[Closed] Road brakes - Are better ones better?

try new pads first.

and/or cables.

Some unbranded calipers are gash though!

See here:

http://www.singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/darkside-brakes-upgrade

In terms of leverage, there isn't much mechanical advantage between cheap and expensive road brakes. The geometry is the same.

The main difference is in how long they stay working well. This is down to the linkages and pivots used, whether they are bushings, bearings, fit, quality and hardness/flex of materials used etc.

Look at the sheer number of moving parts in a dual pivot road brake, and you'll soon understand why the more expensive brakes using better pivot hardware stay working better for longer. Cheaper brake pivots are more prone to seizing up since they are not manufactured to as close tolerance in the first place, are made of less long-lasting materials and are not as well sealed. No different to the difference between cheaper and more expensive MTB components really.

You can make a big difference to cheaper brakes by upgrading the pad holders, the pads themselves, the cables and keeping all of the moving parts well lubricated. Taking each in turn:

1) Pad Holders
Don't under estimate the flex that can come from cheaper plastic pad holders under the pressure of what is actually quite a bit of force generated by the levers. Metal pad holders are much stiffer and surprisingly do make a big difference.

2) Pads
Dry weather general braking isn't much different from pad to pad. You'll really notice the difference in the wet and on longer descents where better pads fade less.

3) Cables
So much lost power is lost through poor quality inners stretching, and poor quality or worn outers compressing and absorbing the power generated at the lever. This particularly applies to the rear brake where the cable run is longer.

4) Lubrication
It is really important to keep the pivots well lubricated and running smoothly. Think suspension pivots and linkages. There are often more in a single dual pivot brake than on an average suspension bike. You wouldn't let your suspension pivots and bearings run dry for months, yet people think you can on road calipers. This isn't the case. A squirt of GT85 will work wonders, and taking them appart is a fiddly and technical job.

Ultimately, if you change all of the above, you might as well just buy better brakes. They will inherently flex less since they are made of better materials and to closer tolerances. You still need to maintain the pivots, keep them lubricated etc, but at least you have a better starting point.

And, bear in mind that road brakes are meant to slow you down, not stop you dead. They are not designed for the constant and extreme speed changes that MTB disc brakes are. They are designed to slow you down gently and carve off speed, not stop you dead. Of course, you want the security of having something strong in an emergency, but comparing them to disc brakes isn't quite "apples with apples" given their different intended use.

I've found that dual pivots need to be adjusted really close to the rims to work well. That said, they're never amazing, but I can still pull a stoppy on my racer.

thing I'm trying to get my head around is are expensive brakes all about weight and looks or is there something in the design that makes them grip better? They all look pretty much the same to me.....

I bought some of them cnc'd pups from planet x, compared to my 105's. which were fine, they are fantastic.

I have the new Ultegras and they're fantastic, miles better than my old Tiagras. However, i think some of that might be the resigned lever, which is meant to work better when braking on the hoods.

Flipping great brakes though.

BTW, I agree that good, clean, well-lubed cables with proper-length well-routed outers, make a very big difference to braking power.

Good, thanks fellas. I should remember the Forum <search>

I noticed quite an improvement with the 105 brakes I have when I swapped the pad inserts for the pink Kool-Stop ones

~£6/pair from Wiggle

My Tiagras (2010 Spesh Allez Elite) are about 0.000000001% as effective as my new Elixir CRs. On a bike that's a fair bit faster - still not got my head around that yet (newish to road biking, been MTBing for ever).

Boardman Pro? Don't they have Sram 350s I think.

I'm keeping my Bike Shimano free on this one and savign for a Rival brakes and chainset but only after Im fast enough.

My winter bike has some Tektro brakes and they suck like a lemmon but were fine when I went for softer pads (which wear faster).

I've had pals who compare their road cantis and mtb disc braking and are put off by the road brakes unless they give it time to get used to the setup.

Since Bikeradar/cycling weekly stated the Boardman had weak brakes-everyone has wanted to upgrade them. If they said they were awesome everyone would leave them...

I know you posted similarly on another thread, Solarider, but I'm not sure I totally agree w/regard to brake geometry.
I'd echo what Cynic_al said, some unbranded or lesser brand calipers are just dire and very flexy, from new.
A lot of it has to do with the OE brand giving the manufacturer a nice cheap part that allows the all-up weight of the bike to look good.
Hence the brake is made from a crap flexier alloy /and or underdesigned thinner arms.
Some of the cheaper Shimano/Campag brakes are or were fairly heavy and worked fine- I have a set of RX100 brakes on a pubbike, that with a change to cartridge pads and new cables work brilliantly (but not quite as good as Dura-ace with Nokons!)

The geometry is indeed bascially the same, so there isn't any inherent mechanical advantage.

The cheaper more flexible materials used do mean that at the bite point, rather than the brakes arms being stiff and aiding bite, they flex and absorb power.

IMO/E SH*T braking is most often due to friction in cables or pivots and gash pads.

Ah!, so we are agreeing that some cheap brakes are just, no-good then.

my cheep ones are fine (cannondale PX, so i think that makes them tektro?)

but equaly some 90's exage felt good on decent rims (makes more of a diference than i though swaping wheels) with new pads and a good lube. and theoreticaly they are less powefull being single pivot.

Ive used tektros which came on the bike and were dire ....

Upgraded to soras when the tektros siezed up they were better

My tt bike came with mavic ssc brakes at 170 quid a pair .... I bought it second hand- would never have entertained that cost new. But they are far and above best road brakes ive used .....have to be careful with them as they find the tires limits quickly !

Try cleaning your rims with an enamel rubber. Mine work massively better after that.

There are differences between the makes, Campag are more powerful than Shimano, Sram are pretty good too but the Mavic ones are the best (and expensive)

There's a lot of difference between the 2000 Campag Veloce on one of my bikes, and the Tektro ones on the other, both dual pivot designs. The Tektro ones are deep drop ones, and run with Shimano pads, the campag ones are normal 49mm ones with standard Veloce one piece pads - better compound seems to make a difference, with less flex in the caliper itself.

Anyone mentioned cables?

Some particularly cheap and nasty ones are probably worse, but assuming you're talking about decent ones (say, 105 upwards?) I wouldn't have thought that upgrading would get you any noticeably better braking performance- maybe a bit of weight saved or bling added. Like lots of other people have said changing the pads would probably make more difference, but it's largely just getting used to it I reckon.

As everyone says loads of factors affect brakes and well maintained cheaper brakes with good pads work Ok. Expensive brakes (newish Campy Record on my best bike) are great and once experienced cheap brakes will never feel quite right again.

All I know is that my Ultegra brakes are way better than the tektro ones I have on my commuter