rousseau

Bought a used Chorus 11-speed group last year, and it's been working nicely up until today. After replacing the cables and housing the front shifter no longer works. The clicks are gone. No resistance when you hit the long lever or the thumb lever. Nada. I was forced to put a downtube shifter on the bike just so I could shift between the rings.

Any idea what this could be?

mattcalifornia

Probably one of the internal springs or ratchet mechanism broke or wore out. The nice thing about Campy shifters is that all of the parts are replaceable. I'm not expert enough to diagnose which part needs to be replaced, but you can either bring it to your LBS or take it apart and see if anything looks broken. All of the replacement parts are readily available on line. Just google "Campagnolo shifter parts" and several sites will come up with the parts.

genejockey 

I've occasionally had Campy front Ergos suddenly refuse to shift - lever moves, nothing happens. Usually, it's been when I'm in the small ring and just reached the 'tipover' point at the top of a climb, and I want to shift into the big ring and it won't. When this happened, I reached under the down tube and pulled on the cable, and then it worked, and kept on working. It's happened maybe 3 times. Now I think about it, at least twice at the same spot - the top of a bike bridge over a freeway. NO IDEA why it happens there, but each time, pulling on the cable seemed to work.

Mind you, this may have nothing to do with your problem, but mattcalifornia's right, that ergos are rebuildable.

mattcalifornia

Any chance that part of your thumb or hand was resting on the downshift button? If you are accidentally pushing down on the thumb button even a little bit, the big lever won't shift at all. I've done this accidentally -- took me a minute to figure out what had happened. This can happen most easily when you are standing with your hands on the hoods. Maybe you ride the top of the hill standing with your hands in a position that blocks the thumb shifter? Just a guess.

genejockey 

Nah. It's a reasonable question, but no. That occurred to me at the time, too.

ingo

Since 2010 the Ergo shifters can't be rebuilt, the shifter body is riveted and wear parts are not sold. I had to replace a right shifter when the tiny spring for the down shift lever broke, a 10 cent part. It's cheaper to just buy a new body, keeping the clamp, brake lever, and hood. Before that I would pull the cable out and see if the clicks return on the chance there is debris or a cable routing problem.

Litespud

Agreed - this is called a “pro kit”, which comprises the shifter body without the brake lever, hood and bar clamp (transfer these parts from your old shifter). These go for ~$140, but you’re essentially getting a new shifter. I had my 10sp shifter overhauled for the first time in 16 years/50k miles. We figured out it was cheaper to simply replace with a pro kit rather than replace parts a la carte

mattcalifornia

Yeah, it was a long shot, but worth mentioning.

rousseau

I'm used to rebuilding the 2nd gen shifters, but I guess this is what I'll have to do.

Pulled the cable out. Still nothing, the two levers swing back and forth without a click.

It just seems too suspicious that this happened just when I switched up the cables and housings. I should mention that I had to run off to a bike shop to get an emergency gear cable, and the guy at the shop said it wasn't Campy but that it should work even though the head might be slightly larger (by less than 1 mm?). Is there a chance I somehow ruined the innards of the shifter by tensioning the cable too much and pulling the head into the plastic part of it, I wonder?

rousseau

Though I've put non-Campy gear cables on my bike before and nothing ever happened. This is confounding.

rousseau

Here's a quick video of the shifter in action. There is no gear cable in there, I put a downtube shifter on for the purpose of shifting between the front rings.

sfrider 

Don't know about Campy, but Shimano shifters sometimes collect gunk and the lubrication dries up producing exactly this lack of shifter engagement on the downshift. I've fixed it by spraying WD-40 in the shifters, work and spray until they function again, let them sit for a bit, then add a bit of regular machine oil and work them some more.

RiceAWay

It sounds like the spring that holds the shifting arm that moves the ratchet broke or displaced. Campy are fully rebuildable (I'm sure that the 11's are like the 10's) and so a Campy shop should be able to restore it in short order. It looks like they completely redesigned the mechanism probably for cheaper assembly so you can buy the pats here. here.https://www.benscycle.com/campagnolo...ld3154/product

rousseau

I know that the 2nd generation Ergo shifters (1998-2009) are rebuildable, as I've replaced the innards on five or six of them myself, but my understanding is that that's not possible with the 3rd generation. And yet your link suggests that it is. Though the link says that the part in question is for the 2015 and later shifters, and mine are pre-2015.

Not sure what to think or do about this.

Edit: That part is for a TT bar-end shifter.

noodle soup

I'd contact Branford Bike, and ask if they are rebuild-able.

.https://branfordbike.com/

alcjphil

OP lives in Canada. I suggest that they contact Cycles Marinoni who are the largest Campagnolo distributor in Canada and experts on rebuilding their products. I have had them rebuild shifters while I waited. Takes them 15-20 minutes. I once had to wait a half hour because someone else was there for the same reason and had arrived a few minutes before I did

Leinster

Anything wrong with just sticking with the downtube shifter? I mean, it’s the Front derailleur, it doesn’t need indexing or anything.

rousseau

You one of these fancy lightweights who stays in the big ring on climbs? Heh heh...I'm too far gone when it comes to Ergos versus downtube shifters. I like the modern era too much.

DaveSSS 

Ultrashift levers, 2008 and newer can only be repaired with donor parts. As others noted just by a replacement body with innards. These levers are easy to take apart for inspection - far easier than the old pointy brake hood design. I've had them apart, back in 2008 and even converted an early 10 speed model to 11, with donor parts.