Banzai

In DRY conditions I don't notice a difference between my light road bike with Force calipers, and my crosser with 40mm rubber and Avid BB7s. In WET weather the crosser is a better stopper, but discs tend to shine (not literally ) in sloppy conditions.

PainTrain

Before reading that I could have just replaced the pads on my Tektro brakes I upgraded the front to 105. Holy crap what a difference. I have to brake with a light touch now, the 105's are capable of locking my front wheel at just about any speed I've been going while practicing with them.

I suspect they are out of adjustment. Without being snarky to the OP, you do have the calipers set to their 'closed' position as opposed to 'open' for removing the wheel? That's something I had to become aware of when switching to a road bike from a hybrid.

ravenmore

I've got Planet X brakes (a weight weenie brake) and even those will lock up my wheel if I squeeze hard enough.

ThermionicScott 

I don't buy this either -- a narrow front tire will still pitch you over the handlebars before it skids.

The OP's bike just needs to have someone competent set up the brakes.

pallen

I'm guessing the difference is not a matter of how well the bikes can stop, but rather how hard you have to squeeze to get the same stopping power. On my wife's hybrid with hydro discs, I can lock the front wheel with a relatively light touch. My Shimano road bike will also lock the front wheel, but you have to squeeze very hard on the lever to do so. Just switched one road bike to Campagnolo and they require much less force to achieve the same stopping power. All of my bikes, however, can throw you over the handlebars if you squeeze hard enough.

mazdaspeed

Not IME

mazdaspeed

OP just doesn't know what he's doing lol

Noize4

105 psi tires, 200 pound rider. Bike is factory stock.



Thanks! I do think looking into a pad upgrade will be key.

They're closed, and the bike is pretty new, less than 200 miles. They just kinda suck. I'm squeezing a ton harder than v brakes and stopping much more slowly. Definitely can't lock them at speed.

For those that helped me out, thank you very much!

Says the guy who proudly registered the SN "Mazdaspeed", which is a complete oxymoron, BTW. Bug off.

PhotoJoe 

I have Tektros on my new bike too and am less than thrilled with their performance. I do think a pad upgrade is in my future, too.

mazdaspeed

Guys, tektro calipers suck, don't waste your money buying expensive pads for them when you can buy a set of way better brakes with pads all across the internet for not much more.

mazdaspeed

Piss off, noob

therhodeo

Freire stopping like the boss that he is.

merlinextraligh

Then there's a problem, you should be able to lock them, and to modulate them short of locking them.

PhotoJoe 

(Legitimate question) - So you're saying Ultegra brakes with stock pads will out-brake Tektro's with Kool-Stops?

Trakhak

The degree of importance of weight distribution in stopping a bike on the road is inversely proportional to its wheelbase. Short wheelbase, highly important; longer wheelbase, less important. I assure you that, when I ride my Felt TK2 in traffic, I wish I had longer arms.

merlinextraligh

That's not true. Push your weight back far enough and you can skid a front tire without endo'ing.

I'm not recommending you do this because front skids on a road bike are very difficult to recover from, but it definitely can be done.

Again look at Freire. He actually skids the back wheel a touch, and is on the edge of locking the front wheel, and is no where near flipping over. It's a matter of getting your weight far enough back.

Menel

If the arms of the Tektro's are flexier than your brake cables, then yes.

But that seems unlikely.

merlinextraligh

Have you tried the chest on the seat, butt over the rear wheel approach? It gets your weight plenty far back, even on the shortest wheelbase bike.

mazdaspeed

Yes, overall power and modulation will be better. Shimano has recently changed their pad compound and ultegra brakes flex considerably less than any tektros I've used. There's a reason tektro brakes are equipped on bikes to save money and you never see them on higher end bikes. I'm not a fan of kool stop at all, either, I think there are much better modulating pads out there that aren't prone to squealing. A lot of the key too is having them properly set up. I can't speak for anyone else's bikes or mechanical abilities so I can't say everyone will have the same experience I have. FWIW I have a set of old old first gen ultegra dual pivot brakes with ebay OBX pads and with the rim I'm using, they can easily lock the front tire up at scary high speeds if you use some strength. It's nice only needing a finger to slow down most of the time.

Ghost Ryder

To the OP:
Can't believe no one mentioned that he probably wasn't/won't be going as fast on his hybrid than he would on any road bike.

I noticed he pushed his heals down too, I guess this help keeps you butt from flying over the bars @ higher speeds.
That was an awesome E-brake!

tntyz

I had the same setup as the OP. New pads helped substantially. Braking from the hoods still gives less stopping power (meaning - have to squeeze harder) than my hybrid w/v-brakes. In the drops I'd say performance is about the same.

remixity

I have Ultegra brakes on aluminum rims with Vittora Rubino Pro Slicks, and earlier this week when someone was about to run directly into me with five feet in between us, I squeezed only the front brake from the brake hood and did an end-over the handlebars @ 18mph. Good thing I did endo, because the collision took off a chunk of my Ultegra brake-shifter where my right index finger should've been. Anyway, the front brake is very very strong. Usually, people only skid on their rear tire because the weight shifts onto the front wheel and off the back wheel when decelerating quickly. But if you brake hard on both wheels, you should have very good braking response.

carpediemracing 

In normal conditions if you slam on the brakes of any sports car, you'll engage the ABS (if so equipped). This is because the brake's power far exceeds that of the tire's traction to the ground.

On any car, if you can engage ABS on dry level pavement, your brakes exceed your tires' performance. On my previous car I went from having 225/245 front/rear tires to 275/315 front/rear tires in an effort to improve both braking and cornering traction. It certainly gave me more traction to the point where I scared myself in turns. I could still engage the ABS pretty easily, but I had more stopping power overall.

I think the comparison is unfair though. On a bicycle you need to balance. In a car you don't.

So let's just shift the comparison to a sport bike (or whatever motorcycle deemed similar to the Trek). Again, if you slam on the brakes 100% you'll lock the rear tire and either skid or flip over the bars. Again the reason is that the tires have less traction than your brake pad does on the braking surface.

Likewise, if you slam on the brakes of your bike, you'll skid the rear or flip over the front. This isn't a function of the brakes, it's a function of balance and tire traction.

With a relatively limited range of tires (and therefore tire traction) in a road bike size, you need to deal with balance and maximizing the traction of the tires you're on. This means shifting your weight back when you brake to prevent rotation around the front axle, similar to why some cars have anti-dive geometry on their brakes and why motorcycles have their calipers positioned to minimize front end dive.

Even relatively poor quality brakes (reasonably new) will flip you over the bars or lock up a rear tire. It'll take more hand pressure but it'll happen. The difference will come when you're trying to brake hard in less than optimal conditions, like if you got caught flat footed on the hoods (and not the drops), if it's raining, etc.

Brake pads make a huge difference in increasing stopping power for a given hand pressure (at the lever). Good brake calipers to to - the dual pivot design is a long-lever design, kind of like the V brakes are long lever relative to the regular cantilever brakes they replace. By themselves the V brakes don't stop better but you need much less hand pressure to exert the same stopping power to the rim.

Shifting your weight back is key. In really close situations you can even trade your own inertia to let the bike stop quicker - think of a stoppie on a motorcycle, where the forward energy of the motorcycle is translated to an upward one. This absorbs some of that forward energy, allowing the motorcycle to stop a bit quicker. Your bike allows you to do the same thing. It's easier on the V brake bike (it's a lot of fun to screech to a stop with the back tire 6 inches off the ground) but you can also do it on the road bike.