I’m building up wheels with H+Son TB14 rims for a dream bicycle. Once-in-a-lifetime thing.
I’m in the vulgar position of having to choose between these Campagnolo Record Pista (NOS) and Shimano Dura-Ace HB-7710 hubs.
Both are low-flange designs, just the way I like them.
Thirty-two holes, all.
Neither have contact seals although I’ll be tearing up the streets.🤞
The front Record hub has slightly larger bearing balls (7/32″) than the Dura-Ace (3/16″), presumably improving durability.
Theoretically you can replace the cups in the Records, unlike the Dura-Aces; but finding replacement cups in the year 2046 is obviously delusional. More practically, the Record hubs have grease ports in the hub body.
The Dura-Ace hubs have slightly better spoke bracing angles due to marginally wider flange spacings.
Measured weights as shown with the supplied lockrings and track nuts:
- Dura-Ace front: 191.7 g
-
Dura-Ace rear: 288.9 g
-
Record front: 205.8 g
-
Record rear: 302.0 g
Your choice?
The rims are polished silver. Any strong opinions on black spokes?
by synth_this
16 Comments
Never worked on Campy hubs but you can never go wrong with Dura-Ace hubs. Super easy to service and stay butter smooth.
With hubs these nice, I’d be servicing them regularly so that they last. Any differences the bearing size may or may not make would be irrelevant if you service them often.
It’s a difficult choice but I’d just for for what suited the bike best. I like the Dura Ace myself I think…
In my experience, the grease ports are not super functional. You don’t really want your hubs running 100% grease fill. And the covers are easily lost or damaged.
I’d probably take the DA.
(But honestly I wouldn’t build either of these for street riding. I’d get a nice sealed bearing hub. Phil Wood is the OG, but there’s lots of options. Mental BMX’s low-flange hubs have a classic look.)
And I’d definitely go for silver spokes. Black spokes on a polished TB14 rim and these hubs is going to look pretty unusual, and won’t jive with the classic look I’m guessing you are going for.
What’s the rest of the build?
Also, are you building them yourself? I just realised the campag rear hub looks like it’s set up so all the spoke heads face outwards. I think I’ve come across these in my shop a while back, makes building the wheel with 2/3 cross a bit of a pain, not sure of the correct way to build them but it’s something to research first before you go ahead, if you are not already familiar with them. The Dura Ace are just standard so will be easier to build.
I have very similar Campy hubs, wheels build in 2004, I must have done 50-70 thousand kilometers on those and serviced them only a few times and they are running fine. I don’t think you can really go wrong with either option.
I’d go all 6000 cartridge bearings. Cheap Taiwanese front hub, custom Titanium shell and endcaps for the rear. And there’s the opportunity to nerd out about rear axle. But likely just the steel axle from a Taiwanese rear hub.
The only thing that matters is matching the rest of your build.
– you running Campy pista cranks? Go Record hubs
– DA or Suginio 75 cranks, go Shimano.
To use every day Shimano without a second thought
To have on a bike thats mainly for display and used on special occasions Campag
Have had bikes with both on and the Shimano was faultless needing little maintenance always performing well, The Campag in the flesh looked so much better than the Shimano just needed a bit more attention to maintenance and the shifting wasnt as crisp.
what a bunch of beauts! I’d go with the Dura-Ace personally but that’s because I run the HB7600s on my track bike and they are flawless in every sense of the word
I always used Dura Ace when I was track racing at Frisco. It was perfect, never had any issues.
I few folks used Campy or other mfgs.
Like you observed, it’s fair weather gear, the seals are not full contact so that you can get an extra 0.00087 watts to the wheels. Service them regularly, it would be wrong to destroy such nice hubs. I use Phil Wood in almost anything (not pawls) and that will get you a little bit of protection from water.
My take? Neither. Not for everyday street riding.
Those hubs (and rims) are too nice to have them getting gunked up and road salted, trying to skid and skip hop down hills, hitting potholes, etc. I’d rather have a basic set of Formula sealed bearing hubs on some cheap Mavic rims for a street wheelset, personally.
Build your second “Dream” wheelset for racing, or even just display use. Get something cheaper and more utilitarian for your everyday use.
Paul or Phil Wood or Even White Industries to be honest if it’s a once in a lifetime build for street use.
DA all day ATMO. also tb-14 are great rims and hplusson is a great company but i can’t imagine purposely building anything that isn’t tubeless compatible at TYOOL 2025
I have DA 7600 on one bike, high flange campy record on another, and these low flange campys on yet another. They are all fantastic.
I have zero actual data to prove it, but I swear the 7600 have always been my fastest hubs, and I would put that wheelset (7600/Open Pro) on whichever bike I wanted to go fast on.
Both hubs are great picks. Campy would be more unique, but the differences are mostly theoretical. I’d base the decision on whether you like spaghetti or hibachi more, TBH.
Silver spokes will look great. All black might be too “heavy” an aesthetic, but it’s hard to know unless you see the parts built up. You could always explore alternate patterns, e.g. silver with black key spokes near the valve, or run black drive side/ silver non-drive for the best of both worlds.
Both are essentially identical. When the first DuraAce hubs came out, all of us (now old) guys were surprised to say the least. Until then, Campagnolo was significantly better than any other, and we found that Shimano was no worse and no better-both were rungs above any others.
One thing: I noticed that you had specced just a few black components. This would be completely authentic if you’re going for a late 1970s homage. When black anodizing started to be available I added black chainrings and bars to my Gitane, as well as black brakes. That was really “cool” at the time.
I agree that we would have rarely mixed systems; If you had one brand of hubs, your crank would match or be from the same country/style. The Italian look is more shiny polished, the Japanese more velvety/matte.