3alarmer 

....I don't get it either. This has been figured out by guys way smarter than me, and I take them at their word (and equations. )

3alarmer 

...that's why nobody ever invented a saddle strap, in the same spirit as the toe strap. If you shift your weight back off the seat rearward when you use the front brake aggressively, chances are pretty good you won't endo either.

tkamd73 

It’s a coaster brake, who is avoiding the skid, that’s half the fun. Way less painful, if the worst happens skidding out the rear then the front. No one is dying here, its bike forums, not the Marines. It does take time and practice but, you can modulate a coaster brake, much easier with hand lever though.
Tim

Sonofamechanic 

....so we all agree!? You can stop with a coaster brake...we all did it as kids...even if you do leave a black rubber mark on the back concrete verandah of your mate’s house ehich you hope his dad won’t notice...but on a smooth tar road, going fast, a front brake does a whole lot to stop you fast. More to the point, members on this thread have credible and positive experience of extended riding with an IGH with coaster brake...exactly the info I was looking for!!

Sonofamechanic 

Any reason not to pick the Shimano simply because its...newer?

Sonofamechanic 

(Sorry....I mean the Shimano Nexus over the Shimano 3C or SA)

3alarmer 

.
...the earlier Shimano 3 speed hubs were throwaways. There was a problem with the hardening process in making the Pawls, so they often broke. By the time you got one to take it apart, the hard pieces of the pawls would eat something important . (Maybe they eventually fixed it, but it was too late to redeem their reputation).


There are reviews on the various IGH incarnations on Hubstripping. IIRC, some of the Shimano Nexus hubs got good reviews, but they were inconsistent over the years.

Gresp15C

I've been riding coaster brake bikes on and off for 50 years. This is the first time I've seen a discussion of front versus rear braking, exclusive of one another.

In my view, both front and rear brakes have failure modes. I've experienced the failure modes of coaster brakes. There have been two or three times in my life where I said to myself, "When I get home, I'm going to install a front brake." Braking is important enough to have a backup. A rear brake doesn't provide enough stopping power to make a panic stop at speed, and you can further lose braking power if you're on a downslope or in wet conditions. Your feet can come off your pedals. You can drop your chain.

Coaster brakes fade. I've had it happen. Many years ago, my daily commute had a hill that would fade my coaster brake every day if I didn't control my descent quite carefully.

Granted, this is a forum where folks talk about riding bikes that aren't allowed to get wet, or who have never experienced a serious problem, and admitting to a mistake is seen as a sign of weakness. Nobody can ever know for sure if something is a reasonable precaution or an overreaction. I get that.

Jeff Wills

I will add that all of the Schwinn bikes I put together BITD that had 3-speed coaster brake hubs also had front hand brakes. The Sturmey-Archer S3C hubs had much weaker brakes than the Bendix coaster brakes on smaller kids bikes. I don't remember being able to skid the rear wheel on a S3C-equipped bike.

That being said- if you're going to build a bike with a S3C hub and a front caliper brake... go for it! I built a bike around a Schwinn Super Sport frame and a (SunRace) Sturmey-Archer 3-speed hub. It turned out pretty nice:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/ohpv/a...57670249022375

Thomas15

When I was a kid I had a Robin Hood with the 3 sp SA hub in question. I used it to deliver my paper route so rode it most days unless the weather was really bad. Both the bike and the 3 sp hub were bullet proof but I agree the coaster brake wasn't all that good, even for a fairly light kid. The front brake saved by bacon on at least a few occasions. At the time I just sort of accepted the limitations and never really thought about it.

I would like to have one of those vintage 3 speed bikes for my collection but I doubt that I would ride it much.

Geepig

I ride a coaster brake every day, but I would like to find one with 3 speeds so I can do hills easier.

I used to borrow my stepmother's bike when I was a lad simply to have fun with the coaster brake - you ride as fast as you can standing up, and then put all the force you can on the rearmost pedal to get it to lock up. Fantastic fun, and you soon learn to lean the bike a bit to get it to slide out in whichever direction you require. Some years later, when I built my first offroad motorbike I discovered that the same principle worked by locking up the foot brake on a slippery descent so you could choose your exit direction to the left or right.

My current ride gets used on and off road, we have no mountains here and I avoid getting involved in commuting scuffles with buses. All arguments about the superiority of different braking systems are invalid unless one states the parameters, so you can compare like with like.


Romet Jubilat with coaster brake and no hand brakes.

tkamd73 

Beautiful Bike! Great frame for that application, I see you got rid of the flat bars when you redid that. Just did the same to my Sports Tourer, posted earlier in this conversation, totally transformed the riding experience for the better.
Tim

ClydeClydeson

To be fair, it has been a while since I had a coaster brake bike as my primary ride - I built one up as a winter bike a few years back. But now my teenage son has built himself a roadside find from the 1960s with coaster brake only, and I have certainly ridden that one in the past few months.

There is some logic missing from your explanation, though - you say "the coaster brakes stopping power is way in excess of the grip, or friction the small area of the tire, imparts on the road, the weight coming off the rear wheel is way less significant." Well, if the braking power comes from the tire's contact with the ground, the weight coming off the tire is extremely significant.

Further, your point that you can use your brain to shift your weight to make the rear brake more effective is true, but the same can be said for your front brake - shifting your weight back will increase the amount of front brakes you can apply before the rear wheel lifts. But your brain also controls your hands, and you can modulate the front brake to keep the bike from flipping, while still utilising the weight shift to your advantage to get the bike to stop faster. Al it takes is a little practice, but some are so spooked by stories of unintended endos that they never will practice. Too bad, because a properly operated front brake can easily stop a bike (and rider) safely in half the distance of a rear brake only.

Fun anecdote about coaster brakes:
My winter bike that I mentioned, I was out on a ride on the highways North of my hometown, and while crossing railway tracks on a long downhill, my chain fell off (ie. NO BRAKES). Luckily there was a soft surface runaway truck lane near the bottom so I was able to use that to slow me before I blasted through the stop sign at the busy intersection at the bottom of the hill.

Also, full disclosure: The coaster brake bike was originally derailleur equipped, and originally belonged to my brother, but he didn't want it anymore after the front brakes threw him over the handlebars.

79pmooney

Front brake stopping power vs rear brake stopping power. Every few years I break out pencil, paper and a calculator and run the numbers using simply physics, the geometry of a common road bike, a rider of "normal" height, weight and bike position, Since I have long since lost the last set of calcs. all the numbers are slightly different, But the same results keep coming up. Front brakes offer twice the stopping power and half the stopping distance. (No, it is never exactly 2:1 unless you tweak the dimensions of rider and bike to make it so. And pushing back as you brake improves things a little. But that 2:1 "rule" never gets very far off the actual unless you pull some very non-traditional stunts or design a "weird" bike.

Sonofamechanic 

[QUOTE=Fun anecdote about coaster brakes:
My winter bike that I mentioned, I was out on a ride on the highways North of my hometown, and while crossing railway tracks on a long downhill, my chain fell off (ie. NO BRAKES). Luckily there was a soft surface runaway truck lane near the bottom so I was able to use that to slow me before I blasted through the stop sign at the busy intersection at the bottom of the hill.[/QUOTE]

LOL....a bicycle using a runaway truck lane to stop...that’s hilarious...I hope some trucker was driving past to witness that...would have made his day.

bikemeister

Years ago I took a steel 10-speed frame and re-did it with a Torpedo 3S coaster brake rear hub. 27 inch wheels, minimalist design, brake hoods only for hand rest, bar end shifter for changing gears. I didn't have a front brake though (I was a young fool), so the thing had only one cable.

Painted it bright orange with a white fork - always got stares and questions! When I went riding with friends I would alternate between this sleek beast and my other 10-speed. My friend once told me I would be dragging my arse when on the 10-speed but would be leading the pack on the triple. Dam I miss that bike!