Originally Posted by
smd3
The rear brake is maxed out at it's 57mm of reach. This is with the wheel almost fully forward in the chainstay. I'm not sure how you could run a brake at all with the wheel any farther back. I wish I'd known this, I probably won't buy another semi-horizontal drop-out bike again.
You can get bigger calipers (check out, for instance, the first item on Harris Cyclery's calipers page, with 55-73 mm of reach). The angle on the dropout is in fact partially chosen so that the brakes stay aligned as you move the rear wheel forward and back. But it's disappointing that the stock build comes so improperly spec'd...even if you parted out the stock calipers, you'd still lose money on the swap. I'll definitely choose this larger size of caliper if I decide to build up a Casseroll.
Thanks for the info about your bike. Hope the collarbone is healing nicely.