£67 a pair at Merlin

Paid £90 for my set last July. Fantastic kit. Best price / performance ratio out there atm.

Good god that’s good value, cheaper (by about £25) than a set of BB7’s and cheap levers! Was thinking about getting some BB7’s to go on my rigid bike (need a front anyway), with thoughts of transferring them over to a future 29er bike packing build, but these are hard to overlook so long as you’re not going to the north pole.

That is amazing value considering how good they are!

I just got mine from Ribble for £62 in their sale which ended yesterday. Sorry for the lack of PSA 😳

Still great value at Merlin or Ribble for under £70.

Had been deliberating over getting SLX, but at that price and the fanstastic reviews they Deore’s are receiving, seemed silly spending more.

I had the deores at last year’s cheap prices. They are excellent.

The gf needed new brakes recently and I saw that the SLXs were on eBay via High Altitude bikes for £89.99. They were brand new, no packaging and in euro set up – I switched the levers over and they are ace as well. She got the deores and I kept the SLXs. 😀

Well played, these will do nicely. 🙂

Trying to resist ! …dont really need them but …. !

Are these the newer ones that can take the finned pads or the older style calipers?

I’ve said it before and I’ll keep on saying it – they are the best value brakes in the world, ever…

Nonsense – new type, but they don’t come with the finned pads.

Damn, looks like they’ve changed the pad from the M596 though. I run 596 on my other bike and like keeping the same stock set of spare pads.

I’ll look for some even cheaper 596’s then!

Can take finned pads but not the xt pad screw which can be retro fitted to slx. To my eye’ look better than the previous, but hardly old 596, with a bit better modulation.

Damn, looks like they’ve changed the pad from the M596 though. I run 596 on my other bike and like keeping the same stock set of spare pads.

I’ll look for some even cheaper 596’s then!

Really ? for the saving you will make ?, I got 4 pairs of sintered pads today from Uberbike for £21. Although I got my deores from Ribble last week for £62. So totally sorted for a long time with brakes and pads. Were a sinch to set up. Nice big retraction on the pads, making disc rub a thing of the past.

How easy are they to bleed after a hose shorten?

Wondering if it’s more efficient to buy a set of these than faff with bleeding the missus’ brakes.

How easy are they to bleed after a hose shorten?

The last 2 hose shortens I’ve done didnt require a bleed after.

Thanks!
Remember cashback via Quidco too, only 2% but better than nowt.

3% with topcashback 😉

My set arrived this morning from Merlin. Top effort to them 🙂

Mine have been dispatched, think they’ll go on the main bike, and I’ll stick the older Deore’s on the SS hack. Just need some forks for it now and its stealth upgrade will be complete…

I’m looking forward to getting these on the MTB, despite the fact I’m not riding it at the moment… I can’t decide whether to 1 x 10 NW it at the same time, as I’m not sure how much use it’s going to get any time soon. Decisions decisions!

I’ve run a set for the last year, ace brakes. Way better than the Hopes they replaced.

Great service from Merlin as always. Ordered at 11pm last night, email this morning at 11am to say they were dispatched!

I’ll be using them to replace some 775 XTs – which have turned a bit spongey despite several bleed attempts – but will bring the benefit of using the same pads as my 785 XTs.

And I think Ribble have started to discount again, so they might be cheapest now.

Anyone know if they come with a bleed kit?

Also as they’ll be for my 2nd bike, will I be disappointed I didn’t get SLX (whick I know feel identical to my XT’s on my Five)?

No they don’t. You just need a syringe and the yellow funnel.

Or 2 syringes if you don’t wanna fork out for the funnel.

I got a funnel yesterday to bled my brakes. It’s now an off white colour, for some reason I felt disappointed that it wasn’t yellow.

Amazing price! From Ribble with current discount they’re £62.29!

Anybody got theirs and can you tell me if they come with spare olives?

How easy is it to trim the hoses on these?? do they need a full bleed or can they just be disconected and chopped?

Got mine from CRC about 6 weeks ago, ordered them with spare barbs and olives and cut them to size without the need for any bleeding. Superb brakes at a great price.

Had a look online, want to make sure ive got it right, so i put the lever in horizontal position so the lever is basically flat, i pull the plastic cover down the cable, release the cable, trim down to fit, put a new olive and barb in the new end and re-attach.

That should be it??

The way I trimmed mine was to mount the lever horizontally, slide the rubber cover down the hose, cut hose and insert new barb, unscrew the unwanted length of hose, using new olive reinstall. I am sure someone will tell me I did it wrong but the brakes work fine and did not require bleeding.

Picked mine up from merlin today, they are in pukka boxes and are complete with a spare olive.

Trimming and fitting tomorrow, I’ll let you know how I get on, hopefully without bleeding

Mine arrived this morning, only ordered Thursday night, going on tomorrow, but I need some adaptors to complete the switch to the hack bike, she’ll have to wait until Monday!

I’ll be picking some of these up this month as long as there’s some left. Will have to wait til payday though.

Let the upgrading commence!!!!

Ordeded some jagwire hydro hose cutters, £10 from amazon not too bad, going to give it a go at trimming the hoses before my day off, rather than off to the LBS. Hoping i can get the job done myself.

Just done mine, seemed OK, used the two plastic yellow blocks and a pair of molegrips to hold the hose whilst I tapped the insert in.

Seem OK, lever has a longer throw than my Formula R1’s but they stop well enough.

For the money I don’t think you can go wrong.

I may try a bleed if I can get hold of some fluid, to see if that’s the reason the lever has a longish throw.

Will admit, i try to shy away from these sort of things, but had a go paid £3.50 for a tube cutter from the DIY shop, and had a go.

Front one proved tricky lost a bit of oil not too much but a little, couldn’t quite get the cable back into the lever and thought damn ive knackered it. Tried again and locked the bolt and all good! only snag is i didn’t cut the hose short enough took 2″ off but needs another 2″.

Back one i did in less than 5 mins, had a quick test ride, front one judders a little but im sure thats the pads bedding in as my avids did that all the time.

Off to order another olive and barb so i can re-do the front one, but im happy thats another thing i don’t have to get the LBS to do.

Now to tackle the BB30 bottom bracket!