Not Had Interrupter Levers For Over 25 Years. Today, I Tried To Use Them.

[Lovacott]

Bit of a gap in the weather a couple of hours ago, so I thought I'd take the new road bike out for yet another test ride.

At the bottom of a slight downhill near my home is a mini roundabout which I was coasting towards and about to cross when I saw that the car approaching from the left had no intention of giving way to me.

So I pulled up on the interrupters and nothing happened. I scrambled my hands to the hoods and managed to come to a halt halfway over the junction and in just enough time to avoid being wiped out.

It's hardly surprising the brakes didn't work though. I haven't had interrupters on a bike since the mid 1990's.

Fact is, all the drop bar bikes I've ridden in the past have had pull up brakes and it must be embedded deep in my memory?

I had a similar experience with the bosses car a couple of weeks ago when I tried to indicate left by turning on the windscreen wipers.

 

[vickster]

Why didn’t they work? The cross levers work fantastically on all 4 of my road bikes...2 with rim brakes, 2 with discs. I rarely use the brifters to brake!

 

[cougie uk]

Wait what - you're saying that the bike didn't have these levers and you'd regressed 30 years and just thought it did ?

 

[ColinJ]

Fact is, all the drop bar bikes I've ridden in the past have had pull up brakes and it must be embedded deep in my memory?

What IS a 'pull up' brake?



(Waits for some wag to say that you apply the brakes when you want to pull up!)

 

[Drago]

Hideous things. All they do is introduce another point of inefficiency.

 

[cougie uk]

You know. Those flat levers that sit under the bar top and link into your drop brakes. So you pull them up to pull up.

Very popular back in the early 80s.

 

[Lovacott]

Wait what - you're saying that the bike didn't have these levers and you'd regressed 30 years and just thought it did ?

I had drop bar racing bikes from the age of 12 until I was 35 and I've had MTB bars since 1995.

I've only owned the new road bike for a few weeks, but as soon as I get onto it, it's like I regress 25 years.

I actually tried to pull up on something I haven't even seen for over two decades.

 

[Lovacott]

Hideous things. All they do is introduce another point of inefficiency.

Or future mishap...

 

[ColinJ]

You know. Those flat levers that sit under the bar top and link into your drop brakes. So you pull them up to pull up.

Very popular back in the early 80s.

Oh, not the ones that @vickster is talking about - 'suicide levers'...

 

[Lovacott]

Oh, not the ones that @vickster is talking about - 'suicide levers'...

View attachment 578411

That's them.

They were good for when you were doing stuff like sitting upright whilst gently coasting along with plenty of room to stop if you needed to.

Absolute crap in an emergency.

Even worse if you try to use them and they no longer exist.

 

[Eric Olthwaite]

They remind me of many happy hours spent cycling as a boy. Those and "sports mudguards".

 

[cougie uk]

Yes my first road bike had them. I quite liked them. They'd slow you but you'd not use them for downhills or anything sketchy

 

[roadrash]

try some cross top levers they are a world apart from the old suicide levers

 

[Cycleops]

They remind me of many happy hours spent cycling as a boy. Those and "sports mudguards".

Useless, but you had to have them as they looked cool. Same thing with large flange hubs, but at least mine were Campag.

 

[HLaB]

Oh, not the ones that @vickster is talking about - 'suicide levers'...

View attachment 578411

My old raleigh when I was 8 year old had suicide levers thank goodness brakes have evolved