Brake Upgrade

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TechMech

Senior Member
I've just got a Secteur Elite and after coming from a Boardman Hybrid with disc brakes, I'm finding the brakes on the secteur a bit weak tbh.

Now I'm no light weight at 17st, but the brakes on the Secteur do not fill me with the confidence I used to have on the Boardman whilst descending.

What do you guys reckon? Change the brake blocks on the no name callipers to better ones (recommendations please) or fit a set of Shimano 105 brakes to match the rest of the 105 groupset already on the bike (would these actually be better?) or a combination of both? Or can anyone suggest something else?

Or maybe this is as good as rim brakes get?
 

dhague

New Member
Start simple & cheap: first of all, make sure the rims are clean & degreased. They may *look* clean, but it's amazing the difference a good degrease can make.
Next, try some other pads. Kool-stop salmons are highly regarded - I use their dual-compound pads on my Roubaix (same calipers as the Secteur, I believe).

Total spend so far: about £20 for pads.

Hope this helps,
Darren
 

eldudino

Bike Fluffer
Location
Stirling
Hi Al. I've got a 105 brake on the back of my Specialized Allez and it's very good. I'd look for a good pair on ebay, it's nice to have everything matching (but maybe I'm just a bit OCD about these things...)
 

MartinC

Über Member
Location
Cheltenham
dhague said:
Start simple & cheap: first of all, make sure the rims are clean & degreased. They may *look* clean, but it's amazing the difference a good degrease can make.
Next, try some other pads. Kool-stop salmons are highly regarded - I use their dual-compound pads on my Roubaix (same calipers as the Secteur, I believe).

Total spend so far: about £20 for pads.

Hope this helps,
Darren

+1

If neither of these work then the next step is changing the calipers. There are some poor unbranded ones fitted to entry level bikes. Anything above entry level from C or S will be fine, SRAM too. In my experience Tektro brakes are OK.
 

redddraggon

Blondie
Location
North Wales
I find wobbly Shimano brake levers are sometimes the cause of poor braking - used to have Shimano on the commuter but since swapped to Campag with the same calipers - braking feels loads better now.
 

Steve Austin

The Marmalade Kid
Location
Mlehworld
baby wipes are good for cleaning bike rims. Its not necessarily about 'degreasing', just making sure there is no 'oily' residue on the rim
 

ASC1951

Guru
Location
Yorkshire
Steve Austin said:
Its not necessarily about 'degreasing', just making sure there is no 'oily' residue on the rim
Er...what is the difference between that and degreasing?

+1 for the baby wipes. They are soaked in alcohol, which is why they remove grease.
 

manalog

Über Member
OBE Pads, recently fitted a set of triple compounds and they are great. I beleive they are £3 a pair, IMHO they are comaparable to Koolstop Salmon in stopping power in wet and dry.
 
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