James Christie

At the risk of inflaming the feminists amongst us may I suggest that disk brakes (like a/c and auto gearboxes in cars) are a bit like women : once you’ve experienced them it’s tough do without.

james

WhyFi

You want them because they're ******g awesome.

tomato coupe

I'll admit it, my position has changed now that everything has been explained to me in a really large font.

LesterOfPuppets

My '70s Peugeot I'd just open the QR and drop the front wheel right out in less than a second. Then after patching, put it back in, lean on the bars to seat axle properly, close the QR.
'85 Pinarello, same drill.
'88 Trek. Uggh. Lawyer lips. Gotta unscrew the QR a few turns. THEN screw the QR back in the exact same amount of turns to get the tension right.
'18 Fuji. Gotta line the wheel hole up with the fork holes, then spin the Thru Axle in. (actually probably not much tougher than the lawyer lips fork overall, just a different style of PITA)

Luckily some MTB forks come with the Push style TA (no threads)

Even better is the RAT setup. Would be nice if it became universal.

TiHabanero

RAT is cool, neat and efficient. Horay!

Now the reality check. Another standard introduced to the industry that struggles with standards. Just what we need. Next year other makers will come out with their version of the RAT such as RATTY and RATTIER, and more standards are introduced. Best of all is within 5 years a new and improved axle arrangement will take the world by storm and yet another standard is introduced along with the myriad of variants. The simple ol' QR was so simple to use for those that used their minds to understand the principle of what it actually did.

indyfabz

Yeah. My Trek 660 from the 80s was pre-lawyer lips. Wheel would drop right out.

LesterOfPuppets

Something had to be done. Everyone became afraid to run QR with Discs. And race mechanics sure as hell don't wanna mess around with threaded thru axles.

I noticed one team running threaded TA, one running RAT, and Team Ineous stuck with ye olde rim brakes and QRs for 2020. This was back in January when we still thought there would be a 2020.



I reckon the threaded TA team mechanics would rather have 6 bikes per rider so they don't have to swap wheels on the road.

WhyFi

A drill with a 6mm bit seems like a better solution, to me. My Cervelo came with RATs, I futzed with them for a few rides, decided that I didn't have confidence that I'd operate them properly all of the time and replaced them with some TAs from Robert Axle Project.

Mulberry20

Upgrades in technology are cool, it is the basis for the entire economy. In this case, and in the case of tubeless tires, there is basically no benefit to the average cyclist or even the enthusiast cyclist.

I am doing a bike now that is likely to cost about 8 grand if I go with carbon wheels, and I simply cannot do it without disk brakes even though I will curse them.

WhyFi

And others disagree. *shrug*

Pratt

When you apply rim brakes, in my experience, they sort of tap on the bike's shoulder and say "Hello, old boy, what do you say to slowing just a bit, if it's no bother, that is?" With disc brakes, you give a little squeeze and a road block pops up, manned by heavily armed officers who say "Achtung! You vill shtop ze bike now, yes."

Mulberry20

I forgot to include Speedplay pedals. The three items, disk brakes, tubeless tires and Speedplay pedals, are what I would call laboratory engineering rather than practical engineering.

WhyFi

Oh - were you the guy in the other thread that didn't have the mechanical aptitude to install the Speedplays? Condolences.

tomato coupe

Don't forget the RAsTa variant for mountain bikes.

vane171

I like rim brakes because of simple maintenance, and I talk about span of decades, not year to year.
Of course, you always find cases when people would disagree. Recently I adjusted rim brakes on several consumer bikes that had been serviced in bike shops over the years (since the owners are fairly affluent and non-technical when it comes to bikes) and the state of misalignment I found them in was terrible, would not let average shop touch my bike. I shudder though what job they would do on disk brakes.

Someone above said, disks make for cleaner look, but that depends where you look. I still love the look of hubs, some are real works or art, but disk on them spoils it all. And disks don't look good in my opinion on a bike, I don't like the look when people have large sprockets (bigger than 26-28 cogs) and disks almost look like those plastic spokes protectors on consumer bikes.

I bled brakes on my older vehicles, so I know what that is about, don't care to have that on bike. With rim brakes, I change the cable when first strand of it threatens to break, maybe put a drop of oil on it and that's it, adjust the pads when I replace them, which is not that often, I am not a heavy brake user.

Only two conditions I'd say, disks are good to have. One is if you commute in town because it is handy if you can stop on a dime, the other if you live in area with steep and long downhills with curves in them, demanding serious braking. In my years of car driving, I never quite understood what all this talk of fading and overheating brakes and such like is about, until when crisscrossing US I found myself with white knuckles on the wheel, going downhill faster and faster and braking at most only kept speed unchanged, with no hill bottom in sight, passing those gravel exit runs for runaway trucks...

I suppose on bikes and on wide, multiple lane highway, you could just let it go since at some point, you get aero braking effect but on narrow mountain road, you can well wish you had disks.

One big minus for disks came when I watched some pro tour race, maybe TDF or was it Olympic race in Brazil, when the road was wet and someone's disks were squealing like a stuck pig as someone said above here. That's horrid, I'd never want to call attention to me that way , it also offends my technical feel for things or how else to put it.

GeneO 

Not my experience. On both bikes I have hydraulic disk brakes, they modulate well, and I can easily control how quickly I brake. Just another data point.

HTupolev

Probably actually better.

I think one of the main benefits of hydraulic disc brakes is that they save people from themselves, because there's not a lot of room to set them up between "near perfect" and "doesn't work at all." There are fewer degrees of freedom in the setup, and if you get something like the bleed order-of-operations wrong, you're likely to end up with basically zero braking. So in order to do their jobs at all, the bike shops have to get it mostly right.

The thing about your poorly-adjusted cable-actuated rim brakes is that, despite having serious problems, they worked well enough that someone said "this is in working order" and shipped it out the door. They're set up poorly in part because setting them up poorly was an option.

vane171

I am inclined to agree with you.

Otherwise, I think the future is all disk brakes, especially consumer bikes. It creates great aftermarket parts and servicing prospects. With rim brakes, the field was kinda stale, with disks there is technology advances being made which means people will replace working disks to get the latest technology, while there was little to improve on the rim brakes, except looks or maybe better rubber on the pads. Now you have pistons, hydraulic brake lines, fluid, I don't quite know what is in the brake levers, probably some pistons too... engineers are happy, retail is happy...

mstateglfr 

The poster you replied to said disc brakes are great because its easy to swap wheel sizes. That is a competitive advantage over rim brakes.
rim brakes really don't accept 700s and 650b wheel sizes, but disc does.
So while its easy to swap wheels on a rim brake bike, it isn't easy to swap wheel sizes since it will require swapping brake calipers too.

And to be clear, itnisnt tough to swap wheels on a disc brake bike. Its sometimes just as simple as rim brakes(qr disc brake bikes). And at most, it takes an extra 30 seconds(TA disc brake bikes).

NoWhammies

Better braking in the wet.
Less impact on your rims.
Way of the future.
No worries about melting your carbon wheels if you're on the brakes during a long descent.

Illgot

I ride in the elements,. Rain, ice, snow, sun. Disks more reliable than caliper when wet and not using part of your wheel that is 3 inches from the ground, which means less moisture when going through pedals.

It was really a safety issue for me because I almost slammed into the back of a car that decided to jump into the bike lane in front of me while it was storming (the girls didn't want to stop at the red light). If the girls had fully stopped my wet caliper brakes would have caused me to collide.

elcruxio

I suppose that's the difference when you haven't yet gotten used to hydro's. They require significantly less pressure to achieve the same thing so going at them with the learned feel of rim brakes is going to cause some fast stops.

AlgarveCycling

I'm a big fan of rim brakes aesthetically and for their weight advantage. I've never really had braking problems in a lifetime of cycling - apart from the time I had to jump off my BMX bike in a thunderstorm going down a steep hill riding home from school because they had failed!

My Wilier is running rim brakes and Zipp carbon hoops. What I will say, is that I worry going down long steep descents and their performance in the wet which degrades rapidly. That said, living in a region with over 300 days of sunshine, wet riding days are happily a rarity. I love discs on my MTB, the stopping power there is always immense in all conditions in comparison and much needed in my opinion for the terrain I ride on.

More recently, I have taken delivery of my new Trek road bike and it too has discs, so I've rim and disc road bikes now and ride both so get a good comparison. I'd not say the discs stopping distance in the dry is much better than rim - this is supported by a GCN Youtube brake test video recently too. That said, the benefits in the rain is well-known albeit I have yet to ride my Trek in the rain - probably only get caught in rain around November. I am far more confident going downhill however on the disc bike - while pulling hard on both types of brake on the flat will yield similar results, going downhill the discs react better, the incremental effects are more effective suggesting that the faster you go, the greater the advantage of discs regardless of weather conditions.

I opted for discs on the Trek because cost was irrelevant as was maintenance - l'm not at all concerned when there is added maintenance on certain products if I find I like the benefits overall, much like Speedplay pedals which are excellent for those who want more float control for their knee's and a dual sided option but require really easy extra care from time to time. Similarly, discs require more servicing as a trade off for the benefits they offer but, like Speedplay's, it is easy and, let's face it, you would have to be a bit of a moron to get it wrong if you wanted to do it yourself rather than just let your LBS take care of it.

TiHabanero

Always I forget that most participants on the bike forum are enthusiasts. For the person that is into the sport or hobby there is no end to "performance" upgrades. For the average person that rides a bike for commuting, trail riding, general fun, there is a limit and at the shop we hear from them quite loudly when that limit has been reached! Disc brakes for the average person, especially hydro models, are a mistake. They are not like a rim brake where after years of neglect just add lube and they work again. They are costly to replace, do not do well under neglected maintenance, and most of them cannot be successfully rebuilt.

For the enthusiast that is into cycling as a serious hobby disc brakes are fine, but for the rest of the world hydro disc brakes are a mistake.

vespasianus

I agree with most of this 100%. I have two road bikes, one with rim brakes and one with disc brakes. The disc brakes do have more stopping power - in both the dry and in the wet but they both work fine. The other big benefit of discs is the ability to use carbon rims and maintain that stopping power - which absolutely was terrible with carbon rims and especially if any water got on them! The other benefit is the ability to use bigger tires, which can have some benefit.

The biggest pain is the initial set up (longer), the initial cost (more money) and the learning curve. Lastly, when talking with the local bike shops, they all said buy disc if you are ever thinking of selling the bike.