Mixing components (campag and shimano)

[Young Un]

Right, my cross bike is giving me grief! Campag xenon ergo's mated to a shimano deore xt rear mech with a shimano cassette. I can almost get it to work, but not quite. Is it this not quite bit that is the difference between the pulls of shimano and campag, or should I let the lbs see if they can set it up?

Cheers
Steve

 

[bonj2]

Probably. You should take the campag components off your bike and put theme either on ebay or in the bin, and replace them with proper equivalents.

 

[Young Un]

Probably. You should take the campag components off your bike and put theme either on ebay or in the bin, and replace them with shimano equivalents.

Find me a set of cheap (30 quid) shimano sti's and I will!

 

[Sittingduck]

Probably. You should take the campag components off your bike and put theme either on ebay or in the bin, and replace them with proper equivalents.

Oh DO behave Bonj!

 

[Will1985]

Nooo! Don't ditch the Ergos (well you can, but let me know). If you'd asked a week ago I had a medium cage Xenon rear mech in Brum, but it's gone back to Norfolk now. Tell me a timescale and I could get it back for you.

 

[Young Un]

Nooo! Don't ditch the Ergos (well you can, but let me know). If you'd asked a week ago I had a medium cage Xenon rear mech in Brum, but it's gone back to Norfolk now. Tell me a timescale and I could get it back for you.

If I was to change the mech for a campag one, would I not need to change the freehub (shimano 105) to a campag one so I can put on campag cassettes?

 

[bonj2]

Find me a set of cheap (30 quid) shimano sti's and I will!

shop around - i got the ones on my scott for £40 from JE James. think that was a one off of some oem ones though...

 

[bonj2]

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Shimano-Ulteg...s_SR?hash=item2a00aba5dd&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Shimano-105-1...s_SR?hash=item5ad2cdd3a2&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14

 

[Will1985]

Good point. Are we talking 9 or 10 speed?

The easiest change would be the STIs.
For Campag, I can get you a mech, and then it would be a case of buying an Ambrosio cassette (Shimano spline, Campag spacing: 11-23, 12-23, 12-25, 13-28) for about £30.

 

[Crankarm]

Right, my cross bike is giving me grief! Campag xenon ergo's mated to a shimano deore xt rear mech with a shimano cassette. I can almost get it to work, but not quite. Is it this not quite bit that is the difference between the pulls of shimano and campag, or should I let the lbs see if they can set it up?

Cheers
Steve

The mismatch that is not making your transmission smooth appears to be your Campag Ergos with Shimano cassette. What speed drivetrain do you have?
The mech is irrelevant. Campag and Shimano have different ratchet pulls in their ergo and STI levers. You either, as has already been suggested, acquire some Shimano STIs or a cassette with slightly different spacing rings between the sprockets to match the Campag Ergo levers. But AFAIK Shimano cassettes have the 3, 4 or 5 largest sprockets fixed together on a carrier so splitting them might not be possible.

I run Shimano 8 spd quick fire shifters with a Campag Record 8 spd hub and cassette with Shimano mechs no problem but I think this is because it is 8 speed and NOT 9 or 10 spd which is not so forgiving.

Why not pick up a pair of cheap Tiagra STI units?

Hope this has helped.

 

[Will1985]

The mech is irrelevant.

It is relevant - each brand uses different parallelogram geometries, so the same length of cable pull will move each cage a different amount. This is why SRAM and Shimano aren't mixable for STIs and rear mechs, even though the cassettes are interchangeable.

 

[Joe]

What speed are your ergos and cassette?
10 speed Campag ergos pull the same cable as 8 speed Shimano, so cheapest option is just to wack an 8 speed Shimano spaced cassette in there (provided your Xenons are 10spd). I have this set up on my tourer and it works perfectly.

http://www.ctc.org.uk/desktopdefault.aspx?tabid=3946

Otherwise get yourself the appropriate shiftmate. They are a bit fidly to set up but shift perfectly. Great if you're on a budget and have a mish mash of incompatible parts. No need for stis!
http://jtekengineering.com/shiftmate.htm

 

[Young Un]

We're talking 9 speed here, sorry, well the cassette is 9 speed, is there a way to check the shifters?. Have had a look at shiftmates, but at $35 its a fair bit of money. I'll see if the lbs can get it working better than I can, and then will's idea of changing to a campag rear mech sounds like the best option.

 

[Will1985]

You would still need a different cassette Steve. Either way it is going to be about £30 outlay

 

[Dan B]

Look at the CTC link that Joe posted, that's Chris Juden and pretty much canonical on this subject