Disc Brakes

[RDV4ROUBAIX]

Enjoy your disc brakes.

We will. Poor and flawed reasoning, weak arguments and all.

 

[TexPat]

Kiwirider: 'Cross rider for 20 years. I don't race any more. When I did, 'cross races were very few and very far apart. The fastest I ever got was 'very fast club-dude.' I still train with racers. I beat the local fashionistas at the training rides on something similar to this: http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=230483398135
.

Man I dig that Phillipe!

 

[kiwirider]

Man I dig that Phillipe!

Hey, shouldn't you be selling people new carbon fibre, disk equipped cross bikes - or at least organising next year's cross series - instead of drooling over old steelies???

 

[kiwirider]

Kiwirider: 'Cross rider for 20 years. I don't race any more. When I did, 'cross races were very few and very far apart. The fastest I ever got was 'very fast club-dude.' I still train with racers. I beat the local fashionistas at the training rides on something similar to this: http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=230483398135

25 years of mountain biking with my racing years in the past. I still ride and ride hard. The sweetest beat-downs are the carbon multi-pivot fashionistas versus me and my 10+ year-old gear.

I give up though. Despite the fact I'll be beating a couple people on the latest and greatest disc brake bikes next year. The flawed reasoning of many is no match for me. Enjoy your disc brakes.

Most interesting thing about your background is that it nicely mirrors my buddy who has the disk equipped Salsa! Seriously, apart from the fact that he has updated his bikes from a similar sort of era as yours - and the fact that he got to be a level or so "higher" in his palmares than you - you guys could be twins!

His attitude was very similar to yours - "my old stuff works well and I can make gear heads suffer, so why change?". A few rides on new kit and he made the move. He only ended up on a disk equipped crosser because he hated the carbon fork induced shudder with standard brakes - something he never got on his old Concorde (beautiful bike in PDM team colours).

One thing that hasn't changed with his upgrading kit - and a credo that I hold to equally - is his belief that all the techy stuff in the world comes second to a good pair of legs and good race sense ... but that some techy stuff can help you get the best out of those two things. (And anyone who's read some of my other posts on here - such as slamming Di2, Campag 11 and SRAM XX - knows that I've got a seriously skeptical attitude to new tech ... Change doesn't always equal progress ...)

So, really a long way of saying "good on you for enjoying riding classic kit" and "open your mind ... try some of the new stuff - who knows, you may actually find that you get to like it and that it makes your riding more fun"!

 

[dsut4392]

In the simplest terms possible, the course profiles are so different there is no good comparison between 'cross and mtb.

Please don't generalize braking and then apply your generalization to 'cross. It's more poor reasoning.

I'm sorry, but performance of braking systems is something that can be generalised. The use case of any brake is braking the wheel, not "CX" or MTB" specific. For the purpose of braking a wheel [basically any wheel which is in contact with the elements], hydraulic disc braking simply is superior, for the myriad reasons which have been mentioned, none of which you have even attempted to refute.

You bleat about "poor reasoning", yet your argument consists of nothing more than "cantis should be good enough for anyone for CX, because CX isn't braking intensive".

While I have never disgreed with the argument that "cantis are good enough [for CX] most of the time", if it's necessary to have any sort of brake at all to ride CX, you may as well have a better brake than a worse one.

 

[Boeing]

the good news is perhaps we will see companies develop Hydro technology for drop levers and STI

 

[Boeing]

now this is interesting

http://www.canyon.com/_en/technology/project68.html

Canyon is the first manufacturer in the world to develop a road race bike which features hydraulic disc brakes that are controlled by the brake/shift levers

 

[Boeing]

http://www.cyclingnews.com/features/disc-brakes-and-cross-bikes-coming-soon-to-a-store-near-you

Rotor size?

Future frame/hub Rear spacing thoughts?

3 bolt?

 

[kiwirider]

I know that this thread has sat idle long enough to be able to be pronounced dead, but I thought that I'd offer a couple of comments following my first race on a disc equipped cross bike yesterday.

Situation was that I ended up with a mechanical just before the start of the race that meant that I ended up borrowing my buddy's "pit bike". It's a Salsa Las Cruces with SRAM and Avid 5 cable discs. For good measure, it's a size too big for me, I ride Campag normally and his brakes are "back to front" (I ride RH front/LH back). Oh, and we'd just had our first snow of the year, but it was warming up, so we were riding a gorgeous combination of slush and mud. So, that's probably enough stacked against the bike to mean that it was pretty much starting 10 points down ...

Anyhow, I have to say that, after that one race, I am completely converted and am waiting excitedly for the new offering of disc equipped cross frames. Initially, I was about set to send myself over the bars - the braking was that much stronger than what I was used to (Tektro CR720s). After a while, I found that the confidence of knowing that the braking was always there meant that I could hammer that much more into corners and block pass quite easily - which was good, because the nature of the course meant that there were limited opportunities to pass on the straights until the course cut up a bit and the racing line widened.

We also had a lovely little off camber corner on the toboggan hill that dropped steeply into a sharp right hand corner. Again the discs were great, as I knew that I could grab what I needed at the bottom rather than having to trail brake down it. Same sort of thing happened on a couple of u-turns around trees and the like - was great to be able to come in with speed, grab some back brake and get a bit of slip around the corner.

All in all, while I was impressed with the discs when we did a bike swap in training, after this race I'm now a complete convert. The experience was very much like when I changed from a v-brake to disc equiped MTB - one ride and you are happy to have made the change.

I will say to those people who are making comments about wanting hydraulic discs - don't bother. The improvement in braking that you get and the nature of cross racing mean that, in my opinion, cable discs will do you fine. And small rotors are pretty much all that you need - I can't remember for sure, but am pretty certain that my buddy has 140's on both ends.

 

[bc_hills]

I know that this thread has sat idle long enough to be able to be pronounced dead, but I thought that I'd offer a couple of comments following my first race on a disc equipped cross bike yesterday.

Situation was that I ended up with a mechanical just before the start of the race that meant that I ended up borrowing my buddy's "pit bike". It's a Salsa Las Cruces with SRAM and Avid 5 cable discs. For good measure, it's a size too big for me, I ride Campag normally and his brakes are "back to front" (I ride RH front/LH back). Oh, and we'd just had our first snow of the year, but it was warming up, so we were riding a gorgeous combination of slush and mud. So, that's probably enough stacked against the bike to mean that it was pretty much starting 10 points down ...

Anyhow, I have to say that, after that one race, I am completely converted and am waiting excitedly for the new offering of disc equipped cross frames. Initially, I was about set to send myself over the bars - the braking was that much stronger than what I was used to (Tektro CR720s). After a while, I found that the confidence of knowing that the braking was always there meant that I could hammer that much more into corners and block pass quite easily - which was good, because the nature of the course meant that there were limited opportunities to pass on the straights until the course cut up a bit and the racing line widened.

We also had a lovely little off camber corner on the toboggan hill that dropped steeply into a sharp right hand corner. Again the discs were great, as I knew that I could grab what I needed at the bottom rather than having to trail brake down it. Same sort of thing happened on a couple of u-turns around trees and the like - was great to be able to come in with speed, grab some back brake and get a bit of slip around the corner.

All in all, while I was impressed with the discs when we did a bike swap in training, after this race I'm now a complete convert. The experience was very much like when I changed from a v-brake to disc equiped MTB - one ride and you are happy to have made the change.

I will say to those people who are making comments about wanting hydraulic discs - don't bother. The improvement in braking that you get and the nature of cross racing mean that, in my opinion, cable discs will do you fine. And small rotors are pretty much all that you need - I can't remember for sure, but am pretty certain that my buddy has 140's on both ends.

From the lack of replies to this post, I take it that this is the final word on the canti vs. disc brake in CX argument? Disc brakes are the future and canti brakes will disappear until hipsters rediscover them and retrofit their fixies?

 

[Granville57]

I always found it curious that Lemond was offering a disc-equipped CX bike over five years ago with the steel frame Poprad Disc.

I almost bought one of these myself when they were available.
Does anyone here own one?

 

[LugHugger]

I always found it curious that Lemond was offering a disc-equipped CX bike over five years ago with the steel frame Poprad Disc.

I almost bought one of these myself when they were available.
Does anyone here own one?

Sigh...the Poprad Disc.....Steel frame, Bonty parts, discs. When I could finally afford/justify one, Trek UK decided that it wasn't worth importing them The One that got away

 

[Boeing]

I always found it curious that Lemond was offering a disc-equipped CX bike over five years ago with the steel frame Poprad Disc.

I almost bought one of these myself when they were available.
Does anyone here own one?

that was a great bike