Originally Posted by
Bill Kapaun
Ball bearing V brakes?
Sounds like a solution looking for a problem.
Originally Posted by
smd4
Ball "thrust" bearings started to appear in center-pivot side-pull brakes in the 1980s, as I recall. The idea was that as the brake applied pressure to the rim, if thrust bearings weren't there, the friction between the brake's two moving calipers would increase. The thrust bearings were said to alleviate this friction. I imagine the same is true for V brakes.
I have an old set of Shimano
XTR V-brakes which have these bearings. Whether they work better than brakes without these bearings is an open question to me, as I have bikes with both kinds of brakes. In the XTR arms, there are two flat bearings sandwiching the brake arm. Each bearing has 18 tiny balls; these minimize "binding" of the arm on its pivot under braking loads. These arms are a bit of a challenge to service, but sort of enjoyable.