[Closed] Has anyone actualy had a good experience of Avid brakes?

6 year old Avid Juicy Ultimate's here. Great brakes - no issues.

Same here. Had juicys and elixirs in the past. No issues. Running elixirs now. Although I do know of a few mates that have had nothing but problems.

Make of that what you will

My BB7s are great.

Avid Elixirs 2 sets love them, on the look out for another cheap pair as it goes.

Juicy 5 on my old old bike were mega. Elixir 5 on my mates went wrong from the off.

I've had a a few sets and never had any issues.

Not fantastic but I have Juicy 3s, 5s and 7s on my bikes. Had a few issues but nothing major. The 3s on my commuter haven't been bled since I've had them - over five years.

Get them bled by someone that knows what they're doing and they'll be excellent, unfortunately this wasn't my LBS.

Yep. 2nd hand Juicy 5s lasted me 3-4 years including a summer in whistler, still probably fine to use as well. Went back to Elixir 3s from slx on my main bike and much happier. BB7s awesome as well. Absolutely no problems here! I only changed the juicy 5s cos I fancied something new and shiny as well 🙂

Had Juicy 3s, 5s, 7s, Code 5s. Very easy to service, easy to bleed, nice and powerful.
I never got on with Elixirs though.

...only when I replaced them...and the good experience was that I didn't need to use them again!

Don't like the feel of the lever, don't like the feel of the actual brake, bleeding is ok but nothing good or bad, pad replacement is a ball-ache...pleased I got shot of them.

Mine are fine too.

BB7s are brilliant.

My elixir 5s were truly awful...never again.

Elixir 5's shockiingly bad, keep hoping they will bed in, going to give them 1 more month if not then shimano slx on the way.

Have 4 sets across me and Mrs Shecks bikes for about 4 years... No issues for 3.5 years, but in the past 6 months 5 of the 8 brakes have had issues, some of which I've cured, some the LBS, some Fishers, and one of them seems incurable. Beginning to lose the faith

Had loads of Juicy's and Elixir's, currently running Elixir 9s on mine and the missus bike, and held up fine in the Alps last year for PdS and Les Gets bike park, and still going strong.

Bleeding can be hit and miss. Still not 100% sure whats needed to make the bleed go right as I do the same thing every time and sometimes its a good un, sometimes not. I do tend to push more fluid through than they say, that seems to get a bit more air out. I think its pot luck and if you get some trapped air it can be a sod to get out.

BB7s are good. The Juicys that came on my Pitch were ok when freshly bled but quickly deteriorated. Faded horribly in the Alps too.

Had Elixir cr's for two years excellent brakes

Rode a few different brakes at a demo day and none had feel and control as my elixir's

I had a wicked experience with my Avids. I threw them in the wheelie bin, and it was great...

Their V brakes are/were superior to shimanos efforts for the same price. Avid arch rivals if set up properly could be/are amazing.

Sadly their disc brakes don't seem to be in the same league.

Elixir 5's on my Trance seem fine to me. I wasn't a big fan of the funny washers on the brake mounts and it took me a few goes to get them lined up perfectly, but now they are they give as much power as I could ever need. I also bought an Epic solutions bleed kit and learnt how to bleed them, which only takes 5 minutes every few months and keeps them sweet.

love elixir 5's no issues with 3 sets.

Elixir R's here four about three years. Never been bled and never had an issue. Hopefully I've not just jinxed them!!! 😀

Elixir 5's came on my bike, worked for the past 18 months with no maintenance other than changing pads, never been bled.

I've got a set of ancient Juicys and some Elixirs from the first year they came out. As my bikes have chopped and changed over the years I've got rid of Shimano, Hope and Magura brakes but stuck with the Avids.

They just work.
To be fair the Shimano were good too but I didn't like the feel of the Magura and the Hope were unreliable.

Elixir 7s for 10 months. CRs for a year. They're great. I'm not a heavy rider though.

grilla - Member

Elixir 5's came on my bike, worked for the past 18 months with no maintenance other than changing pads, never been bled.

Elixir 5s are basically OK IME, good but not great performance and annoying amount of adjustment / bleeding. Not bad enough that you just have to upgrade them with something good asap, more something to replace in time when you've got some spare bike money.

Had some Juicy 5s. I get very angry when I think about them. I'm angry now. 😡

The Avid X0 Trails I've got are brilliant. I bled them out the box, which wasn't that hard, and they're a great brake. Lots of power and modulation, along with not a lot of weight. What more do you want?

I have bb7 at the moment and my first bike had juicy 3s which worked great through much abuse.

160mm BB7s on 3 bikes with superstar sintered pads, faultless and low maintenance, cheap to run... 🙂

I've had my Juicy 3sl's for 4 1/2 years, never had an issue with them. No bleeding or sticky pistons.

Factory bleeds are hit n miss . Seen plenty with the "one pull ok next straight to the bar" symptoms.
're-bled a set of Elixir 1's on a mates bike recently and they seem fine. He's happy with the feel of them, can't stand the things myself...I don't get on with any other than Hope's .

Yeah, BB7's are faultless and you can strip, clean and rebuild in about 10 mins. Get a workshop box of inners & some Speed dial levers and you're laughing.

Aside from that, no.

Had Juicy 5's, they were crap. Followed by Hopes which were just too modulated for me, now on Formula The One and LOVE them. Faultless over 2 years, changing pads out is so easy, light. Must I go on 😛

i've had 3 sets and all have been flawless, current x0 trail brakes re a bugger to get pads into though. on the plus side they could stop a planet the things are mentally powerful

Had 3 sets of Juicy 7's - never had any problems with those.

Currently running 4 sets of Elixirs: -

1. Elixir 1's - nearly new - bled rear once no issues since - front no issues
2. Elixir 5's - 2 year old front & nearly new rear - had to bleed the rear on receipt - no issues since - front never bled
3. Elixir R's - 2 year old front & rear - never bled - the sharpest of the ones I own
4. Elixir R rear & CR front - never bled the front - had to bleed the rear recently (twice) - I didn't do a great job first time, but got it spot on second time

Followed the SRAM tech video to get the bleed process correct - just make sure I take my time nowerdays to get all of the air out

I'm happy with them & the only ones I'd think about swapping for is the latest Shimano ones

Enjoyed my juicy carbons greatly. Just the carbon levers and the pricetag attached too them kept me from using the full potential of them..

The Juicy 3s I had were **** awful. After years of misery trying to get them to work reliably I buried them in the garden with stakes through the master cylinders. I'm only slightly exaggerating here. Dreadful things.

LMT - Member

Elixir 5's shockiingly bad, keep hoping they will bed in, going to give them 1 more month if not then shimano slx on the way.

You do realise that you are meant to bed your brakes in when they are new?
They don't just bed themselves in during the course of normal riding.
The precedure is in the manual you know.
You did read the manual, didn't you?
😆

urgh Avid brakes a continual thorn in my side.

Another BB7 fan. 🙂

Bugger of a thing to bleed though...

BB7's- amazing, I have two sets. Faultless.

Juicy 7's and Carbons- great- no problems at all, ever. Until 110kg of Ambrose tries to drag the brakes in the Alps. 185 rotors. Boils fluid. Scary (I mean really scary) but not Avid's fault, definite user error.

Swapped over to Frankenbrakes- Code calipers, Juicy Carbon/7 levers. 203mm rotor front, 185 rear. Perfect. No problems ever since, whatsoever. Ride Alps, Wet and gritty Wales. And I'm a big biffer too.

Son of Ambrose also has Avids, the Frankenbrakes' Evil twins. Code levers, Juicy 7 calipers. Brakes have been faultless to date, inc. Alps and local (South Wales) riding. He's a big lad too.

All on Superstar pads as well.

I must admit to wondering if people sometimes just want to jump onto the most recent bandwagon. Avids get slated- but I've more experience of Hope's being Hopeless. And I've had as many OEM pads fail on me as I have had SS fail. Is it just a fashionable thing to do- slate certain brands.

FWIW, I like Avids and see no reason myself to change from them. Likewise Superstar.

No 🙁
Using XTR now and haven't looked back

Serviced the callipers with rubber grease and bled; my elixir 5's worked well for about 8 months then stopped being awesome, I tried to get them to be nice again but I just couldn't manage it for some strange reason - finally I decided that I could no longer spend my life inside bleeding brakes so bought a set of SLX's and I find them a much nicer brake to use as well as maintain.

Have some elixr 5's that came on the missus bike, lasted 2 weeks. We are now having a good experience if leaving them in a cupboard.

However they may have to come out for her HT as the SLX hoses are too short, and you can't just buy and refit brake hose these days - when did that happen - not buying the overpriced kits.

I've had 2 sets of Elixir CRs and have been really happy with them - not had to bleed them, and performance has been great: plenty of power (even for a heavy lump like me), but more importantly I've found the modulation to be great - I don't want the difference between "gentle braking" and "f*ck-me....STOPPPPP" to be equivalent to 1.5mm of lever throw! Some people like that - but not me.

I'm building up a new HT at the moment and am thinking about my brake choices: everyone is saying XTs, but (as above) I really like my avids and have had no issues with them..... so feel like it's crazy for me to get anything else.

Having said all that, a mate has some Elixir 3s on his canyon that are absolute guff.

well, that's their reputation for inconsistency confirmed.

Spend some time working in a bike shop and it will confirm how inconsistent they are.
Avid = mechanics headache.

Have had and or got BB5s, BB7s, Juicy 7s, Juicy Ultimates, Elixir Rs, Elixir CRs and XXs. My daughter's got Elixir 1s. As you can tell, I rather like Avid brakes.

I have had the odd problem, which includes BB5s not being all that good at stopping (could have been set up), Elixir Rs needing careful bleeding, but then being very reliable and floppy leavers on very well used CRs. I've been using XX for three years without problem and have no plans to change. My mate's XX are not as good though apparently.

I got Elixr 5s on my Whyte and after all the talk on here was expecting to be changing them instantly. So far I have put in 160km and they have been absolutely fine and undramatic.

Just as well really since they are on matchmaker mountings and I was struggling to find normal mounts for the X9 shifters (which I am actually liking very much).

There seems to be an Avid/SRAM hate thing going on here of late, which is a change from the love in of a few years ago. Seems like a completely unfounded shift in opinion too.

6 year old juicy fives with nearly 25k mixed commuter/training miles on them never been bled and still on the same set of pads.

Bled a set of Elixir 5's last night (tore my deore hose in a crash and riding today, so fitted the avids.) Took me MINUTES and worked perfectly first time.

I expect it to be one of those 'once in a lifetime' events.

X0 on both of my bikes. Bit of a pain to bleed but once done properly they work really well

Avid juicy carbons, 2008 Trek remedy 9 , never bled or touched and still as good as the day I got the bike!!!

Have some EX3s come on a bike and have also bought codes 5s. Both really good brakes but the factory bleed was shocking on the 5s.

d. I also bought an Epic solutions bleed kit and learnt how to bleed them, which only takes 5 minutes every few months and keeps them sweet.

Sounds fantastic... Only every few months. Wow!

And yes, avid's reputation seems to be as inconsistent as avid's breaking performance.

Had a set on the GFs Boardman. Were fine till they over heated on a long descent and needed bleeding (yes i had a bleed kit, no it wasn't quick and simple). Swapped for SLX.

Loads of hire bikes on gran Canaria had them. Hated the will they-won't they performance. I ended uptying the lever to the bar when putting the bike on the trailer to stop air getting in to the calipers.

I think that is half the trouble.... The amount of air already in the oil before you put it into the system. And a also the fact that over time DOT lets in water. Probably one reason that I've not had bleed a set of Deore for approx 7 years.

Avid Juicy 7's were fine for several years, but changing pads and worsening piston stick made me get rid last year and put some Elixir 5's on instead. They are on my Inbred and even after shortening the hoses & re-bleeding they are fine. They work consistently & don't rub. Plenty powerful too...

I've got Elixir R SL's on my Stumpjumper and they are also fine. They have been bled a couple of times after going 'inconsistent' after the bike was stored upside down for a while. Must have been air in the system as they have been fine since bleeding. Again, no rub to speak of.

Two of my usual riding mates also use Elixirs and have had no issues with them.

Various Juicys and Elixirs no probs with any of them apart from a sticky piston on the back of one bike easily remedied. Rarely bled any of them just keep feeding them pads.

Various Shimano again no probs

Have a set of Juicy 7's and two pairs of Elixir CR. The Juicy were a bit flakey and did need fairly regular bleeds. The Elixir have both been brilliant. I really like them.

Someone mentioned that the factory bleeds are a bit hit and miss and I think that's correct.