Campagnolo Reviews 7

I asked Campagnolo what the safe torque setting is to mount Record brake levers on my carbon racing handlebars. Campa did not send any answer. Probably they know their ergopowers are unsafe. They may slip if one applies the max 8Nm the bar manufacturer prescribes. That's probably why the Campa user manual is full with death threat warnings. However if you exceed the 8Nm to the Campa spec of 10Nm is even more dangerous. You may break your handlebar. @ CAMPA: MENTION HERE THE SAFE TORQUE SETTING FOR CARBON BARS, CAMPAGNOLO!? (If you don't mention it in private mail, you will get the same question in public).

I bought a new wheelset for nearly $4k, and I thought that I would have excellent warranty support if something happened. But I already spent a week talking (this is mostly monologue) with their support, and they don't want to help me and only cry because they don't have any officials in my country. I propose they may contact any mechanic or shop in my area so we can close this case (I already did the same thing with Trek SLR recall and they excellently completed the recall case with my handlebar). But Campy just ignored it and repeated the same thing.

Now to repair my wheelset I need to pay 1/4 of its price, only after a couple of thousands km. I have a Marchese wheelset that has 30k km and still works perfectly without any problem. And I also had multiple products from Campy over my life, but they were reliable af. Even my Chorus groupset has the same mileage as a Marchese wheelset.

Now I really can see that Campy became a cheap Chinese product with Italian style. Sad and pricy.

Last Friday, whilst shifting to the large chain ring on a flat road right after leaving my home to start the ride, the left shifter's small downshift paddle just broke. I've literally used the groupset for only 1000kms. The replacement part (EC12-CHDB101) will cost me at least $250, almost as much as a new brand new brake lever with the caliper.

I'm literally very disappointed with the durability of the product. This wasn't my expectation and my impression of campagnolo.

I wrote them and received the following answer:

"Sorry for the inconvenience and thanks for choosing our product."

I believe I should be compensated both for my financial loss and losing three weeks to replace the arm in the height of the training season.

I ordered a shirt from them, which had the shield logo on the chest, arm, and back. The shirt I received did not have the logo on the arm or back. The amount of time I had to spend resolving this was much greater than the value of the shirt. They made returning it difficult, even though it wa 100% their fault.

I purchased Fulcrum Sport CX wheels (Fulcrum is a Campagnolo brand) in April 2020. Since then, I've had to replace the rear wheel's cassette body twice, once at the start of every bike season, as they were completely rusted each time. I take good care of my bike, clean it and service it at the end of every season, so there is no reason the cassette body won't last over a year.

When I flagged the issue to Campagnolo askign for a replacement, here was their response:
"The Racing Sport CX was an entry level OEM wheel. We madethese wheels based on the asks from our OEMs to meet a certain weight and an extremely low price point. Because of this there are certain concessions made to serviceability and therefore longevity of the wheel. Most OEMs use this wheel as a place holder, assuming most customers will replace it. [..] I can easily see how you may go through a free hub per year. These use a one-piece freehub body that is sealed and non-serviceable so if a bearing goes becomes corroded due to moisture and mud during the season, it must be replaced entirely. To give you perspective, the freehub body probably costs more to replace that it costs to make the entire set. We stopped using this wheelset design in 2019 in favor of a more serviceable option. I know this isn't a great answer but it is the reality with this wheel."

It is a disappointing answer that reflects poorly on Campagnolo's brand, to say the least. They're essentially telling me that Campagnolo made the conscious decision to design a low-quality wheel for it to be quickly obsolete in order to meet financial criteria...I understand that the fact that OEMs "assume most customers will replace it" (which in itself is dishonest) is out of your control, but to me, Campagnolo is not holding itself accountable to its mission. Is this wheelset really "the absolute benchmark"? Do these results "make Campagnolo proud"?

I never got a follow-up from them past their initial answer.