Bicycle Mechanics - Cantis & Campys

Hi there-
Having issues with a campy ergo 10sp lever & some cantilever brakes.

In a nutshell...I cannot for the life of me get any power out of the brakes. The levers are difficult to squeeze, and, no matter how hard I squeeze them, it takes a bit to even just slow down.

I put newer pads on the canti's, but, they don't really grab much better. I have the standard surly hanger on the rear that came with it, and, an "L" shaped cable guide on the front passing through the cable holder on the headset.

I'm not sure if Campy just doesn't work with cantilever brakes (i hardly see any cross racers using them...wonder if this is why!?), or, if I'm missing any other parts somewhere in the braking system.

Any help is appreciated.

58t

Does each indivual part work smoothly ?

- Levers without cables attached ?
- Cables smooth in housing ?
- Calipers without cables attached ?

See if you can measure the amount of leverage they have. For each mm of cable movement, there should be about 4mm of movement at the tip of the lever. Maybe your levers are designed for high-leverage brakes and therefore have low leverage in themselves.

You can increase the leverage of the brakes by shortening the transverse cables.

Homebrew-
Yeah, everything works great. I took the brakes out of the box...they were brand new.

noglider
Hmm...good idea. Will i have to lengthen the one cable that comes into the center thing on the brake?I don't care so much about the "action"...i just want to stop! :lol:

Yes, you'll have to lengthen the main cable.

There's a very good article on adjusting cantilever brakes here

http://sheldonbrown.com/canti-trad.html

The section on mechanical advantage should help you

there's no reason campy levers shouldn't work with cantilever brakes, the levers pull the cable with about the same leverage as any other conventional lever

Sweet thanks for that Airburst. I always forget (shame on me) about Sheldon's site.

which brakes do you have, an idea to their geometry (wide vs low profile) would provide a better idea as to adjusting them.

Pre-2009 Campy levers have a 4/1 ratio of lever travel to cable travel 76/19. The new levers have the same ratio, but it's 22/88 since the levers are longer and brake cable to pivot distance is longer.

Campy claims it's "the same as the competition".

I'm going to take a stab at this and say that it has nothing to do with the levers. It is more about the initial placement of your cantis.

As a general rule, I keep the arms of the cantis as parallel to each other as possible while the pads make contact to the rim as if they were in the braking position. Some older canti pads have posts that allow for repositioning(lengthening/shortening). I have v-brake pads which dont allow for this so I've restacked the cones and washers to get the pads to make contact while in this parallel position. Once you have that set, your traverse cable length is up to you.

Whatever length you decide, you need to make sure that the yoke placement on the main cable is placed so that at resting, there still exists tension on the canti spring. At resting, the canti should NOT flop past this tension and pretty much rest against the fork. The spring should always have tension against it.

ok.. i hope that makes sense.

Great! Thanks bluenote...so...basically what folks are saying is that I need to drop the yoke of the canti down. Additionally, depending on how I like the brake action, I might have to shorten or lengthen the cross cable. correct?

GUys-Real quick before I take this whole get-up apart...

these are the brakes I have. Will this setup work? Again, these brakes with 2000/2001-ish Campy Centaur alloy brifters. They look different than the classic canti brakes I see on Cross bikes:
http://www.origin-8.com/product_detail.php?short_code=Pro+Force+Cantilever&cl1=BRAKES
http://74.8.32.131/new_800/12275.jpg

yes, they will work.

Take notice that the arms are parallel to each other. This is what you want it to look like when it is in the resting position. You can lengthen/shorten the brake pad arms to create distance from the rim. Once you have that in place, you can pretty much do anything with the length of the stradle and the yoke placement. Keep in mind of what i said earlier, the resting position should still have spring tension in it as it is in the picture with the yoke/stradle in place.

Canti levers and road levers are different. They are specific to the brakes.
The pivot point in the levers are different.

Canti levers and road levers are different. They are specific to the brakes.
The pivot point in the levers are different.

You are confusing cantis with v-brakes, or are just wrong in your assumption.