It looks like Campagnolo will be releasing a 13 speed gravel group in September. There isn't much info out yet, but I am looking forward to this. I had never ridden Campagnolo, but last year I got a Canyon Endurace with a Campy group and it is amazing. My favorite component is the brakes which perform better than anything Shimano or SRAM make (I also have Force and Ultegra bakes). I really wanted to switch to Campy just to get the brakes for my gravel bike, but I run 1x and they do not have a clutch derailleur right now. So I would assume the new group will have a clutch derailleur.
Sounds like a 9-42, 13 speed cassette, which would be really nice. I run 1x with a 10-42 cassette which has plenty of range for me, but the jumps between gears can be annoying.
I made a mechanical Mullet with a 12s Chorus shifter and a Eagle derailleur with a Jtek Shiftmate 2 in place of the original cable pulley. Shifting gears are perfect, the Campy shifter are ergonomic and for gravel up and down four gears at once is great.
Phillipe wrote:I made a mechanical Mullet with a 12s Chorus shifter and a Eagle derailleur with a Jtek Shiftmate 2 in place of the original cable pulley. Shifting gears are perfect, the Campy shifter are ergonomic and for gravel up and down four gears at once is great.
Thats a very cool setup. So you just replaced the existing pulley on the Eagle derailleur with the pulley from the Shiftmate 2? How did you figure this out, J-Tek do not advertise this.
While I love Campy, use it on my road bikes, and would be thrilled to put it on my gravel bike, it seems that they're still suffering from the same fixation on the high-end of the gearing range as SRAM, Shimano and Rotor. A 120"+ top gear is useless to me - especially on dirt - and effectively turns this into a 12 or even 11-speed cassette with huge gearing jumps. Ugh!
By all means, they should offer it for riders who can use it, but they should also offer options for mere mortals. Hopefully, Miche or somebody will start making 12 and 13-speed cassettes with reasonable gearing soon. Or maybe Rotor's 13-speed cassette and hub will be compatible. At least that starts with a 10 and offers 10-36, 10-39, 10-46, 10-52 options, so you you can pick your desired range and an appropriate chainring.
So with a 9t back you'd use a 36t front for the same 4:1 as the 40:10 I have now, giving a 36/42 low which would be about the same as a ~40/47 low which would be good, could probably go even lower, though I use the 40/10 on the road a bit.. Can't afford Campy so kinduva moot point for me though.
I think the appeal of the 9 tooth cog is that it makes the whole system weigh less because you use a smaller cassette and a smaller chainring. There are a few downsides, its more inefficient to use smallers gears (probably lose a couple watts) and greater wear. However for marketing purposes it always help to say your groupset weighs less than the competition. It is kind of amazing that gravel is the biggest growing segment in cycling, yet we still can't seem to get manufacturers to make what people actually want. I don't really like this new trend of offering only 1 or 2 cassette choices for a groupset. Back in the "old days" you had a lot more choices for cassettes.
Exactly. For example, in their 10 Speed road groups, Campy had cassettes starting with 11, 12 and 13-tooth cogs. That went away with 11-speed. I can't remember the last time that SRAM road cassettes were available with anything other than an 11. Shimano has had a very limited number of road cassettes available with 12s. The lack of options - from all manufacturers - sucks.
While you can save a handful of grams with a 9 or 10-tooth cog and a smaller chainring, I'd rather have a smoother, more efficient drivetrain.
For gravel, I don't need a 4:1 ratio, either. I'm currently running a 2x11, 46/30, with a 12-32 Miche cassette (3.83:1 top gear) , which is plenty for my needs (slightly smaller would even be fine with me). This would be equivalent to a 38x10 or 42x11. Given the option on a 1x, I'd go with a 38t or 40t chainring and an 11-42 13-speed cassette, which would give me plenty of range for gravel and keep the gearing jumps tolerable.
Phillipe wrote:I made a mechanical Mullet with a 12s Chorus shifter and a Eagle derailleur with a Jtek Shiftmate 2 in place of the original cable pulley. Shifting gears are perfect, the Campy shifter are ergonomic and for gravel up and down four gears at once is great.
This groupset with a 9-42 cassette looks like an ideal upgrade for my gravel bike. I think I'll wait a bit until more wheelsets compatible with this new N3W hub standard are available.
Despite what the announcements have said about availability, Rodeo-Labs is saying December before they’ll have Ekar bottom brackets to assemble bikes. I guess I have time to save.
Competitive Cyclist appears to have very limited quantities of everything in stock (less than 2 of everything), including 68mm English, and 70 mm Italian bottom bracket cups, but Rodeo uses T47 don't they?
