Originally Posted by The Golden Boy

^^^ That.

You more or less want your pads striking the rim kind of level. Notice how your pad posts are *roughly* level?

What happens with brakes that almost work- is they're angled downwards- and the pads are striking the rim along the top edge of the pad.

While this is great- it does pain me because I've always looked at the DC960s as kind of 'low rent.' I've heard the 960s work well, but I've also heard they don't work. As was mentioned- the DC981s are also supposed to be favored to work. My favorites are the Shimano XT M732 or the Deore II MT62 cantis- just because they look so well designed and there's no exposed spring and just look so good. And I've had success with the Suntour XC Pro cantis on my 1985 Trek 720- and those are some pretty brakes- that champagne color would really work on a green frame like the TS-V.

Your TS-V is beautiful.

I thought it was interesting you chose to make your bike Shimano-free... The 1984 and 85 Schwinn Voyageur SP were both Shimano-free builds as well. I used to be a total Suntour homer and go out of my way to not use Shimano stuff. After deciding to use indexing past 6 speeds- Shimano was just better at it. I still think a Suntour XC Pro RD feels nicer than even an M900 XTR RD- Accushift 6 is fine, but I don't have a lot of confidence in Accushift 7 and haven't used 8 at all.

As far as the Suntour BB- I'm running one- and keep an eye on eBay- I think I picked up my BB tool on eBay for like $20. Then again, some clowns have them up for ridiculous amounts of money...