Lower gearing for 80s Benotto with Campy?
 

First of all, I apologize profusely for the lack of pics.

A customer has an 80s Benotto; he purchased it new, it fits him well, he loves the vintage appeal and the fact that it's all Campy. He refers to the componentry as 'Camponelli Victoria,' which I take to mean Campagnolo Victory.

While he loves the bike, he is asking for an overall lower gearing range. Right now he has the original equipment — 52/42 chainrings (teeth are in great shape), Campy front and rear derailleurs, and the freewheel has been changed to a 4-notch Suntour, which has a 24 tooth big ring. I think he'd like to keep the changes as simple as possible, as in not going with a new group/wheels/etc.

Seems to me we could either go with a wider range freewheel and some type of longer cage derailleur. OR possibly go with smaller chainrings. When I attempted to measure it with my TA chainring chart, it looked to be 110 BCD. But when I read about it online, I see lots of references to 116 BCD and difficulty getting replacements, left handed crank remover threads, etc.

Wondering what thoughts/suggestions you have for lower gearing on this bike? Not really looking for a new group, etc., unless that's the only option.

I'm going to link a great photo taken by Cudak888, in order to give you a visual reference. I certainly hope he doesn't mind. If I can upload my own crappy cell pic, I will update the thread.

http://www.jaysmarine.com/campagnolo_TRI_VIC_2.jpg

Thanks!

I think the chainrings are the way to go but they are hard to find especially with their 116mm bolt PCD. He may have to get a replacement BB and crank set-up if he wants lower gearing.

Yeah - a standard road double 53/39 up front, and a 30t freewheel in back will open it up considerably.

I did just that to my Mondia, and it worked fine. Didn't need a new bb, just a crank, freewheel, and Shimano Light Action RD. You might get away with using your RD - mine was a Very Short cage Suntour Superbe.

Velobase shows that victory 116 chainrings were available as small as 35 tooth (good luck finding one though . The RD should accommodate up to a 28 or possibly a 30 tooth freewheel cog. Probably much easier to rebuild the freewheel as a 7-speed 13-14-16-18-21-24-28 to increase the range. The gearing change from a 24 to 28 tooth chainring is a fairly substantial difference, it just wont have the tight gear spacing that a narrower freewheel provides.

Thanks for your insights, all!

So it sounds like finding compatible chainrings will be tough. So if we go with a wider range freewheel and a longer cage rear derailleur, would this cause any issues with the front derailleur? I can get a 28, maybe a 30, and even a 34 tooth freewheel, but I'm wondering if that will cause issues up front?

You will likely need to raise or lower the FD, but it should function just fine once adjusted.

I would simply suggest a nice mega range shimano or sachs FW and shimano RD and the shifting will be as good or better than he is used to.

if he does not mind loosing some of the top end you could always find something like a 15-30 FW and maybe that will work on the current RD

good to know. Thanks!

That sounds great. I was thinking a Shimano Alivio long cage derailleur and a 14-34 Megarange if it played nicely with the front derailleur. He has no problem with eliminating the higher gearing. He has 2 Regina corncobs that he's already had removed because he doesn't want to go fast. Thanks BG!

I think you should first try keeping the original campy derailler, install as large of a rear cog as you can get to fit with the campy and see if that is sufficient. A 42x30 is a pretty low gear and you can avoid the mega-jump between a 22 to 34 tooth gear to still have a nice progression of gears available for climbing. If you put a cheap shimano long cage derailler on this bike it will adversly impact the vintage character of the bike.
For a bit lower gearing, I would think that you might be able to modify a cheap and easily available 110mm BCD chainring to work on the 116 crank by ovalizing the chainring mounting holes outward my 3mm each.

I can see your point. I guess I expected the RD not to be able to handle a wider range freewheel.

What's kinda funny is that I had a bit of a hard time explaining to the owner that Campy doesn't exactly stock replacement parts for circa-1980s Victory gear : )

Campagnolo Victory/Triomphe compact chain rings pop up often on ebay (35t,36t & 50t). Be prepared to pay $75 plus for each to win them. Miche also makes/made a 116 bcd compact crankset for robbing the rings on the cheap. Tuff to find.

There was a long cage Triomphe/Victory rear derailler. I'd try and snag one of those on ebay and keep it sorta original. Chainrings, I don't know, not my time period.

Another option is to get a silver Campagnolo compact crankset. Here's my wife's setup with a 14-28 7spd freewheel.

http://i832.photobucket.com/albums/z...hiBrava-50.jpg

Which crankset model is pictured?

I've always liked Zeus as a wider range replacement for Campagnolo, but they're getting hard to find now also. Here's the 48/36 crank that replaced a 53/42 Super Record on my bike:

http://www.os2.dhs.org/~john/zeus-drillium.jpg