Why choose disc brakes over rim brakes for a road bike?
02-21-19, 03:45 PM
#101
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*sigh*
I love watching this forum dissolve into chaos over something like this.
Like I said before - everyone's opinions are pretty much useless. No one in the industry cares what you think. Disc are here and aren't going away. It is simply a matter of time before they become ubiquitous.
Those that talk about any sort of real benefit of disc on a road bike: sorry - you're stretching. Rim brakes are amazing and have come a long way just in this century alone. We easily have enough braking power with the rim brakes available now to skid. When you skid your braking power has overcome your contact patch. It doesn't take much to overcome the contact patch of a road tire.
Yes everyone is drunk with going with wider tires. This is nothing new and will also return to narrower tires in the future under some new generally accepted marketing crap "backed up" by all sorts of biased data again. "Well due to new tire technology and compounds we have in fact found that riding narrower tires at pressure x results in a lower rolling resistance and aids in aerodynamic drag reduction.....blah blah blah" Wide tires make it harder to run with the rim brakes we have but there's over a century of rim brake design that is more than capable of handling it.
There will come a time int he future where leading edge niche of riders and certain racers will stray from the herd and field rim brake bikes again. They will cite the feel of the ride, the low weight, having to learn how to carry more speed through corners, etc all as reasons why they have gone that way. As long as they carry with them a Rapha-esque aesthetic pertinent to that time then the minions of recreational forum users will follow suit.
hell I'm already seeing a surge in riders going back to polished silver hubs, rims and spokes.....just because no one else is running them. "Everyone's bikes are all matte finish and murdered out. They're boring"
Sorry just enjoying a bit of this wild ass guessing from everyone and attempts to rationalize what really isn't that difficult of a question.
I love watching this forum dissolve into chaos over something like this.
Like I said before - everyone's opinions are pretty much useless. No one in the industry cares what you think. Disc are here and aren't going away. It is simply a matter of time before they become ubiquitous.
Those that talk about any sort of real benefit of disc on a road bike: sorry - you're stretching. Rim brakes are amazing and have come a long way just in this century alone. We easily have enough braking power with the rim brakes available now to skid. When you skid your braking power has overcome your contact patch. It doesn't take much to overcome the contact patch of a road tire.
Yes everyone is drunk with going with wider tires. This is nothing new and will also return to narrower tires in the future under some new generally accepted marketing crap "backed up" by all sorts of biased data again. "Well due to new tire technology and compounds we have in fact found that riding narrower tires at pressure x results in a lower rolling resistance and aids in aerodynamic drag reduction.....blah blah blah" Wide tires make it harder to run with the rim brakes we have but there's over a century of rim brake design that is more than capable of handling it.
There will come a time int he future where leading edge niche of riders and certain racers will stray from the herd and field rim brake bikes again. They will cite the feel of the ride, the low weight, having to learn how to carry more speed through corners, etc all as reasons why they have gone that way. As long as they carry with them a Rapha-esque aesthetic pertinent to that time then the minions of recreational forum users will follow suit.
hell I'm already seeing a surge in riders going back to polished silver hubs, rims and spokes.....just because no one else is running them. "Everyone's bikes are all matte finish and murdered out. They're boring"
Sorry just enjoying a bit of this wild ass guessing from everyone and attempts to rationalize what really isn't that difficult of a question.
My good road bikes have - Shimano dual pivots, old (really good) Shimano cantis and Superbe sidepulls, all "de-tuned" with Tektro V-brake levers for best performance on descents I don't know. Winter/rain/city bikes have mixed caliper, Mafac front, Weinmann rear combined with regular Tektro levers.
What all these bikes have is very, very good braking for the conditions they are ridden. (I tried the V-brake and dual-pivot combo on my good fix gear to get really nice big hand grips for climbing. First real test was coming down from MacKenzie Pass into Sisters. I had the corners dialed ... until I came to a blind, tight and steep one. Hit the brakes hard because this was a pedal scraper - no thanks! This was not a subtle squeeze, It was adrenaline driven. And all that happened was the bike slowed really fast; I made the corner with speed to spare. and nothing exciting happened, No lockup, no skip. After that experience, I was sold. Since then, I've been de-tuning all my good bikes' brakes with those levers. My winter bikes have stayed Mafac front, Weinmann rear, regular levers because they spend so much time riding the NW wet.
My V-brake lever, powerful caliper setup wouldn't work for a person who lives on the hoods. I do my serious braking from the drops where I can get a strong grip. I don't have strong hands but they are large.
Silver wheels? Never left them, (I do have one black DT wheel. I paid $10 for it, Forgive me.) I have gone to the 28c Corsa G+ (closet clincher to the old Del Mondo and Paris Roubaix silks BITD and ribbed tread! Heaven .. until I go sewups (and hell if I roll one off before I do).
Ben
02-21-19, 03:46 PM
#102
Senior Member
Thread Starter
@ljsense ---- you keep saying that rim brakes are so much easier to use with extreme precision for the most minimal applications. My question would be, how much have you practiced.
All your analogies mean nothing. Reality is where i ride, in a concrete, not conceptual world. it sounds like you have figured out a way to explain why a thing won't work---but refuse to accept the fact that it does.
Fact is, plenty of people find riding on discs to be just as easy as riding on rim brakes. if You cannot, then practice more. Stop inventing weird excuses based on turntables etc. ... it can be done, learn to do it.
You are essentially complaining that you can't make discs work with precision----though that might be your theory rather than your experience. Several others say they have---which makes me think you need to develop a finer touch.
Not suggesting that you look to solve your own issues as opposed to telling everyone that their own experiences are invalid .... at least not directly.
All your analogies mean nothing. Reality is where i ride, in a concrete, not conceptual world. it sounds like you have figured out a way to explain why a thing won't work---but refuse to accept the fact that it does.
Fact is, plenty of people find riding on discs to be just as easy as riding on rim brakes. if You cannot, then practice more. Stop inventing weird excuses based on turntables etc. ... it can be done, learn to do it.
You are essentially complaining that you can't make discs work with precision----though that might be your theory rather than your experience. Several others say they have---which makes me think you need to develop a finer touch.
Not suggesting that you look to solve your own issues as opposed to telling everyone that their own experiences are invalid .... at least not directly.
I get that disc brakes are great. I love them. I have them on my mountain bike, my fat bike and my cross bike. I have outlined six reasons why I like rim brakes better for road racing. Trying to explain one of those reason -- why a rim brake might have a specific narrow performance edge -- is difficult. Forget about the record player or whatever you think sounded stupid, and just dive into corner after corner at 27 mph with people all around you. Yes, it certainly can be done with disc brakes with no real problem, I just think it's a hair better with rim brakes, in my opinion. If a dog or something ran out onto the course, I'm sure I'd wish I had disc brakes. But again, in my experience, crashes in crits happen so fast, great brakes usually aren't the salvation. What you really need is a lucky break.
Last edited by ljsense; 02-21-19 at 03:51 PM.
02-21-19, 03:57 PM
#103
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@ljsense ---- you keep saying that rim brakes are so much easier to use with extrme precision for the most minimal applications. My question would be, how much have you practiced.
All your analogies mean nothing. Reality is where i ride, in a concrete, not conceptual world. it sounds like you have figured out a way to explain why a thing won't work---but refuse to accept the fact that it does. (the Catholic Church had to give in to Galileo ... hope it doesn't take 400 years for you to learn to ride discs.)
Fact is, plenty of people find riding on discs to be just as easy as riding on rim brakes. if You cannot, then practice more. Stop inventing weird excuses based on turntables etc. ... it can be done, learn to do it.
I personally don't care what kind of brakes anyone uses or favors. But i do want to keep at least some of the discussion on this site honest and fact-based. You are essentially complaining that you can't make discs work with precision----though that might be your theory rather than your experience. Several others say they have---which makes me think you need to develop a finer touch.
I use Ultegra rim brakes on my "fast" bike (that describes its set-up, its weight relative to other bikes, and its potential---no bike I ride is fast unless going down hill (or on a rack on a car being taken somewhere to ride)) and after a few panic stops left me fishtailing and flat-spotting rear tires ... I gapped the rear brakes a little wider. Because I am right-hand dominant, in emergencies I was over-squeezing the rear brake lever. A simple adjustment has eliminated the problem.
Not suggesting that you look to solve your own issues as opposed to telling everyone that their own experiences are invalid .... at least not directly.
All your analogies mean nothing. Reality is where i ride, in a concrete, not conceptual world. it sounds like you have figured out a way to explain why a thing won't work---but refuse to accept the fact that it does. (the Catholic Church had to give in to Galileo ... hope it doesn't take 400 years for you to learn to ride discs.)
Fact is, plenty of people find riding on discs to be just as easy as riding on rim brakes. if You cannot, then practice more. Stop inventing weird excuses based on turntables etc. ... it can be done, learn to do it.
I personally don't care what kind of brakes anyone uses or favors. But i do want to keep at least some of the discussion on this site honest and fact-based. You are essentially complaining that you can't make discs work with precision----though that might be your theory rather than your experience. Several others say they have---which makes me think you need to develop a finer touch.
I use Ultegra rim brakes on my "fast" bike (that describes its set-up, its weight relative to other bikes, and its potential---no bike I ride is fast unless going down hill (or on a rack on a car being taken somewhere to ride)) and after a few panic stops left me fishtailing and flat-spotting rear tires ... I gapped the rear brakes a little wider. Because I am right-hand dominant, in emergencies I was over-squeezing the rear brake lever. A simple adjustment has eliminated the problem.
Not suggesting that you look to solve your own issues as opposed to telling everyone that their own experiences are invalid .... at least not directly.
Ben
02-21-19, 04:01 PM
#104
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Here's my experience: cornering in a crit is something I've been doing for more than a decade, and I am still trying to maintain as much speed as possible through them. My goal is to not touch my brakes, stay within a few feet of the wheel ahead of me, and only have to do 500 watts instead of 580 or whatever coming out to get the good draft again. If I have to slow before a corner, I want to just barely back off. It's so tiring to ramp up that speed again and again. It's what makes crits tough. My experience is that my cork pads on well trued carbon wheels brush off a little speed, when needed, a little more gently and predictably than when I've tried it with disc brakes. I've only ridden 2 crits with disc brakes, but that is like five hundred corners or something.
I get that disc brakes are great. I love them. I have them on my mountain bike, my fat bike and my cross bike. I have outlined six reasons why I like rim brakes better for road racing. Trying to explain one of those reason -- why a rim brake might have a specific narrow performance edge -- is difficult. Forget about the record player or whatever you think sounded stupid, and just dive into corner after corner at 27 mph with people all around you. Yes, it certainly can be done with disc brakes with no real problem, I just think it's a hair better with rim brakes, in my opinion. If a dog or something ran out onto the course, I'm sure I'd wish I had disc brakes. But again, in my experience, crashes in crits happen so fast, great brakes usually aren't the salvation.
I get that disc brakes are great. I love them. I have them on my mountain bike, my fat bike and my cross bike. I have outlined six reasons why I like rim brakes better for road racing. Trying to explain one of those reason -- why a rim brake might have a specific narrow performance edge -- is difficult. Forget about the record player or whatever you think sounded stupid, and just dive into corner after corner at 27 mph with people all around you. Yes, it certainly can be done with disc brakes with no real problem, I just think it's a hair better with rim brakes, in my opinion. If a dog or something ran out onto the course, I'm sure I'd wish I had disc brakes. But again, in my experience, crashes in crits happen so fast, great brakes usually aren't the salvation.
I think where things went off is when you try to expand your subjective (albeit perfectly valid) experience to a larger truism about disc vs rim in general.
Rim and disc certainly do feel and respond differently.
02-21-19, 04:24 PM
#105
Senior Member
Really? I learned bike mechanics myself, from literally the ground up---picking up junk bikes off the roadside. I learned about different brake systems when I first saw the,
Sorry, but it ain't rocket science. A lever pulls a cable which in some way pulls actuator arms---or compressed fluid does it. A "bike mechanic" who can't cope with center-pull, side-pull, dual-pivot, cantis, and Vs is just lame.
As for discs, I had to ... read some instructions. Can i still be a mechanic ... after learning to be a better mechanic? I am nto sure of the Mechanic's Guild rules.
Why? Why is that?
If that were the case, shouldn't most riders be best served by single-speed and coaster brakes?
When it comes to brakes, most riders are best served by brakes which stop the bike with the least demand on the rider. A coaster-brake bike demands a weight shift. A bike with weak brakes demands a lot of pressure. A bike with weak rim brakes in the wet has longer stopping distances, demanding greater rider attentiveness and quicker reaction. Brakes that respond very quickly with not a lot of force are best---regardless of what some other person considers to be "tried and true," which is a vague enough phrase that it could mean anything, including Flintstone stops.
A new rider on a bike for the first time learns immediately how the brakes works. if that rider rides a different bike, s/he learns the particulars of that bike' s brakes and adapts---whether they be the same sort or different.
I have driven all kinds of motor vehicles, with air brakes, vacuum-assisted brakes, drum and disc brakes, and with varying levels brake boost. After the first couple stops i .... just drove.
It never took me even a few overly abrupt stops to learn the different braking characteristics of any bicycle I have ever ridden.
Sorry, but it ain't rocket science. A lever pulls a cable which in some way pulls actuator arms---or compressed fluid does it. A "bike mechanic" who can't cope with center-pull, side-pull, dual-pivot, cantis, and Vs is just lame.
As for discs, I had to ... read some instructions. Can i still be a mechanic ... after learning to be a better mechanic? I am nto sure of the Mechanic's Guild rules.
Why? Why is that?
If that were the case, shouldn't most riders be best served by single-speed and coaster brakes?
When it comes to brakes, most riders are best served by brakes which stop the bike with the least demand on the rider. A coaster-brake bike demands a weight shift. A bike with weak brakes demands a lot of pressure. A bike with weak rim brakes in the wet has longer stopping distances, demanding greater rider attentiveness and quicker reaction. Brakes that respond very quickly with not a lot of force are best---regardless of what some other person considers to be "tried and true," which is a vague enough phrase that it could mean anything, including Flintstone stops.
A new rider on a bike for the first time learns immediately how the brakes works. if that rider rides a different bike, s/he learns the particulars of that bike' s brakes and adapts---whether they be the same sort or different.
I have driven all kinds of motor vehicles, with air brakes, vacuum-assisted brakes, drum and disc brakes, and with varying levels brake boost. After the first couple stops i .... just drove.
It never took me even a few overly abrupt stops to learn the different braking characteristics of any bicycle I have ever ridden.
I've been riding a long time and have seen many riders fly over the handlebars from braking. On these forums you will find endless references to flying over the handlebars. If you are the great mechanic you say you are, you understand that the front exit is entirely about the rider and has very little to do with brakes. Have you ever successfully explained center of gravity to someone who does not have the concept?
It must be nice to be able to figure out any mechanical system by glancing at it once. You should come to Chicago and make a lot of money. We have LBS here where there is not one mechanic who understands discs. I have friends who love their Ultegra discs and friends who have been back to the shop twenty and thirty times trying to get the darn things to work. Also plenty of bikes permanently ensconced as garage ornaments because the discs don't work and no one knows how. Or the parts don't exist. Countless bikes where the discs don't work because the rider is never going to get the pads hot enough to break them in. I've been looking at bicycle disc brakes for 45 years and only in the past five have they been at all realistic. I guess there must be some reason why lots of engineers and lots of parts maker tried for forty years before it worked. And the parts are still a problem.
Coaster brakes are not about weight shift. They are about flatlands and coastal plains. Where most of the population has always lived. They work on bikes where the rider is sitting directly above the rear axle and the coaster arm. If you have to do weight shift you should probably be on some other brake and some other bike.
"Most riders are best served by brakes which stop the bike with the least demand on the rider." Hunh? Riders need to be involved with their bike. When everything works 'perfectly' with no demands placed on the operator watch them get in over their head. Much better if thought process is absolutely required to make it go. Or stop.
"It works for me." Fine. "Therefore it must work for you." Non-sequitur. You can use your insights to enjoy your rides and I hope you do. Do not fix anyone else's bike.
02-21-19, 04:58 PM
#106
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*sigh*
I love watching this forum dissolve into chaos over something like this.
Like I said before - everyone's opinions are pretty much useless. No one in the industry cares what you think. Disc are here and aren't going away. It is simply a matter of time before they become ubiquitous.
Those that talk about any sort of real benefit of disc on a road bike: sorry - you're stretching. Rim brakes are amazing and have come a long way just in this century alone. We easily have enough braking power with the rim brakes available now to skid. When you skid your braking power has overcome your contact patch. It doesn't take much to overcome the contact patch of a road tire.
Yes everyone is drunk with going with wider tires. This is nothing new and will also return to narrower tires in the future under some new generally accepted marketing crap "backed up" by all sorts of biased data again. "Well due to new tire technology and compounds we have in fact found that riding narrower tires at pressure x results in a lower rolling resistance and aids in aerodynamic drag reduction.....blah blah blah" Wide tires make it harder to run with the rim brakes we have but there's over a century of rim brake design that is more than capable of handling it.
There will come a time int he future where leading edge niche of riders and certain racers will stray from the herd and field rim brake bikes again. They will cite the feel of the ride, the low weight, having to learn how to carry more speed through corners, etc all as reasons why they have gone that way. As long as they carry with them a Rapha-esque aesthetic pertinent to that time then the minions of recreational forum users will follow suit.
hell I'm already seeing a surge in riders going back to polished silver hubs, rims and spokes.....just because no one else is running them. "Everyone's bikes are all matte finish and murdered out. They're boring"
Sorry just enjoying a bit of this wild ass guessing from everyone and attempts to rationalize what really isn't that difficult of a question.
I love watching this forum dissolve into chaos over something like this.
Like I said before - everyone's opinions are pretty much useless. No one in the industry cares what you think. Disc are here and aren't going away. It is simply a matter of time before they become ubiquitous.
Those that talk about any sort of real benefit of disc on a road bike: sorry - you're stretching. Rim brakes are amazing and have come a long way just in this century alone. We easily have enough braking power with the rim brakes available now to skid. When you skid your braking power has overcome your contact patch. It doesn't take much to overcome the contact patch of a road tire.
Yes everyone is drunk with going with wider tires. This is nothing new and will also return to narrower tires in the future under some new generally accepted marketing crap "backed up" by all sorts of biased data again. "Well due to new tire technology and compounds we have in fact found that riding narrower tires at pressure x results in a lower rolling resistance and aids in aerodynamic drag reduction.....blah blah blah" Wide tires make it harder to run with the rim brakes we have but there's over a century of rim brake design that is more than capable of handling it.
There will come a time int he future where leading edge niche of riders and certain racers will stray from the herd and field rim brake bikes again. They will cite the feel of the ride, the low weight, having to learn how to carry more speed through corners, etc all as reasons why they have gone that way. As long as they carry with them a Rapha-esque aesthetic pertinent to that time then the minions of recreational forum users will follow suit.
hell I'm already seeing a surge in riders going back to polished silver hubs, rims and spokes.....just because no one else is running them. "Everyone's bikes are all matte finish and murdered out. They're boring"
Sorry just enjoying a bit of this wild ass guessing from everyone and attempts to rationalize what really isn't that difficult of a question.
Here in CA, Disk Brakes are safer, on mountain passes, and around town where the best brakes add a saftey buffer, (Ca drivers
)Rim brakes are great for Crits, no arguing that
02-21-19, 05:19 PM
#107
Banned
It's the Latest thing ...
I now have a bike I ride on the street/road, with *disc brakes, on it , because it's my wet , winter bike... but its not a road bike ..
I have a road bike , it does have rim brakes , it's C&V and never had mudguards , It's not ridden much because the other bike is more practical..
*TRP Hy Rd.. they are quite nice .. replaced the original Avid BB7..
full on hydro Di2 brifters are showing off your wallet prowess.. nice if you got it..
Industry likes Buyers...
,,,,,
....
Last edited by fietsbob; 02-21-19 at 05:37 PM.
02-21-19, 05:32 PM
#108
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Fir instance, you did not open the thread by saying. "I think rim brakes are superior for criterium racing." You started by saying
And by calling disc brakes "unnecessary" you took a very strong position agaisnt them ... a position which you have been trying to back away from, i notice.
Later you say
When you had another chance you replied,
There are regular corners I do -- one is near home, toward the bottom of the hill, and it cuts widely across a divided avenue and ends off camber. It is the final test of many of my rides and my mantra is "practice for the crit, be brave, don't touch the brakes, heavy on the outside pedal, loose through the shoulders." When I'm riding a road bike well, have confidence in my cornering, and am riding in a good group, brakes are pretty much just along for the ride. Bike racing isn't like Moto GP where you accelerate so hard you have to slow way down for the next corner. If anything, it's about finding an extra half pedal stroke so you don't have to accelerate quite so hard after coasting through the corner. Some courses, you don't have the touch the brakes until it's over. That's fundamentally why I don't get why disc brakes are embraced so thoroughly by manufacturers and I assume many buyers. They're not part of anything that promises what to me seems essential to sell a racing bike: you'll go faster.
Your next post doesn’t mention crits or racing.
Finally, in post #67 , you get to what you claim was always the heart of the matter:
Finally in post #102 , you talk very specifically about your personal issues.
I think a lot of us understand crit racing, and how it is essential to be able to stay with a group, save energy, explode away when a beak goes, all that.
But there is this:
But … as I said above, I don’t care what you use. However … waiting until 100 posts into a thread to actually talk about the main topic ….
Or, you were actually just railing against discs in general, and when pressed, had to admit there was really only one small issue.
As @Kapusta notes,
If you simply like the feel and responsiveness of cork on CF rim brakes in a crit, then that is what works for you. Braking response and feel is a completely subjective thing.
I think where things went off is when you try to expand your subjective (albeit perfectly valid) experience to a larger truism about disc vs rim in general.
Rim and disc certainly do feel and respond differently.
I think where things went off is when you try to expand your subjective (albeit perfectly valid) experience to a larger truism about disc vs rim in general.
Rim and disc certainly do feel and respond differently.
Which is also fine. No reason you have to like discs … but as peoplel noted, your reasons for not liking them didn’t make much sense until you actually revealed the deeper reason. Confusion can be fun, I guess …. Or whatever.
Ride as you like and live as you think you should I guess.
02-21-19, 06:00 PM
#109
Senior Member
Thread Starter
Road bikes to me are race bikes. Races, at least here, are crits. Even the "road" races are just crits with big laps where you can't cross the centerline. It's like that in a lot of places throughout the U.S.
Some engineer at every brake manufacturer has a bunch of curves showing braking force vs lever force. If someone wants to volunteer one that's not a trade secret and show how much braking force exists vs how much lever force exists, I think everyone will see what I mean. I don't think it's just personal experience when someone says that disc brakes help them down a long descent or get through some mountain bike trail. The data exists to back that up. But when I represent the other side of the curve, the assumption is that I'm just relaying a preference or personal taste.
Rim brakes operate differently from disc brakes. They have different response curves. Most of the time when you're braking, your going to want to be on the disc brake response curve. But in a crit, which is the essence of racing, and the market where so many of these bikes end up, riders are using their brakes in a way that doesn't scream out for discs; in fact, it's the part of the response curve where rim brakes shine.
02-21-19, 08:06 PM
#110
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*sigh*
I love watching this forum dissolve into chaos over something like this.
Like I said before - everyone's opinions are pretty much useless. No one in the industry cares what you think. Disc are here and aren't going away. It is simply a matter of time before they become ubiquitous.
I love watching this forum dissolve into chaos over something like this.
Like I said before - everyone's opinions are pretty much useless. No one in the industry cares what you think. Disc are here and aren't going away. It is simply a matter of time before they become ubiquitous.
The OP's mind was made up before he posted the thread, and no one is going to change it.
02-21-19, 08:55 PM
#111
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02-21-19, 09:13 PM
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The central issue: Trust me, I know what I'm doing,
Last edited by Bikesplendor; 02-21-19 at 09:16 PM.
02-22-19, 09:00 AM
#114
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This topic has been discussed ad infinitum on this forum. To the OP or anyone else...Just do a search instead of creating a topic.
The reality is disc brakes on road bikes are here to stay and rim brakes on road bikes will be a thing of the past within the next 5 years. The big 3 will drive this change and the component suppliers will follow making rim brakes more or less obsolete much like 26" mountain bike tires and front derailleurs on mountain bikes.
The reality is disc brakes on road bikes are here to stay and rim brakes on road bikes will be a thing of the past within the next 5 years. The big 3 will drive this change and the component suppliers will follow making rim brakes more or less obsolete much like 26" mountain bike tires and front derailleurs on mountain bikes.
02-22-19, 12:07 PM
#115
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I just ride disc brakes to annoy people. 
02-22-19, 01:01 PM
#116
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I ride discs to slice the arteries of my foes when there's a pile-up.
02-22-19, 01:20 PM
#117
I eat carbide.
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02-22-19, 01:32 PM
#119
I eat carbide.
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PSIMET Wheels, PSIMET Racing, PSIMET Neutral Race Support, and 11 Jackson Coffee
Podcast - YouTube Channel
Video about PSIMET Wheels
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02-22-19, 02:05 PM
#120
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Finally this thread is getting good.
02-25-19, 12:41 PM
#121
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I'm not speaking hypothetically about this stuff. Rim wear is just a reality for people who ride outdoors year-round here. A few thousand hilly miles in the mucky wet can be all it takes to burn through a rim, especially if a lot of it is night riding where the lack of visibility demands more braking. For people who ride a single set of wheels year-round, a rim replacement cycle of every year or two is not that rare; there's zero wear in the summer, but extremely rapid wear when it's mucky.
About a year ago, before a group ride, there was a sound like a gunshot. On a wheel that had just been topped off, the thin brake track allowed the hook to separate from the rest of rim in one spot. The rider of that bike is an experienced roadie, and did not "drag his brakes for a decade", he just hadn't been very diligent about checking brake track wear. Similarly exploded rims aren't a rare sight for bike shops in the region.
About a year ago, before a group ride, there was a sound like a gunshot. On a wheel that had just been topped off, the thin brake track allowed the hook to separate from the rest of rim in one spot. The rider of that bike is an experienced roadie, and did not "drag his brakes for a decade", he just hadn't been very diligent about checking brake track wear. Similarly exploded rims aren't a rare sight for bike shops in the region.
02-25-19, 12:58 PM
#122
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02-25-19, 01:20 PM
#124
Junior Member
The main benefit for the garden variety Fred is better braking performance, especially noticeable on long descents, and in wet/icy conditions.
A secondary benefit for Freds enjoying the sweet nectar of big heavy tires and rims; no rim brake caliper clearance issues. (However, disc brakes bring with them thru-axles, and the trick of aligning the rotor with the caliper, so wheel changes do not become easier.)
For actual road racers, the main benefit of disc brakes is to allow the use of light weight carbon rims, decreasing weight around the perimeter of the wheel, which is how you go fast.
A secondary benefit for Freds enjoying the sweet nectar of big heavy tires and rims; no rim brake caliper clearance issues. (However, disc brakes bring with them thru-axles, and the trick of aligning the rotor with the caliper, so wheel changes do not become easier.)
For actual road racers, the main benefit of disc brakes is to allow the use of light weight carbon rims, decreasing weight around the perimeter of the wheel, which is how you go fast.
02-25-19, 01:22 PM
#125
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don't need disk brakes
Hi, Yes, I ride mostly on dry days, and don't need all that expensive technology to stop the bike! They wan't you to spend more money on technology that doesn't do anything to make a bike faster.
Let them do something to make the bikes lighter and faster, or less complicated for a change!
Let them do something to make the bikes lighter and faster, or less complicated for a change!