Again, thanks for all the comments. I think my action plan will be to go the incremental route. I’ll get some Kool Stop pads (I’,m partial to the salmon or the combo pads), mess around with the straddle cables, realign the pads with the rims, and maybe look at different levers. If I’m still not satisfied, I’ll probably find different brakes. Or maybe I should just go really slowly.
__________________
Some days, it's not even worth gnawing through the restraints.