You think rim brake, direct mount will return?
 

I've noticed in cycling, while trends come and some leave, they often come around again, like steel getting more popular again, or when press fit was constantly touted by the big brands being so superior, well, BSA is back.

I wonder if rim/direct mount be the same, after a few years of big brands trying shove disc brake down our throats to point of refusing to make rim brake versions of their road bikes, it will come back in a few years?

What you think?

I am guessing they will always be around for budget/entry level bikes and custom builds. I don't see them coming back for the "better" road bikes, sadly.

When they run out of ideas to get some of us to buy stuff we do not need, they may resurrect rim brakes for some sales but not anytime soon, I imagine

You think it's cause people aren't making enough stink about it or do they really really really love disc brakes that much?

I'm not talking about performance, just by aesthetics and ease of care and cost. Rim brake/direct mount are so just so simple stupid cheap, and IMO look so much better on a sleek road bike.

Really want the new Cannondale Supersixx or the BMC Teammachine, but really don't want to switch to disc. I don't have any tools I don't think to properly maintain then, it would be a huge investment to switch over. Have to change wheels and everything, cause the stock wheels on the Cannondlae Supersixx if I don't want to spend 7K are horrible.

How many miles do pads last on disc brakes?

I had some on a bike and seemed like every two weeks, I needed new pads.

I'm not sure. But I did some group rides this past summer, and noticed on a handful there was someone who had to stop to adjust their brakes, horrible grinding, high pitched noise. This has happened a few times now, I've had brake rub too, but I just lean over or lean back and adjust it on the fly. I mean, I don't understand the love for disc brake cause rim is well simple stupid and it works. I understand the reasons for disc, but how many people actually riding hard in the rain or flying down huge mountains and needing that modulation? Hell every cyclist I know around here use their trainer when it rains.

I'm strictly talking about road, not gravel, MTB etc.

It's probably for several reasons. Most people don't work on their own bikes so the fact that rim brakes are stupid easy/simple is not a driver. And give the devil his due, disc brakes give better stopping/modulation and "solve" the concern about poor stopping with carbon fiber rims (especially in the wet and/or long descents).

I still have exclusively rim brake bikes and have zero interest in discs but the reality is they are already dominant, and although rim brakes won't disappear they will likely be a minority.

Yeah true, but for me will feel really stupid paying someone to maintain something that was so simple stupid as brakes... Not only would I have to buy new wheels, I'd have to buy new tools.

Oh well, I guess I'll keep riding this frame and maybe just buy a used frameset for 2nd bike next year.

You mean there are real cyclists who do not do their own pad replacements? They go to a shop for that? What a waste of time and gas. It is a 2 minute job. I just put Swiss Prince pads all around.....oh wait, those aren't disc pads

Hopefully never. Rim brakes are a poor design: any essential system that works by wearing away a structural component of your bike is an inherently flawed design and should be re-thought. Disc brakes solve that issue.

People who need to stop to adjust disc brakes whilst out on rides clearly don't know how to work on or set them up. User error, not design error.

Most of the maintenance is swapping pads, which takes a screw driver, a tire lever and a couple minutes. If you wanted/needed to do a bleed job, two or three or four years down the line, you just need a bleed kit, which is twenty or thirty bucks.

In 50 years of cycling, I have never wore out a set of rims from braking.

My training wheels (Flo 60 carbon) have more than 50,000 miles on them.

How many miles do disc pads last? Maybe a 1000? I got less on mine. That would be 10-15 changes per year for me. THAT is a problem needing a solution.

https://prodifycycling.com/bike-disc-brake-guide/

It's obviously going to vary, depending upon conditions, but 1k miles per set would be exceptionally low in my experience; I'm probably closer to 4k or so. If you're talking about randonneuring and the like, which seems to be your bag, the service interval should be quite a bit longer.

According to Strava, I have 2200km on current pads which are still good for a good bit. Last pads I replaced after 5700km and they were really worn. The ones before that 5900km.

I live in a reasonably hilly area, too - my typical stats show about 1100m-1200m of climbing per 100km and at 72-75kg I'm not exactly a lightweight.

1600km sounds way too short. Anyway, I don't see myself buying a rim brake bike unless I buy something vintage for leisure rides.

I have worn through rims many times. When I had rim brakes on my mtb I knew the rim was toast when I got the thump from the low spot. This was with considerable wet use, though.
I wore through the brake track on a Mavic Open Pro last year. It started shaking/pulsing when braking and I measured it with a micrometer and it was worn down a substantial amount. Dry riding on the road only.
Usually my rear rim will crack before this happens so this surprised me a bit. I never get much more than about 10k miles from a rear rim on any bike ever.
I have seen the brake track blow off of another rider's bike on two separate occasions. Scary.

Once the hydraulic brakes become the norm, some company will claim a major revolutionary design change to rim brakes, start a massive ad campaign, get a couple of teams in the TdF to use them and then the pendulum swings back. Gott keep people buying stuff.

Originally, wasn't the idea of disk brakes that rim brakes can get slippery in muddy conditions...which is why back n the day you only found disk brakes on MTB and cyclocross bikes? The issue was never that rim brakes wear down rims or that there was a problem with stopping power. Disk brakes were always considered heavy and clumsy and not well suited to road cycling until recently.

I never saw it as a real problem at all.


I think road bike disc brakes are a really good idea in a few circumstances:


- Lots of riding in wet conditions

- Carbon rims (another fairly recent development that's becoming quite prominent)

- You think they look cool, don't mind that your frame must have wider spacing, and don't like the thought of having to replace rims when they wear out after thousands of miles


I think claims about disc brakes' better power and modulation are greatly overstated. And I don't believe they really cool better (but at least you never have to worry about them getting so hot on a huge descent that tire blowout could become a concern).


Disadvantages include requirement for tangent spoke lacing, and for a stronger/heavier fork. The latter is kind of moot, since everything comes with a beefy, carbon fork now (aero shaped legs are inherently strong along the axis where needed to counter braking forces, without adding much weight).


I side with those who believe we'll have rim brakes for decades to come, on lower end bikes. The upper tiers in every manufacturer's lineup will probably never go back. I'm kind of ambivalent about this, as I am with electronic shifting, ever higher numbers of cogs, and lots of other tech developments. Part of me misses the old ways, but I get that progress is a good thing and inevitable.

I'll be surprised if 20 years from now we don't have as commonplace other developments that are not even on anyone's radar now. Maybe super light, powerful ebikes with regenerative braking (like what gas-elec hybrid cars use), photovoltaic paint to charge the battery whenever the bike is outside, or ??? Probably also tires with extremely low rolling resistance, extremely light weight by today's standards, and 100% puncture resistance.

Look at how different a high end road bike of today is from the ones in, say, 2000. Come 2040, I bet bikes will have so much new tech, we can't even imagine them now.

No, direct mount rim brakes wont make some huge comeback. They were a short lived answer something that very few people asked.

20 years from now, most bikes will probably be electric. Heck, most cities may not have clean enough air to ride. Or some may be underwater. Some may be riding on another planet at that point, which introduces all sorts of issues when it comes to tire pressure and gear ratios.
I dont know whats to come, but I do know direct mount rim brakes arent the answer to that unknown.

There’s a lot of assumption that discs are hydraulic, but that’s not necessarily true. I rode cable actuated Avid BB7 for 16 years and loved them. Wheel swaps were easier than resetting rim brakes, and as they were on my year round utility/commuter, braking was reliable in wet, snow, and cold, and they kept the bike a lot cleaner; pads throw nasty gunk all over the rims and tires in the wet, and it’s worse in the salty slurry we often have here in Michigan during the winter.

Also, pad durability was excellent, and pad changes did not require any tools at all.

I have two other bikes with hydro discs, and those are also excellent. The stopping power and low effort to achieve it is vastly superior to any rim brake caliper system. From a performance standpoint, it allows later braking, and it’s much comfortable and confidence-inspiring not to have to squeeze so hard on the levers, especially when braking frequently or descending.

Hydraulic brake maintenance is tedious, but not really difficult. Having different systems can necessitate different connectors for bleeding, and given the infrequency of that service, I can understand how it makes sense to just take it to the shop every few years rather than “tool up” at home. It’s not like cables are cheap, though, either…my Campagnolo brake cable sets cost $50 a go, and I need to do bar tape to change cables, too, so that crap is pricey. I have a SRAM brake bleed kit which came with fluid that cost $80; that’s amortized over the entire service life of the bike, aside for fluid, whereas cables and bar tape is $80 every three years typically. I think discs are more economical than rim brakes.

Disc brakes are mostly maintenance free like they are on your car or mtb. Pad changes don’t require any special tools. You may need to bleed them every few years, but it’s hardly rocket science.

Your wrong. Drum brakes are next. Carbon fiber hubs with integral drums. Carbon fiber shoes. Hydraulic actuated too. :roflmao2:

With wireless Bluetooth to the hydraulic actuator in the drum. Press the lever. The electro hydraulic piston is boosted by the rotating drum generating more voltage with lever pressure. This drives the pads. USB connection on the outside for charging.

Not a chance. The shift to discs has been driven entirely by pros who want to drive harder into the corners and need a useful braking option that is both more powerful and easier to modulate. They don't care 2 whits if it looks cool. Rims brakes suck and that's just a fact. Anyone who says otherwise has never used a disc brake equipped bike, doesn't ride in conditions where there are clouds between them and the sun, or they descend like they're scared. Discs are far superior and there's frankly no physical/mechanical way to make rimmies any better than they currently aren't.

Steel came back because it never left.

For the anti-disc crowd, come at me. Without fail 99.9% of you fall into one of the 3 categories I listed. I don't know much about bikes except what I've learned over 45 years of riding, racing, crashing, and fixing them.

I had BB7s on my first disc equipped bike for about 2 weeks, I thought they were fine. Then I installed hydraulic brakes. Way better. But, definitely the BB7s worked, much better than rimmers.

Maintenance is not tedious, not for Shimano. Agreed, definitely not difficult.