Disc brakes in the rain.

[summerdays]

Assuming your bike is set up for rim only brakes doing a front disc conversion requires:
* new front wheel
* the brake its self
* new forks
you may also need to buy a new headset, possibly change your brake leavers. If you want a rear disc you're now talking about a new frame, that's a big expense especially if you'er not confident or competent enough to swap everything over to the new frame. It's one of the reasons I got a bike with discs on this time which wasn't quite what I wanted.

Why might you need a new headset?

Mr Summerdays went down the conversion route a year or so ago ... me I took the easy route and just bought a bike with disk brakes on after I was fed up replacing/adjusting v-brake pads, and having grey slime all over the wheels.

 

[HJ]

Fortunately my frame does have disc brake mounts, so it is the brakes, forks and hubs, or I could just go for the n+1 approach...

 

[GrasB]

Why might you need a new headset?

It's not a given that you will need a new headset, it's also not a given that you won't either as I found out. In my case I found the crown race was built into the old forks & it's a weird design that you can't get spares for. I've also had a crown race warping & then split during removal. It's fine if you can get a replacement but sometimes you simply can't so it's new headset time.

 

[2Loose]

Roll on the creation of hydraulic STI levers

 

[skrx]

Boy do they howl when it's wet!

See if you can play a tune :-D

My discs make a reasonably nice tone (rather than a screech) but it's not rained enough for me to get much practise...

 

[Piemaster]

Roll on the creation of hydraulic STI levers

Yes please.
Drops & (mechanical)discs may be possible at the moment but it all just seems a bit of a fudge.
My son has a carrera Gryphon - discs + flat bars which is nice. Hydraulic discs would be an easy conversion. The Titec H-bars give a bit more variety but still have an hankering for drops.

 

[BigSteev]

It's not just an efficiency thing though, it's a confidence & modulation thing. While in ultimate power the calipers on my road bike match the discs on the hybrid when they're called on the hybrid always inspired confidence & are much easier to modulate, also because they're hydraulic rather than cable the hybrids brakes actually have feel.

Exactly the opposite of my opinion. I run discs (Avid juicy 3.5s?) on my Big Sur and, to be honest, I hate them. I can't seem to adjust the point in the lever's arc at which it makes contact and they seem to either be on or off, no feel whatsoever. Yes, they can lock a wheel quickly, but that's exactly what I don't want to happen while braking. If I could retro fit a nice set of V-Brakes I would, but there are no mounts for them.

 

[GrasB]

I've used Avid Elixir R & Hope X2 hydraulics & both of them have knocked spots of the best V-brakes I've used for modulation & feel. I will say I wasn't impressed with the X2s until I spent a good 40 min setting the brake lever up & bedding the pads in properly.

 

[Sheffield_Tiger]

Every time I get on my rim braked road bike I wonder how I ever coped with rim brakes...


....

then I realise that my road bike's calipers are far superior to the cantis that i used to have..

..and that the cantis i used to have were far superior to steel sidepulls...

..then I wonder how the bloody hell we ever actually stopped!

 

[psmiffy]

+1 - But being able to remember is why the first thing that gets upgraded on any bike I own is the brakes