I have a hardtail as a second bike. It has been upgraded over the years and now has wide bars, shorter stem, , basic Mavic wheels, hope BB Andy just recently had a new cassette and chain and fork service. Frame has also been replaced (was originally a Decathlon Rockrider 8.2, frame replaced under warranty).

The only issue I have is that the dual control brakes are jut not great anymore. I have tried all the obvious things, bleeding, cleaning the discs, new pads. One has good Bite but the other has terrible howl and little power. I am also finding the dual control brakes shifters difficult to get accurate indexing and therefore it isn’t ghost shifting and jumping around.

My other bike has regular shimano stuff which seems to work fine (basic Devore brakes and shifters). I am tempted to scrap the existing stuff and get myself a new set of shifters and fresh brakes. I am I just wasting cash here?

I was half tempted to put some Hope brakes on my main bike and transfer the shimano stuff across to my second bike. But they seems a ot more expensive and the advantage of my current set up is that the brake pads work across both.

Either way I just want to have reliablity; if I need to change the discs out I will do so as well, although in the past I thought it was ok to give them a good clean with disc brake cleaner.

Any thoughts welcome.

Change em, there long in the tooth now, & no doubt worn. If on a budget just buy more deore kit, stop being tempted by the shiney, they all do the same job (if working properly).

Word of warning, I had a Rockrider many moons ago with the dual control, (is/was yours the anodised dark blue one? I bloody loved that bike, I really should have kept it, but I digress) If it’s a similar age the gear system may be rapid rise, so if you do put new shifters on it, you will need a rear derailleur too.

rapid rise mechs work fine with ordinary shifters, as long as you don’t buy 10sp or 11sp shifters (RR were all 9sp and lower, weren’t they?)

Hi, it was indeed originally a blue/grey rock rider. Now almost 10 years old. Frame is now a 8xc, but it looks exactly the same, save for the colours.

Rapid rise should be ok, was going to go for 9 speed so should work all ok.

Will get onto CRC/Merlin and get some deore brakes, thanks for the help and advice all.