Shimano hub with 8 speed campagnolo spacing

[CJ]

Chris, would a Dura Ace / Hubbub wire rout modification lessen the travel of the rear mech?

With a Hubbub modification it'll likely do 6-speed - if that's any use to you. You'll be lucky to find any spacers that thick these days.

[fenderbender]

Nope, not much use as I'd like to get 8 workable gears and use diy spacers.
I think I'll try and ad another set of can-spacers and see if it improve things.
If so I know I'm on the right track!

[garygkn]

You will probably run out of space.
Best to just change the gear levers.

[fenderbender]

Thanks for all the input and it seems like I've finally nailed it!
Replaced the original clear Campa and beercan spacers with a set from an worn out Shimano 7-speed cassette.
After grinding away the three inner knobs with a Dremel, witch took about five minutes, they would slide on the Campa 9-speed freehub body like a glove!
Just came back from a quick spin up and down the steepest hill in the area and apart from the poor index shifts of the Avanti brifters and the occasional ticking sound from the eight 9-speed cogs there was little difference to a stock 8-speed cassette!
So I wouldn't hesitate to recommend this and I think that it would be a good thing if you Chris should include some unorthodox conversions in your article
Here's som pics:

This 1981 Crescent 92318 sports-racer frame has a fair bit of room for mudguards and bigger tires. But not enough to fit Schwalbe Marathon 32mm touring tires or studded 35mm Marathon Winter's! To do this I had to heat the nos "Bluemels Popular" front mudguard and shape it a bit around the brake and fork crown. In the rear I lengthened it with a broken off stump, from an earlier set that had a close encounter with a Beemer, by glueing and riveting them together. Then routed it above the ol' Shimano 600 side pulls using left over rack mounts hardware on the underside. This is the reason for the ridiculous space between the mudguards and the temporary 25 mm tires.
Cheers! Pete

[MartinC]

I think that it would be a good thing if you Chris should include some unorthodox conversions in your article

Top marks for persistence and ingenuity.

Poor Chris - if he had to research and document all the Frankencassette combinations of spline patterns, sprocket thickness and spacer thickness combinations it would extend his shifter/mech/spacing matrix into enough dimensions to cause a nervous breakdown!

[fenderbender]

Thanks for the compliment and I note it's the only reaction so far.
Thing is that the info in the Rear Shifting article is great for reference but hard to deconstruct and apply in a real world situation! So why not list working combinations in yet another article?

I think there is a lesson to be drawn from this that indexed Campa 8 and most 6/7-speed parts have such similar cassette spacing, movement in the rear dérailleurs and built in tolerance that it's highly probable they will work well enough when combined.

Here is a list of the parts used:
90's Campa Avanti 8-speed Ergopower brifters
New Campa gear wires
90's Campa Record Rear hub with new 9-sp gear hub body
C. 2005 Campagnolo Veloce Ultra-Drive steel 9-sp 12-23 (21t) cassette with the 23t replaced by a 2mm Shimano spacer
7-sp spacer set from a 90's Shimano 12-30 mtb cassette w. the knobs removed
80's Shimano 105 RD-1050 6/7-sp short rear derailleur w. BBB fixed upper pulley
90's Sachs 7/8-sp chain
Shimano 105 FC-1057 polished 7-sp triple crankset w Shimano 6-sp 50-39-28t chainrings
1981 Crescent 92318 cro-mo/hi-ten sportsracer frame w respaced rear fork 120 to 130mm OLD.

Off to tinker with a 1997 Diamond Back Axis mtb and a frozen Octalink BB! Any tips?
/Pete
Edit: spelling & added some info

[garygkn]

Well done!
I would have given up at the start.

[Bowedw]

If you type in Marchisio into your computer you will have a whole list of suppliers of this item. I believe I got mine from Mercian Cycles. Basically its 8 very nice sprockets to fit onto the shimano hub with the campag spacers, you can choose the sprockets sizes you want. Not cheap but excellent quality and you can replace that 14 toother when it wears out (that's the usual one I find slips first and with Campag or shimano I do not think you can buy seperate sprockets)
This makes the system superb value in the long run.
I do believe the earlier version had an adaptor that slid onto the hub with the sprockets splined to suit the adaptor. The later one has the sprockets to suit the hub and is stronger as a result.
I personally can recommend the system.
You can also use a shimano 8 speed cassette which has slightly different spacing. you move the wire on the derailler to the other side of the fixing bolt which makes the derailler move a bit more each time. I have used this in the past. You can also screw the wire tensioner in from the lower side of the derailler which moves the pivot point of the wire.You can fine tune the gears in on the cable stop on the frame Look on Highpath Engineering's site as he has, or used to have all the details. I do know from past experience that alterations like these will work perfectly well. When I changed from screw on blocks to cassette wheels I went the Marchisio route as I had to buy a new cassette what ever method I used

[CJ]

I think that it would be a good thing if you Chris should include some unorthodox conversions in your article

Top marks for persistence and ingenuity.

Poor Chris - if he had to research and document all the Frankencassette combinations of spline patterns, sprocket thickness and spacer thickness combinations it would extend his shifter/mech/spacing matrix into enough dimensions to cause a nervous breakdown!

Thank you for that.

I am 99% certain that what we have here is a mismatch that luckily does not (yet) exceed the tolerance of the system or where other defects introduce compensatory errors. The chances of it working well enough for someone else are not good, so I'll not be adding it to my recommendations.

I already get a few people complaining about Shimergo systems recommended by me, that should work and generally DO work, since all the numbers DO match up, but don't work for them because of some other thing they've got wrong, too much friction in cables etc. Recommending combinations that the likes of Shimano and Campagnolo forbid is a risky act, so I'm sticking to things that OUGHT to work in spite of their warnings and for which I've received lots of proof that they DO work and preferably have also been able to try myself.