Brake pads – what are your ultimate stoppers

Still havenet found the percefect break pad

What are people finding are the best for stopping power and ok wear rate?

Any suggestions welcome

Oli

Disc brake pads or good old fashioned caliper brake pads

As Swiss stop I find the best on my road bike for stopping power and control life span pretty good.

And any cheap sintered pad for disc brakes will do normally superstar components when on offer.

I’ve just put some kool stop salmon pads on mine and can definitely tell the difference.

Stock Shimano pads on my XT brakes

Clarks 3 compound pads on my V-Brakes

Kevlar in the dry, sintered in the wet.

Brand doesn’t seem to make as much difference as making sure my discs are sized appropriately to get heat into them during general use.

They’re both hard compounds though, which may refect my weight, and I find I have to change my discs roughly every two years due to wear.

I use RAHOX pads on my Shimano XT brakes and find them the best. They are slightly better than the Shimano pads and way better than the cheap ones. That’s in terms of stopping, wear and fade. If you have “weaker” brakes then they are way better. I did a few words on them here, http://www.basquemtb.com/rahox-mountain-bike-brake-pads/ if anyone is interested.

I can’t link from the phone as it seems to crash.

Doug how are those in the wet? I assume nost of your riding is dry.

I stick to organic shimano original pads. Very reliable.

Mostly dry but definitely not all Dan. They are fine, I couldn’t give as detailed report on them in the wet to be honest. Mostly our brakes suffer from long periods of dry and polishing, then when it gets wet they can squeal for a bit. That’s for all brakes and I think it’s to do with the long periods of dry. Lots of others have been trying the RAHOX in the UK conditions so maybe can comment.

Disk brake pads

Oh, then I just use sintered pads from Hope,

I’ve tried alternatives but they either squeeel, fade really quick and in some instances fall off the backing plate.
I’m using Hope brakes so this maybe makes it a natural choice for me.

OE sintered pads in my experience, be it Shimano or Hope.

I usually have some SS/Uberbike/whoever else kicking around as spares, but they are for emergencies. Never as good as the OE stuff & last a fraction of the time, complete false economy.

As above,after trying out a variety of ‘cheaper’ pads, I have come back to using OE for both my Hope Tech x2 and Shimano XT.
In my experience they last longer, don’t squeal anywhere near as much. i do tend to stick with organic pads with 180/183 discs although the Rocket has a 203 on the front

I have been using RAHOX in some fabulous mixed conditions in Devon. Been reliable and stopping power is great in all conditions. Do squeal a bit when wet but every pad I have tried does that! Previously used Elixir sintered which work well but are very loud!

Superstar kevlars in mine- because they work, they’re consistent in different weathers, they’re unfussy about heat, and they last pretty well everywhere I’ve ridden. And coincidentally they’re cheap but I’d still use them if they were more expensive. (grit eats them but then that’s true of most.) I’ll try some rahoxes at some point, and the nukeproof black pads are decent too.

(that’s with formula the ones, I didn’t find them as good in my old XTs for some reason)

If i’m going to go with OEM do people recmmened resin (organic) or sintered

UB sintered inserts in finned backing plates. Run them in Hope M4’s but they are the Saint/Zee filed to fit as the Hope ones weren’t out at the time.

Race matrix are shite.

teethgrinder – Member

Race matrix are shite.

Testify! One of only a couple of bike products I’ve ever thrown in the bin before it was worn out. To be fair they were fine for mincing, they’re only dangerous and terrifying when you try and do something harder.

I use Goodridge pads on all my bikes. I do 90% of my riding on the Quantocks where the mud is basically grinding paste and get really good life from the sintered pads. I swap to the organics when its dry though, both compounds always have good stopping power and I’ve never had a pad fail.

Have got a set of superstar organics somewhere but haven’t tried them yet.

The Swissstops (Magura) on my singlespeed have lasted over a year and don’t even look worn. Between 50 and 100km a week up and down the Surrey Hills.
Far better than anything else I’ve tried.