Campagnolo have redesigned their Record EPS electronic bar end shifters for 2013. The new version (above), which is stubbier than before, was on display at the Cycle Show over the weekend.
Being electronic rather than mechanical, there’s no reason for the shifters to be any longer than that.
The existing EPS bar end levers have been reinvented for the Athena EPS groupset (below), Campag trickling the technology down to its fourth tier for 2013 - they skipped third tier Chorus. They come with different graphics now, obviously, and different wiring – these will work with Athena mechs only, not Super Record or Record. But, that aside, they look exactly the same to us.
Well, judge for yourself. Here are the original EPS bar end shifters...
We showed you most of the Athena EPS system a while back but we’d not seen the bar end shifters before. Despite being differently shaped, the two versions are virtually the same weight. According to Campag, the new Record ones are 51g while the Athena ones are 52g.
On both designs the lever automatically returns to the centre point – or zero position – once you’ve pressed it so it’s always in the same position when you want to change gear. You can set your own zero position.
If you want to move multiple sprockets in one go, you just press and hold the lever rather than needing to press it several times.
Mat has worked for loads of bike magazines over 20+ years, and been editor of 220 Triathlon and Cycling Plus. He's been road.cc technical editor for eight years, testing bikes, fettling the latest kit, and trying out the most up-to-the-minute clothing. We send him off around the world to get all the news from launches and shows too. He has won his category in Ironman UK 70.3 and finished on the podium in both marathons he has run. Mat is a Cambridge graduate who did a post-grad in magazine journalism, and he is a past winner of the Cycling Media Award for Specialist Online Writer.