Originally Posted by
Tourist in MSN
I think you just explained it.
My one bike that has disc in rear apparently has tight enough tolerance that when I drop the wheel in it is perfect. But if many bikes are made with looser tolerances, I can see having to fiddle with it.
Decades ago, some bikes with horizontal dropouts had little adjusting screws (Campy drop outs for example) so you could be very precise in how you adjusted the frame. But on other bikes I recall holding a hand on the left chainstay and a spoke in the fingers to adjust how the wheel was oriented for rim brakes, it only took a few seconds but you just get in a habit of doing it. Then vertical dropouts came along, you did not need to do that any more. But now if you have sloppy tolerance in the dropouts and you are used to vertical dropouts, I can see needing to fiddle with it for a few seconds when you are not in the habit of doing so.
once I figured out how to easily center the caliper properly, it is easier, but I still find that I need to eyeball it with a teeny tiny nudge to one side or the other before I do up the qr, and also I see that when you tighten the qr, there is a slight movement, so I compensate for this little additional movement.
Again, not hard to do, like you said about stuff, but for some people this is challenging.
Sure, ideally one should just plonk the thing in and thats it, so this is why I actually understand the thru axle idea. I'm sure I'll own a thruaxle bike at some point and like it....
oh, re the rear dropout adjusting screw things, I have a bike with these, its an elegant little detail, one of the reasons that I just can't sell my old touring bike for now, its a neat frame. You slide the wheel in and bam, its centered. (but frankly, hardly ever have to remove the wheel, even when I rode the bike a lot, so it was cool, but not a deal breaker)