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Even by road bike standards, the brakes on my wife's bike are crap, so crap that she won't pick up any speed going downhill as she has no confidence she can stop. They're not the best brakes (Tiagra) but I expected them to be as good as my Ultegra just heavier. They're not - I've ridden it up and down the road and they're terrible.
Levers are fine, cables look fine, the brakes themselves seem fine but when the brake blocks hit the rims they just don't seem to stop the bike. First/Cheapest/Easiest fix is new brake blocks I reckon. Rims are aluminium.
What do you recommend?
I have Swiss Stop* and they're awfully good.
*On a Brompton, which uses a road type slot in pad.
It's worth giving the rims a really good clean and also taking a bit of sand paper to existing blocks if they've gone shiny. Failing that I'd go for Swiss stop. I have the blue ones
Swiss Stop BXP (blue)
Swiss Stop +1
Had green and could slow down in the wet finally although use discs in wet/winter.
As well as new pads, just check you haven't washed the bike in car shampoo or similar that has left the rims polished...
So recommendations are Swiss Stop, Swiss Stop, Swiss Stop and Swiss Stop...
I reckon I'll bung some Swiss Stop on then.
Pick up some shimano 5800 calipers and Swiss stop pads. Might have some in the shed you can have for a good price.
I've been really impressed with my Ultegras. Whether it's the new calipers or the pads, I don't know but they're streets ahead (or behind!) of my old 5600 105's.
Swap the one-piece brake pads for cartridge holders with replaceable pads and use a soft-compound ones.
Swap your brakes over, give her the nice, confidence inspiring kit.
I've found koolstop salmons to be very good compared to shimano.
Second to cleaning the rims. Good scrub with a scourer and some soap. If they are really bad after a wet race mine get a wipe down with disc brake cleaner. Enamel rubbers are also good at removing tough grime.
You can probably feel if the cables are fine. The brakes will feel crisp. Good housing can help brake performance so if you've not replaced the cables and outers recently then it is worth doing.
Look at lever and caliper set up. There is a point when you have maximum power squeezing the lever. If the calipers are too far from the wheel you lose a lot of power. Equally if the bit point is at the wrong part of the levers reach you won't be able to squeeze that hard.
Finally what generation tiagra. Might be a generation thing rather than a level (e.g. 105 thing). The latest tiagra stuff is good in my limited experience.
Swap your brakes over, give her the nice, confidence inspiring kit.
But, but... then my calipers wouldn't match all the other kit on my bike!
Actually, what I will do today is swap the pads over between mine and hers to see if just changing the pads makes the difference.
Also, if Akira can find the 5800 calipers in his shed I'll probably buy them - it can't do any harm to replace the (old) Tiagra calipers.
Finally I'll give the rims a good clean - this is an old set of my wheels (Fulcrum Racing 5) and have been in the shed for a while.
It's the cables.
Old Tiagra are ok but not much more than that. Pick up some of the latest 105 or Ultegra callipers, they’ll make a good amount of difference.
switch the calipers over from your bike. It could be they flex under pressure, so that the pads dont stay parallel with the brake track and reduce their effectiveness. Change the pads is a cheap option, but may still be rubbish. It may be the brake track itself being not grippy enough, cheap wheels do this, which would also be shown up if you just swapped calipers, if they are good on your bike but rubbish on hers.
I think cheaper shimano brakes just pivot with a washer between the two arms, Ultegra pivot on a cartridge bearing so are noticeably more powerful, I got a fright going back to the summer bike with Ultegras on it!
Higgo - yhm!
I'll look in shed when I get back from holiday, few thousand miles away currently.