Does anyone remember the original Campag Syncro Gear Levers?

[rusty bodie]

if you do, you'll remember that they didn't work at all! i had a super record 753 at the time and couldn't wait to fit these new levers that promised SIS style shifting without having to change your block and rear mech - how wrong we were!!

did any gear levers, whether shimano or otherwise actually turn a super record rear mech into something wonderfully indexed or were we always doomed to doing out nuts on the top tube when out of the saddle??

:shock:

 

[mattr]

Christ, they were terrible.
Click, rattle rattle rattle clunk clink crack bang........... Dammit, time for another shift.

How many different inserts did they have available?

 

[rusty bodie]

Christ, they were terrible.
Click, rattle rattle rattle clunk clink crack bang........... Dammit, time for another shift.

How many different inserts did they have available?

aye, you remember them alright!!! they didn't work at all as i remember it and would get "the fear" getting up out of the saddle for dreading crashing down on to the top tube when the gears inevitably jumped!!

:shock:

i remember two different inserts - a 6 and a 7 speed. i wondered recently if the likes of the shimano 7 speed shifters etc would have worked with a super record rear mech. i'm sure they wouldn't but that old gear looked so damned cool!! too bad about the shytey shifters!

:?

 

[gfk_velo]

Re:

I did find a couple of combinations that worked "acceptably" but it took a while - the Croce d'Aune RD with a Sedis chain and a Regina America 6 speed, or a Regina Synchro (later) freewheel worked sort of OK so long as the block was "straight" or nearly so ... but they were not great.

It was all a bit difficult as the teams I was working with at the time as well as many of the riders that I worked with and / or raced with, were all on Campagnolo.

There was a trick to the set-up on both Synchro 1 and Synchro 2, though, which Campag never really talked about but the engineers at the factory let me in on - a bit similar to the 9 and 10s bar-end shifters which were launched in 2000 (which was the late version Synchro lever on a different mount anyway), the trick was to set in the middle of the cassette and average the errors - as is now the official advice anyway - but also to set the cable tension so that the top jockey was under the required sprocket when the lever was pushed fully forward in the detent for that sprocket.

At that time it was far less common to set the rear hanger accurately for alignment, too - a lot of installations suffered with that and again it was something not much discussed, even, in those days.

I can't recall if we were instructed to use non-compressive outer but I do remember using Shimano SIS outer cable at the back - that hurt, even back then - and running the inner cable through the metal BB tunnels in a short piece of nylon sleeve ...

I think Campagnolo, with Synchro 1 tried something very, very difficult - to make a system that would work with almost every RD they had made in the preceding 10 years or so, with many different makers chains and freewheels and all this with (in some cases) a non drop-parallelogram RD - a gloriously flawed attempt but with it's heart in the right place ...

 

[bodrobert]

Re:

I am using Campagnolo Syncro levers nowadays (I don't know if it is the first or the second version), and it works well on my road bike. My rear derailleur is Campagnolo Victory. It wasn't too good at first, but I've modified the derailleur a bit: I've rasped the "bumper" to get the top jockey wheel very close to the cogs. With this modification it shifts very well.

 

[colnagolover]

I have complete first gen. Chorus groupset with Syncro 1 shifters (6 speed) and, while a long way from a smooth index shift, the set-up works betterv than plain friction. I've been happy to ride with it since 1988 and, like all Campagnolo products, it shows no sign of ever wearing out and I just can't imagine ever wanting to change it for some other product. It'll probably outlive me anyway

 

[Penfold6290]

Evening all, I too have been through the ringer with Syncro levers, in my case Syncro II in 7 speed guise. Eventually I got it all working very nicely indeed but what a ball ache to begin with!

What I have found to work well on the two bikes I have with 7 speed Syncro shifting -

• C Record Syncro II levers, blue insert
  Athena Gen 1 RD
  Regina 7 speed silver chain courtesy of Nigel at Campy Oldy
  Regina America 7 speed freewheel - 13-23/13-26/14-28 also from Nigel

I have also had success with the same shifters, RD and chain as above but with a Shimano HG50 7 speed cassette in both 13-23 and 13-26. The indexing is as good but the shifting is so much better thanks to the sprocket design.

However, the following combination was less successful -

• C Record Syncro II levers, blue insert
  C Record Gen II RD
  Regina chain as above
  Regina 13-26/14-28 freewheels as above (13-23 was pretty good to be honest)

The C Record RD is a thing of beauty but the index shifting is woeful compared to the slant parallelogram design of the Athena. The key is keeping the distance from the top jockey wheel to the corresponding sprocket as uniform as possible, with the C Record (and its brethren) this is impossible, the smaller the sprocket the bigger the gap! I found correct RD hanger alignment on the frame absolutely critical but it's still very sensitive to adjustment. A barrel adjuster is necessary on the RD otherwise you're wasting your time, this is available for the C Record RD but I'm not sure about the Super Record. I fear the earlier RDs such as the Super Record were just not designed with this in mind and a sort of 'works OK' mentality prevailed.

Good luck!

Martin

 

[mattr]

I just gave up and bought a complete shimano groupset (600 ultegra IIRC). Managed to get rid of the freewheel, crappy indexing and delta brakes that worked ok (but not amazingly) in one fell swoop. The shimano stuff went on and just worked and worked...... and worked.

Unfortunately i sold the campag stuff, not knowing that a complete, immaculate CDA groupset (with a couple of record upgrades) would be worth a sodding fortune 25 years down the line.

 

[bodrobert]

The C Record RD is a thing of beauty but the index shifting is woeful compared to the slant parallelogram design of the Athena. The key is keeping the distance from the top jockey wheel to the corresponding sprocket as uniform as possible, with the C Record (and its brethren) this is impossible, the smaller the sprocket the bigger the gap! I found correct RD hanger alignment on the frame absolutely critical but it's still very sensitive to adjustment. A barrel adjuster is necessary on the RD otherwise you're wasting your time, this is available for the C Record RD but I'm not sure about the Super Record. I fear the earlier RDs such as the Super Record were just not designed with this in mind and a sort of 'works OK' mentality prevailed.

Good luck!

Martin

If I remember well, two type of C Record RD exists, the one has adjuster around the mounting bolt, while the other lacks it. In case of there is no adjuster there, you must modify the mounting to minimize the distance between the upper jockey wheel and the sprockets.

 

[Penfold6290]

The C Record RD is a thing of beauty but the index shifting is woeful compared to the slant parallelogram design of the Athena. The key is keeping the distance from the top jockey wheel to the corresponding sprocket as uniform as possible, with the C Record (and its brethren) this is impossible, the smaller the sprocket the bigger the gap! I found correct RD hanger alignment on the frame absolutely critical but it's still very sensitive to adjustment. A barrel adjuster is necessary on the RD otherwise you're wasting your time, this is available for the C Record RD but I'm not sure about the Super Record. I fear the earlier RDs such as the Super Record were just not designed with this in mind and a sort of 'works OK' mentality prevailed.

Good luck!

Martin

If I remember well, two type of C Record RD exists, the one has adjuster around the mounting bolt, while the other lacks it. In case of there is no adjuster there, you must modify the mounting to minimize the distance between the upper jockey wheel and the sprockets.

Not sure that's right, the barrel adjuster is machined such that it slides on the recess that the gear cable outer would normally occupy, it doesn't actually thread into the derailleur body itself like on later models. You then adjust the set screw on the RD body so that the clearance between the upper jockey wheel and the big sprocket is as small as it can be without touching.

Martin