio Special

That about says it. It all works pretty well and looks about the same. Too bad in the quest for sameness no one can make a dedicated touring/randonneuring group.

Kommisar89

It's kind of a vicious circle...go into most any LBS and you see Shimano, Shimano, Shimano and maybe a bit of SRAM, especially cassettes and chains. If there is any Campagnolo, it's only Record so it's way expensive stuff. You won't find too many shops carrying Veloce or Centaur much less something like Mirage. If it's out of site it's out of mind and nobody buys it. Plus, since Campy doesn't make mountain bike gear and many (probably most) young riders went from bmx to mountain to road in their cycling progression they've been using Shimano or SRAM for years. It hard to break that habit. But while that affects the volumne of products sold it doesn't really have much to do with the quality of the products themselves.

Mike Mills

The debate about which to buy today is very different than which to buy back in 1972. In '72, Nuovo Record was deservedly the king. I have Campagnolo Nuovo Record on my bike. It's there NOT because it's the best performing component set on the market today. It's there because it's what I put on it when the bike was built.

When I built up my Bob Jackson in 1975, Nuovo Record was the best available component group. The Shimano Crane rear derailleur had come out, so had Dura Ace, but these were largely unknown and unproven. I did not want to be the guinea pig.

For the record, I did own first generation Crane derailleur and Dura Ace brakes. I still have the brakes. I have a box full of Shimano DeOre XT and Suntour Superbe derailleurs. My bike still proudly wears its Nuovo Record group.

UnsafeAlpine

I've been using 06 Centaur components on my bike. I haven't ridden comparable Shimano components, but one of the things I've noticed is the detail of the Campy stuff. The little engravings, the bolt that all say Campagnolo. Campy makes a much more detailed product. I prefer the shifting set-up to the swinging brake levers of Shimano. I'd be interested in riding a comparable Shimano equipped bike, but I'm extremely happy with Campy.

I should state that all my parts were bought as NOS so I got a pretty good deal on them.

well biked

I put 2009 Campy Centaur on my recently acquired '97 lugged steel Pinarello, and I chose that parts group for a couple of reasons:

It's made in Italy (it's a vibe kind of thing, this is the only Italian bike I've owned).

The aluminum version of '09 Centaur really does look nice to me; of all the modern groups I think it looks best on my lugged steel Pinarello.

As a bonus, it works great, at least so far.

tatfiend 

LBSs seem to carry the brands and models that are manufacturer fitted to bikes, or upgrades thereof. These days that is primarily Shimano and SRAM. In the 1970's for high end road bikes it was Campy. Looking at currennt bike catalogs how many road bikes from major manufacturers are available with Campy? The way to succeed in the bike business at the component level is to have your equipment specified and used by the bike manufacturers/distributors.

Outside of road bikes Campy does not offer any suitable comkponents and even when they did offer MTB groups none of the major American manufacturers/distributors specified it for use on their products.

From figures I have seen drop bar road bikes are currently about 12% of total LBS sales. This means that at maximum Campy could be fitted to only that %age of bikes. In reality their American sales are far smaller than that.

Many riders are going to presume that current Campy must be inferior due to it not being fitted to new road bikes that they are familiar with. Not necessarily true but perceptions control sales.

I keep wondering if Campy will stay in business. If the American market was their sole source of sales quite possibly not. Any one have any idea of their market levels in Europe, Japan or elsewhere currently?

roccobike

Kommisar, I guess I'm not "anti-Campagnolo", as much as I am "why should I buy Campagnolo?" IMHO, Campy has created an elitist marketing image. When someone is buying an entry level or lower mid-level bike today, they don't consider Campy because it's not really an option. When I purchased a new road bike last year, I wanted full carbon, 9 or 10 speed and I wanted to keep it around $1700. When I shopped around, mentioning Campagnolo immediatley drew a "not in your price range" response from all the shops I went to. But mention 105 and the response was "of course".
I still view Campy as a sort of Caddilac or Lexus of the road world, something nice, but it still performs a basic function that a 105/Tiagra (Chevy or Camry) performs getting you from point A to point B reliably. I'm not a racer so what difference will it make to a B class rider other than some nice bling. So my question remains, why do want Campagnolo, what's in it for me other than bling?

repechage

Campagnolo has never been as big a volume producer as say Shimano. Shimano worked their way up for volume and respect, Campagnolo has worked their way down market for volume.

As mentioned previously, SRAM will I think keep both of the other mfgs. on their toes going forward.

One problem with Shimano is repairability, Ergo's can be rebuilt, even upgraded to higher capacity, Shimano B'rifters are not supported for repair, you are supposed to toss them, and buy new... clever.

Campagnolo did just announce a wholesale price decrease for the USA market, the dollar got stronger. In the past that would just be extra profit, but today a necessary thing to do. So, they now have to admit elastic demand.

I'm a fan of Campagnolo, but I must acknowledge that others have pushed them forward from time to time... Now, where is the Ultra-Torque Pista crankset?