nerdag said:
Do you know if a left 07/08 QS shifter will work with such a setup? From my reading, I suspect that the "semi-indexing" of the QS shifters would work, but haven't been able to see them in action to verify either way.
My preliminary findiing (
i.e., the critical, bottom line!) is that
the 2007 Campagnolo QS front/(left)
shifter does, indeed, work with a Shimano 6503 front derailleur + Ultegra 6503 crankset (where the Ultegra triple crank was installed on a 112.5mm XTR bottom bracket -- it's what I have my DA crank installed on -- almost the perfect
Octalink bottom bracket if you don't have/need an Italian BB, BTW, and you don't get bent out of shape about the Q-factor being offset by an additional ~1.5mm). The actual triple crankset & BB are irrelevant to the test, of course.
I used THREE indents to move the chain up from the granny to the middle chainring & TWO indents to move the chain onto the outer ring from the middle ring.
The larger ring was an older, 52t, 8-speed 105 ring (
whew -- gotta make the test tougher than with the "ideally" ramped-and-pinned chainring just to put the shifters
through their paces), and the shifting was
fine once I had the outer stop re-set (you would think that it would't have changed from where it was with the double OR something about the cable travel is ever so slightly different OR the crank wasn't bolted onto the spindle as far/tightly) ... but, it was only coming off a 42t middle ring that was originally on the crank instead of a 39t.
The smoothest shifting is, of course, was when the chain is on the middle cog in the rear!
The TWO downshifting indents allowed the chain to fall onto the proper ring, respectively ...
Trimming is almost as refined & can be done by up-shifting, if necessary, after dumping onto whichever smaller chainring the chain is on ...
So, I guess it actually is
quicker if you don't have to move the cage back out!
The thumb shifter (both, left & right) are limited to ONE shift at a time ... the hood isn't even slotted ... cursory inspections suggests that there is a physical impediment on the shifter body which would not allow the thumb lever to move further, regardless.
The right shifter can downshift multiple cogs, still, but upshifting to smaller cogs with the thumb shifter is one cog at a time -- this is not as much of a potential handicap as it is with OTHER brands because the thumb shifter's range of motion is so short that I am sure a fairly rapid fire dumping of the cassette could be executed with a "twitchy" thumb action.
Even though my intention is to use them with a DOUBLE, I'm very pleased to find that the 2007 QS ERGO shifters will
still function with some-if-not-all Shimano front derailleurs when the proper chain is used (
NB. In the past, I could easily get away with a MISMATCHED front derailleur & chain -- e.g., 8-speed front derailleur & 9-speed chain); so, I think the new QS ERGO shifters will probably work with your current setup.
NB. I do NOT know how the 2007 QS
innards compare with the XENON's internal mechanism -- it could be the same, it might simply be a slight modification thereof, or it might actually be a "new" design.
BTW. Due to a little laziness on my part, it took longer than necessary to rig the left-hand/front QS shifter to my Shimano
6503 (Ultegra "triple") front derailleur ...
I think it took me longer to adjust because I had to fiddle with the derailleur's stops (which means I'll have to putz with them when I restore things) ... but, if the stops are already "right" on your bike, then you will just have to tension the cable, properly.
For the most part, installation is, of course, similar to installing a regular ERGO shifter
except you NEED to peel back the hood to get at the shifter's innards (vs. potentially just poking the cable through the slit in the bottom of the hood, which was not the ideal way) ...
Nontheless, I reckon that it will ALWAYS require slightly more time (for me, at least) to set up the front shifters than with a traditional 13-indent/(
12-clicks) ERGO shifter AND the barrel adjuster may subsequently need to be tweaked more frequently. Maybe, not!?!
I do NOT know how the shifters will actually feel on the road ... it won't be as drastic going between a "regular" ERGO shifters & a QS shifter as it would be to go from an ERGO to a Shimano-or-SRAM shifter.
BTW2.
WHETHER the QS is to mollify the newbies (AND, the long time Shimano-users, too!) who are comparing the feel of the Campagnolo shifters with Shimano's at their LBS [who subsequently think they like the lighter feel of the Shimano shifters rather than the stiffer feel of "classic" Campagnolo shifters]
OR BECAUSE Campagnolo would like people like myself to stop saying that their Centaur/Veloce/Mirage shifters are functionally equivalent to the Record/Chorus shifters and it is unnecessary to spend the extra money, the final product IS physically lighter & truly does have a really light feel when there is
N'T a derailleur attached to them compared with the traditional feel with which many of us are familiar ...
... The Veloce QS pair weighed about 340 grams vs. the 400+ grams for the pre-2007 model ... some of that weight is from the use of COMPOSITE material for at least ONE of the internal parts which had formerly been metal.
)
