agmetal

Annoying, but good to know.

noglider 

It's not bad if you have a good bolt and the right wrench(es). You could use a M5 bolt that uses an allen wrench, so you can spin it fast. I would recommend a nylock nut, though. These things have a big tendency to loosen.

dynaryder

We've got them with the disc-rotor-sized heat sinks,really doesn't do much. They are slowly replacing the standard crappy brake levers with dog-leg ones that greatly improve the feel of the brakes(I always specifically pick those),but stopping power and fade are unaffected.

I've had a couple IGH bikes with rear rollers,and they're ok but not my first choice. I would never own a bike with a front roller,even if I moved somewhere pancake flat. Too much weight and not enough power.

BTW,if anyone is ever looking at a Euro-spec bike with rollers,for awhile Shimano had a really messed up setup for attaching the brake cable to the hub. You had to hold down a spring bar and move a nut out of a notch in two directions at once. Super PITA to deal with;I had two bikes come into my clinic with these and had to dig up the tech docs online to figure them out.

fietsbob

mine has a coaster brake like strap, but it has 2 bolts 1 holds it on the frame, the other one Has a separate bolt, for the brake arm

Mine, I got a ball detent pin, with a ring to pull it out , so no nut and bolt to loosen to remove the wheel.

I, just pull the pin, and use the 15mm spanner to loosen the axle bolt .. the cable has a Barrel with a set screw to secure it
it comes off the actuating arm end without any tools ..

PaulH

Everything else is too much of a hassle for me. I like them a lot. The front roller brakes require a lot more of a squeeze than do rim brakes, but that makes for easier modulation onm ice.

grolby

Eh, it depends. I think rim brakes come in for more criticism than I would expect in this forum, given the frequent emphasis on heavy and slow. I've only ever had rim brakes on my commuter bikes, in some pretty grim weather, and at slow, commuting forum-certified speeds, they are perfectly adequate. When I commute on my faster, more expensive bikes, those also have rim brakes, but they are much nicer than the crummy brakes on my commuter bike, so I find them perfectly adequate as well.

Not that disc brakes would not be an improvement, I just haven't found myself wishing for them in my east coast commuting experience. Roller or drum brakes, on the other hand... well, again, at low speeds on flat terrain, they're great and have the advantage of low maintenance, but I sure wouldn't put them on one of my personal bikes. The best thing you can say about them is that they work equally poorly in all weather conditions. They are still worse than a quasi-decent pair of rim brakes in the rain, and much worse when it is dry. They're a great choice for bike share fleets, I've done a fair bit of riding around on Boston's Hubway bikes and have found them sufficient, if not confidence-inspiring. But the only reason they work for bike shares is that those bikes are deliberately designed to be extremely slow. There aren't a lot of steep hills in Boston, but when I've taken a Hubway bike down a short one, I haven't found the braking power on offer to be very encouraging. Roller and drum brakes have their advantages, but they aren't the be-all end-all of commuter bike braking needs and have sufficient shortcomings that I wouldn't want a bike with them.

agmetal

My 90mm front drum hub has stopped my bike confidently at the bottom of Beacon Hill in Boston with no difficulty....short, but pretty steep. I've also been able to stop quite abruptly with it in traffic when necessary. I don't have any experience with the 70mm versions or the Shimano rollers, but I've never felt like I was even remotely lacking in stopping power (except for the need for a few squeezes in the first couple minutes at the end of a day where the bike was locked up outside in pouring rain all day)

Mr IGH

My Shimano roller brake is a little grabby, its a rear brake, lock up isn't too bad. My Sturmey Archer drums have always worked well, I've used them since the early eighties. As good as any rim brake in the dry, much more effective in the wet. With disc brakes on my mountain bikes and drums on my commuters, only my road bike has rim brakes. As soon as I can find a reasonably priced disc road bike that takes 28mm tires I won't have any rim braked bikes.

Matariki

In my experience, disk brakes are more finicky than drum brakes, requiring frequent adjustments. They wear more quickly as well.

agmetal

While you're all here, I'm wondering if anyone knows of any reason why a drum brake wouldn't work with a fork ike the one below? I'm thinking about a singlespeed build with front and rear drums on one of these framesets, but I've only used drums on traditional curved forks. I know SA makes the two different sizes of reaction arm clips (and I'm guessing this fork would need the larger one), but is the taper likely to cause any issues?

kickstart

For my needs and riding style, all forms of braking provide adequate stopping power.
The typical conditions here in the PNW, lots of hills and wet, I go through brake pads very quickly, put significant wear on the rims, and the black brake slurry gets on everything.
The drum brakes on my Raleigh don't have those issues, and work as well as I need, so for me they are the best.

fietsbob

Given there are No Single speed Rear Drum brake Hubs how about a 3 Speed drum IGH and the Drum Front?

Front, the band for the brake strut is chosen by the tube dameter , As measured 6" up The Left Blade.

agmetal

Sturmey-Archer disagrees with you: X-RD ? Sturmey Archer

fietsbob

Nope, look how long the Right axle end Is. that is to screw on A Multi 6~7 speed Freewheel 126 wide. Ive been using one for 24 years.

you could screw a single speed freewheel on but the chainline would be really dreadful an the wheel Dished .. a Lot.

a 3 speed IGH is a Lot better Wheel build

Mr IGH

For single speed use the cassette version with ss cog and spacers:

X-RDC ? Sturmey Archer

agmetal

The spec sheets list two different axle lengths, and two different spacer setups, so that you can have a 119mm OLD on a 154mm axle for single-speed, or 135mm OLD on a 183mm axle spaced for either single-speed or seven-speed.

Mr. IGH brings up a valid point that occured to me earlier - would it be more cost-effective (and smooth/durable) to do the FW version with a White Industries Eno freewheel, or the cassette version with a cog and spacers?

I already have a drum front/3-speed rear (with 1971 SA AW hub and caliper rim brake), and while I like that, I want an even lower-maintenance option as a bespoke single-speed.

Mr IGH

Much cheaper to run the cassette version. If you decide you want gears later on, you're all set. Easy to adjust the chainline, allows cheap crankset options. I find the freehub to be quiet and reliable. The WI freewheel cost 1.5x the SA cassette drum hub. $90 more to change size....

Mr IGH

It'll work just fine, I've used hose clamps on non-standard forks without any issues.

agmetal

I will definitely take this idea under consideration. Wanting gears later isn't really too much of an issue, though....I've already got "that" bike, and my intended gearing is based on experience with a previous single-speed build. I'd think that the cassette version would require a more dished wheel than even the 7-speed spaced version of the freewheel hub, though?

I also found this fork earlier: www.NYCBikes.com I've emailed them to ask about more of the specs, to see if it would mess with the geometry of that frame too much...if it fits, it would then mainly be a thing of how much it would cost to get the fork powdercoated.

(Sorry for hijacking!)

Mr IGH

IIRC, The cassette version is better than the freewheel version. I didn't find the dish to be excessive when I built the cassette hub.

Edit: in 135mm axle the cassette and freewheel versions require the same amount of dish.

Dahon.Steve

Interesting.

I'm going to add my 2 cents on my experience. The most beautiful bike I owned as a Bianchi Milano and it came with a 7 speed Nexus roller brake. I loved how fast the hub stopped the bike and only used the front brake as an emergency. I did notice it was a slow cruiser and thought it was the frame geometry. Then I tested a 20 year old Univega hybrid and discovered how much faster that heavy hybrid was (because it freewheeled better) compared to the Milano. It turns out, the Bianchi roller brake was scrubbing off speed and left me using more energy than the Univega. I had sell the Milano in mint condition because it was using too much of my energy.

The next bike I have was a Dahon Presto with rear coaster brake. That bike has even MORE drag on the rear wheel than the Bianchi roller brake! I love how it stops the bike quickly but can't deal with the drag issue.

The next bike I purchased was a Torker had a rear roller break and front hub drum from Sturmey Archer. I have to say Sturmey Archer built a fine product. I have no complaints because there is no drag from either hub brake. Now if I could just get around to riding it more!

fietsbob

But fyxation frames Eastside Chromoly Steel Fixed Gear Frameset | Fyxation are 120 rear spaced , its a Track bike Thing.

X-RDC hubs are 135.

But X -RD3 is 117. so will Fit. and build pretty Dishless ..




Measuring things is rare on this Hamster Wheel

dynaryder

I also had a Milano,but it had the 8spd hub(with roller). A little draggy but not too bad. I bought a wheel from a friend that had one of the original 7spd/roller hubs and built my 1x1 around it. That thing was draggy as hell. Bad enough you could feel it holding you back slightly coasting downhill.

5spd? If so,that was a SA hub on the back with a drum,not a roller. Roller should technically be capitalized because it's Shimano's own unique design and is only made by them. As I said,rollers are not drums;heavier,draggy-er,and rely on grease.

grolby

Fair enough. I should say, my experience is specifically with Shimano's roller brakes. I have not used a true drum brake. Mostly, I wanted to disagree with the statement that any kind of hub brake is always better than rim brakes.

agmetal

Perhaps, but the Eastside is irrelevant, because I'd be using the Quiver frame, which has 132.5mm spaced dropouts
Quiver Steel Road Frameset | Fyxation