chaadster

Yeah, knowing Heine/BQ, you don't need to read the article to know how they're going to fall or what they're going to b*tch about. Talk about mature tech...those guys are over the hill.

Lazyass

I believe they may mean removing the wheel. I think it was Team Roompot who tested them in the Eneco Tour a few weeks ago. They ended up just switching bikes when a rider had a flat because changing the wheel took too long.

RJM

Jan Heine, who runs that magazine, is using an older rando bike with centerpull brakes and he has a preference for performance....and I'm sure his braking is totally solid. Older stuff like centerpulls are awesome.

I'm not at all sold on disc brakes for a road bike and have found rim brakes are perfectly fine. Of course they aren't mature tech for the road though...they haven't been out all that long and they haven't been widely adopted.

MKahrl

There's a cool picture in an earlier issue of BQ testing rim brakes where the rear tire is a foot off the ground. The tester said it looked scarier than it was; the bike was surprisingly easy to control with the rear wheel airborne. How much more braking power do you need on a single bike if your current brake can throw you over the handlebars?

Maybe they should be comparing rim and disc brakes on a tandem.

redfooj

Jan isnt entirely retrogrouch for the sake of being retrogrouch (a la Grant Peterson). He wears tights, uses clipless, and while advocating fairly large tires, still favor fairly light versions of them. He doesn't endorse or market his wares as race-appropriate... and atleast has justification for his choice of gear. (although I think top-routed brake levers are utter rubbish for ergonomics and function).

A bit refreshing from the fawning of other publications -- when have you ever read a negative review?
"This frame is light and rockets off your feet"
"This frame is heavy but gives the feeling of sturdiness and durability"

"The top grade dura ace groupset provides impeccable shifting"
"This sora groupset is not as pretty or light as the upmarket equipment, but functions exactly the same"

**yawn**

popeye

Yes, you can make a case for discs on a tandem.

WalksOn2Wheels

I can see the "not mature tech" argument in terms of industry wide standards (but in that case, pressfit BB's aren't mature technology), but who needs anything better than Shimano hydraulic discs? Those things are friggin' awesome. Not that they won't improve, but carbon-ceramic rotors? That seems like a bit much. That's basically F1 and MotoGP tech. The majority of cars being produced and manufactured as we speak use steel rotors, and would you call a brand new car an immature technology?

Bandera

"Afraid for my safety, I stop to let the (Shimano BR-785) brakes cool......
the brakes have stopped howling but the lever still bottoms out against the handlebars during hard braking."

BQ #53 Pg.40

chaadster

Well, whether he's a retrogrouch for the sake of retrogrouchiness, or has some sophisticated rationale, I don't know, because I barely find BQ interesting enough to read, let alone interesting enough to want to get into Heine's personal belief system, so I'll take your word for it. Regardless, I've read enough to know he's an ideologue.

LesterOfPuppets

Only in front. Surely everyone running disc will be running through axles before long.

eriku16

Shimano MTB parts are adapted for road bikes and are in no way mature.... Waiting for some company who is willing to spend the R&D for a true ground up design exclusively for road bikes.

Kabloink

You can't blame democrats for not wanting to ride a penny farthing.

njkayaker

"Immature" implies that the technology is either still changing rapidly or isn't very reliable. It isn't a synonym for "new". One common problem with "immature" technology is that it become obsolete.

In general, people should avoid buying "immature" technology.

That things "don't always come about in linear fashion" has no relevance (no one is talking about how new technology is developed).

njkayaker

???

BQ is talking about bicycling for long-distance Randonees and dirt-road riding. Not racing or mountain biking or downhill or touring.

njkayaker

No. "Wheel ejection" doesn't sound like "wheel removal".

Spoonrobot 

As mentioned earlier in the thread, hydraulic disc brakes for road bikes are not mature technology. The calipers and levers are making a ton of compromises and design choices that MTB did not have to deal with. I think road hydraulics will get better but most definitely will not be as good as MTB hydraulics since the shifting and brake mechanisms have to be incorporated into the same lever, unlike MTB where shifting and braking controls are two separate components.

Mechanical discs for road bikes are probably as good as they're going to get but they're making compromises over rim brakes that generally turn people off.

I''ll still take the review with a grain of salt. Jan has provided an excellet counterpoint to modern race-focused cycling but anyone who prefers & advocates threaded headsets in 2015 is suspect.

Lazyass

If they were studying wheels with standard dropouts and quick release skewers then maybe. There are cases where disc brakes have pulled wheels out of dropouts, I know one case went to court. The disc pulls the wheel in the direction of the open fork ends with a lot of force. I don't see how thru-axles would be a problem.

Darth Lefty 

Sounds like Tejon Pass... He should have shifted down to third to let the engine do the work.

Seriously, disk brakes for road bikes don't seem big enough. They ought to be bigger than the ones for MTB's because the speeds are higher, especially on descents. But the market wants them to look more delicate because they're for road and not MTB.

69chevy

I think the wheel ejection thing came from this..

Trek released a statement detailing how improper installation of a front quick release lever on the bike could lead it to get caught in the front disc brake, resulting in a separation of the front wheel and loss of control for the rider.

LesterOfPuppets

That recall concerns QR levers that swing wide open and snag on rotor spokes.

Another front wheel ejection fear stems from the fact that when applied, most front disc calipers want to push the front axle out of the dropouts. So if your skewer fails or isn't properly tightened (even if it's not the full-swing levers that the recall is concerning, even if you have leverless skewers) the wheel might eject.

You'd have to be going over some rough stuff (rough enough to unweight the front wheel intermittently), while applying front brake, with a broken or improperly tensioned skewer to even have a chance at wheel ejection.

Through axles will probably dominate disc braked bikes in no time, so chances of this type of ejection will drop from very slim to extremely slim.

njkayaker

Yes, it's (likely) this BQ is referring to with "wheel ejection".

I don't think this is standard/universal yet. If it isn't, this could be part of why it's being characterized as "immature technology".

gsa103

The MTB community has basically standardized on a 15mm thru axle (20mm for downhill bikes). The exact threading mechanism, etc is left to the fork manufacturer, but the hubs are all designed to accept a 15mm axle, so your wheels work with any fork.

As for over-heating brakes, this isn't really a new issue. People over-heat rims and pop tires on a regular basis. I'd rather have the brakes start to fade and gradually degrade compared with a catastrophic front tire blow-out, due to the tire/tube over-heating.

I do think forks will ultimately need to support 180mm discs, especially for larger rides.

redfooj

not the first documented time the r785 have failed

Shimano R785 road hydraulic disc caliper failure - BikeRadar

" the rear Shimano R785 hydraulic brake failed on the road bike I was riding as I was descending from 12,000ft to 9,000ft on a -5% paved road in traffic. ....
The rear brake lever felt mushy for a minute or two, then lost all power. Oil had leaked out of the caliper"

LesterOfPuppets

Unfortunately you still have to go pretty high up the hierarchy to get 15mm TA. At Specialized, for instance, it looks like you have to drop over $3000 to get a fork with through axle.

UnfilteredDregs

lmfao...Irrefutable proof that the fools at BQ know neither how to adjust or employ discs.