icemilkcoffee 

Is your disc brake better today? Yes of course it is. How about if you leave your bike in the shed for say 40 years? Will it still be OK? I have three bikes that are nearly 40 years old and their brakes are all working still.

Koyote

Why wouldn’t it?

(Not to mention, why would I care?)

icemilkcoffee 

Because the fluids would have leaked out and probably made a mess on the floor.

You might now. I'm just saying one is designed to last the ages and the other is not. You've heard the phrase 'heirloom quality' right?

PeteHski

This is a ridiculous scenario.

JohnDThompson 

And, your frame and fork have to be designed to handle disc brake loads.

I have nothing against disc brakes; they make a lot of sense especially for technical off-road riding. But rim brakes are perfectly fine for most riding conditions, and don't require me to buy a new frame and fork.

Sierra_rider

Why would I leave my bike in the shed for 40 years?

If it's in there for 40 years, I clearly DGAF about the brakes.

79pmooney

Because it was decided to run the front calipers behind the fork so when you brake, the disc and hence the hub is forced down. And out of traditional dropouts. Not entirely rational engineering. (Sophomore engineering students have the force mapping skills to see this. The bright ones got this by 10th grade on their own.)

tomato coupe

For most of us, our fluids will be leaking out and making a mess on the floor in less than 40 years.

Chuck M 

I've never thought about how useful something stored in a shed will be 40 years from now when I'm making a purchase. I'm going to keep on not thinking about it.

indyfabz

+1.Ask me how I know.

cyccommute 

It’s generally implied in all of these arguments. When you make a comment like “In the last 5-6 years, I've been in two gravel races in which riders have broken their necks - literally - on such descents,” the implication is that rim brakes are dangerous and lead to bad bike handling. Of course the broken necks could have been from so other incident but the implication is there. I’ve had lots of comments from people in person along the line of “how can you ride on rim brakes? They are so dangerous.” And they usually add “I would never ride on anything but disc brakes.”

Nope. Didn’t miss the point at all. You like discs. I find them to be just another brake system that operates the same as most any other brake system widely available today with the possible exception of coaster brakes.

PeteHski

Which is not something the end user has to even think about.

Polaris OBark

What JDT refers to seems like a gratuitious objection, unless someone out there is selling bicycles with frames and forks that don't have disc brake caliper mounts, not to mention the wrong wheels.

Disc brakes for most people are a major improvement. There are still many bicycles with rim brakes and 130mm rear hubs for those that don't need or want them.

It is weird how people make up problems, instead of bringing up the genuine quibbles (eg: cost, especially of frequently replaced brake pads).

smd4

Disc brakes cost more and the pads need to be replaced more frequently.

PeteHski

I think they invent these “problems” simply because they are determined to prove that their rim brakes are still the best. Same goes with pretty much any new bike tech. Some people will just invent dozens of ridiculous arguments to prove their point.

The 40 year shed storage test is a novel disc brake issue I haven’t seen previously 😂. I’m sure there will be other gems in this thread too.

tomato coupe

The cost difference is pretty small -- only about $100 more for Ultegra Di2 disc (R8170) vs. rim (R8150) groups.

Polaris OBark

Excellent points. I wish I had thought of those.

PeteHski

Yep, fair points. But neither are show-stoppers for me.

Polaris OBark

Until you buy a few dozen replacement pads over 10 years...

tomato coupe

I don't replace either rim or disc pads at anywhere near that rate -- it's closer to one set every 2 or 3 years.

PeteHski

Yeah, pads are relatively expensive but not enough to bother me or even recall how much they actually cost.

PeteHski

Same for me.

3alarmer 

.
...in interest of contributing to this discussion topic, I e-mailed a request to my marketing guys, to workshop it.
It turns out that there's already an ad campaign we can piggy back on, but we do have to modify the product slightly.
.
.



(And it's probably going to be expensive to license from Kellogg's. I don't want to sugarcoat it.)

Atlas Shrugged

Seriously? $25 per year is going to push you over the top? When I was a paper boy in the early 70’s, that would be considered as inconsequential. We are past bordering on ridiculous

Dave Mayer

The First World bike industry is in trouble. Post-pandemic inventory overhang and dropping sales. Competition from Asia for direct sales to customers, and new groupsets such as Sensah and LTWOO. Internet sales, on even expensive items such as bikes are becoming ubiquitous and accepted by customers.

What the First World bike industry needs to do:

• Make bikes difficult to work on for a weekend warrior. Introduce complex proprietary tools for undertaking basic maintenance. Hydraulic discs and electronics are great because they lock most riders back to a shop for what used to be simple maintenance. Internal cable routing: a windfall! It looks kewl and saves 0.001 watts on the road, but it allows a shop to hand a $300 bill to a customer for a stem swap.
  
  
• Introduce new transitory ‘features’ on bikes, like aero fins on 1950s cars. Like suspension elements on road bikes. Or discs, which are heavy, fussy and unnecessary.
  
  
• Change over the fleet: Introduce different dimensional standards which will render the previous generations of bikes obsolete and useless. Like wheel sizes and widths and attachment standards. Plus different bottom bracket standards and cassette systems. Note the success of how the 26” MTB wheel standard was replaced by the 29-er through a rare coordinated and concerted effort by the entire First World bike industry. Then the 27.5” standard had to be introduced because the 29er was a mistake for many riders. Of course, the industry could never ever go back to 26”. Nope.
  
  
• Introduce an integrated supply chain direct from manufacturer to retail customer. Buy up the independents and lock customers into one single brand, particularly for servicing, where the money actually is. There is no money in selling $300 hybrids, but there is profit in selling an expensive bike to a platinum card holder. Then, due to difficult to service proprietary parts, the weekend warrior is locked to you for frequent ‘servicing’ - forever. Basically, a subscription service.
  
  
• In addition to changing the bike fleet over frequently by introducing new ‘standards’, also choke off the supply of replacement parts for bikes over 5 years old. Customer walks into a shop looking for a 10-speed derailleur… “This hasn’t been made in 10 years! We cannot source this. Let me show you some newer bikes!”
  
  
• Hire a cadre of social media sycophants and influencers to rag on anyone or entity who challenges the above strategy.