Campagnolo 12-Speed

[SchallUndRauch]

Well for going up hills on gravel, something like 30 front/30 rear would be nice. I think Campa is out of the gravel game, however, since they don't have any clutch mechanism for the RD. And the respective patents probably are held by SRAM/Shimano...

[ultimobici]

Campag know plenty about gravel. Their stuff was good enough for Tiesj Benoot to win Strade Bianche.


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[SchallUndRauch]

Yeah well, there's gravel and there's gravel. I would not recommend doing the Dirty Kanza with a clutchless RD.

[graeme_f_k]

Yeah well, there's gravel and there's gravel. I would not recommend doing the Dirty Kanza with a clutchless RD.

The way the 12v RD works with the Embrace mechanism essentially duplicates the way that a clutched RD works, without a clutch ... the stability of the parallelogram is exceptional and shifting is identical between big and small chainrings because the Embrace mechanism holds the parallelogram in the same position regardless of whether big or small chainring is engaged.

I ran 34 x 32 on the Rollercoaster 6-day gravel race in South Africa last year and that was OK even on the 165km / 2500m vertical queen stage with 4 successive climbs with peak gradients of 20% plus ...

[Miller]

My CX/gravel bike is kitted with Potenza Disc. On Sunday I rode an astoundingly muddy and rocky CX sportive in the Chilterns and the Potenza drivetrain was rock solid. No hassle at all with front and rear shifting. I really do not agree that 1X is mandatory for mixed terrain riding. I can see why bike manufacturers like it, it's one fewer component to supply and install, but the benefit to the consumer is much more obscure. 2 x 11 simply gives you more range than 1 x 11 and front gear shifting is a solved problem, right?

Far too much hype around 1X for gravel.

[kgibbo1868]

Sorry if this is a silly question, but if I want to run Campagnolo 12 speed ( or any mechanical grupset) on a frame with external cable routing can I have the cables crossing at the head tube aka “Cal style”? I don’t want the cables to cross along the down tube so is there any solution for this?

[Calnago]

There's nothing specific about 12sp Campy that limits your cable routing options over other mechanical drivetrains. Your frame will determine what options are available to you. Not exactly sure what you want to end up with, but if you cross just once in front of the headtube so that the rear derailleur cable enters the left side of the downtube and the front derailleur cable enters the right side of the downtube, then the cables will have to cross before they get to the guide at the bottom bracket area. They can either cross internally which has been made much easier with today's fat tubes and internal routing or, if you have external cabling as you mention, then they would have to cross underneath the downtube. That was usually an easy thing in the old days as tubes were skinny and the bosses usually low, so that the tube didn't interfere with the crossing. But if your bosses aren't low enough to be able to clear the downtube where they cross then no, you need to "double cross" at the front then run the cable down their respective sides.

For instance, here's my C50 which will not allow a single cross up front as the downtube would get in the way when they have to cross again underneath the downtube on their way to the BB guide... but Colnago did a really nice job of placing the bosses far enough out that even with the double cross in the front of the head tube, there is no rub on the headtube, so in this case I prefer the cables double crossed up front and then running down their respective sides. I generally prefer this method on frames that nicely allow it, such as this C50 does... allowing you to kind of "frame" the headtube logo/badge between the double cross of derailleur cables out front. The exception would be if the frame is super small and crossing under the downtube makes for a smoother bend from bars to downtube. Or, on many modern frames today, the cables are entering in the downtube in places that really make it pretty much impossible to do a double cross up front without having significant headtube rub, thus from my C59 onwards, all my bikes have the internal crossing of the derailluer cables. The C50...


And here's my C60 which lends itself really nicely to a single cross in front of the headtube and the second cross internally in the downtube...

Hmmm... I've since played with different stems and spacers to finally settle on a 130mm -8 degree Deda Zero 100 stem with an 8mm carbon spacer plus a 3mm red "bling" spacer underneath... this is where it finally ended up...


Even turning the bars acutely the cable housings never touch the headtube, and the bends are nice and relaxed, keeping internal cable friction to a miniumum...


Bit of a sidetrack from 12sp specific stuff, but since you asked... there it is.

[kgibbo1868]

Great answer as always, thanks! For my build it will be externally routed and the boss position will not allow for a cable crossing under the down tube. I was hoping there was a BB cable guide that would cross the cables but it looks like I will need to a double crossing in front of the head tube.....


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[XCProMD]

My CX/gravel bike is kitted with Potenza Disc. On Sunday I rode an astoundingly muddy and rocky CX sportive in the Chilterns and the Potenza drivetrain was rock solid. No hassle at all with front and rear shifting. I really do not agree that 1X is mandatory for mixed terrain riding. I can see why bike manufacturers like it, it's one fewer component to supply and install, but the benefit to the consumer is much more obscure. 2 x 11 simply gives you more range than 1 x 11 and front gear shifting is a solved problem, right?

Far too much hype around 1X for gravel.

1x was a very good idea for dual suspension MTB’s, more the more travel they had. On a MTB, you find yourself smashing gears uphill quite often, and chain management can be complicated when the suspension enlarges and shortens the chain line across its travel.

Even so, I made an experiment and used DA 7970 for 2 Enduro racing seasons. The front shifting was no longer an issue. Actually the rear one became a problem as the RD7970 was not the most reliable thing out of a Shimano drawing board, and stretching it past its spec limits used to fried it in a short period of time. Checking the numbers from those seasons I went through 7 RD’s in roughly 9 months of racing ( including 2 EWS races, as an indicative of what we’re talking about).

I think it’s a pity that Shimano couldn’t get more interest in their Di2 from the MTB world. To start with, an expensive RD will never help because it’s one of the most exposed components. Then there were too many cases of resolvers failing and batteries draining, that didn’t help either. The new 12s XTR seems to be a sign of the Japanese focusing more on mechanical for MTB.

But electronic FD was a real problem solver. It would have made possible to avoid such large and heavy cassettes adding to the unsprung mass of the rear wheel.

In gravel, as long as there’s no rear suspension and riding other than on the flats is the field of application, I fail to see the benefit of 1x. Especially when even the mechanical road groupsets shift so good these days.

[Miller]

Checking the numbers from those seasons I went through 7 RD’s in roughly 9 months of racing

I think it’s a pity that Shimano couldn’t get more interest in their Di2 from the MTB world. To start with, an expensive RD will never help because it’s one of the most exposed components.

That must have been expensive.

I see that Sram will be pushing their new Excess group for gravel, I shudder at the thought of such expensive componentry meeting the mud that most of my off-road ventures encounter.

[XCProMD]

It was sponsored (not by Shimano but anyway). But yes it was crazy.

As much as I’m for electronic controls (not only shifting but suspension, telescopic seatposts, etc) I understand many can’t consider a 400 € RD as a realistic alternative for MTB’s. Actually in Enduro many downgrade their RD,s to GX or NX

[Calnago]

Far too much hype around 1X for gravel.

1x was a very good idea for dual suspension MTB’s, more the more travel they had. On a MTB, you find yourself smashing gears uphill quite often, and chain management can be complicated when the suspension enlarges and shortens the chain line across its travel.

Good post. Other than what you describe above with large travel full suspension mountain bikes and gear mashing up hills over rocks and roots... playing havoc with the chain and ever changing effective dropout to BB distances and angles, etc, I can’t think of any scenario where 2x wouldn’t always be my preferred option to have at my disposal, gravel included.

[mattr]

1x was a very good idea for dual suspension MTB’s, more the more travel they had. On a MTB, you find yourself smashing gears uphill quite often, and chain management can be complicated when the suspension enlarges and shortens the chain line across its travel.

Not to mention the interference from pivot and shock location. Quite a few early FS bikes have had their suspension geometry compromised to either allow for a front mech to be fitted at all or to allow for multiple chainring sizes. Alternatively they end up mounted to the swing arm. Which isn't ideal.
Thankfully DM and side swing have alleviated quite a few of the issues.

[octav]

Just finished a one week 350km of rides with the my new Super Record 12 speed fitted on a Colnago CX Zero. THe rides were done in Slovenia(Maribor) and had flat, climbs and steep descents.
I can say that the difference between SR11 is almost invisible besides the rear derailleur. That works really great with all type of combinations small/big ring with any sprocket. It just works nice, although it is pretty ugly(my friend from SLovenia was riding on his Record 11 pre 2015 red accents with the lovely crankset)
+Rear derailleur functionality
+Crankset: Initially it didn't impress me but now it really looks good
-Brake clearance for the rear. It worked with the skeleton to have 28mm Mavic tire on the back. Now it doesn't work, the clearance is minimal and I need to change the tire. They just marketed bull**it. I will go with 2x GP5000 25mm
-Rear Derailleur design
Neutral: Fron shifting seems to be the same
N: Brakes seem to have the same stopping power, I can't see a major difference it works flawless like it used to with Bora wheels
N:Ergopowers are basically the same, small changes that I can't really feel
For me, it was the opportunity to sell my Etap, put the SR11 on the gravel/cycloross bikes and buy the SR12 for the road bike. Otherwise I would have kept SR11

[Kjetil]

While we wait on the weather:



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