Bicycle Mechanics - Need brake booster

Looking for a brake booster like old Shimano carbon or Salsa branded one to tighten-up the rather vague brake feel on my rear Avid Single Digit 7 brake attached to rather spindly chainstays on my Rans Rocket (yes Kool Stop pads on Avid brakeset and they are adjusted properly). Noticed recently ebay seller or two asking absurd price for Shimano carbon booster and refuse to pay that ransom (c;

If Shimano is no longer making the booster you want, you have three choices; eat it and pay the ransom, go without, or bide your time and wait for another to come up.

If it's on ebay you have a 4th option, and that's to make the seller an offer and see if he bites.

Otherwise there are plenty of boosters still available, though maybe not carbon.

Question, just to clarify, Chainstay canti's are very rare, and I can't imagine a chainstay being too spindly. Did you misspeak and mean that the seat stays ate spindly? If so, I can see that you might need a booster, so I suggest you bite the bullet and get a decent one at a decent price, even if it isn't exactly the model you want.

"Question, just to clarify, Chainstay canti's are very rare, and I can't imagine a chainstay being too spindly. Did you misspeak and mean that the seat stays ate spindly? If so, I can see that you might need a booster, so I suggest you bite the bullet and get a decent one at a decent price, even if it isn't exactly the model you want."


Thanks for taking a moment to reply. Not to sound like a condescending prick, but the Avid Single Digit 7's are V-brakes not cantilevers and the Rans Rocket is not the classic diamond frame bike. What constitutes the chainstays on the Rocket could be open to interpretation to some, but to me that rear brake is mounted on the chainstays. A picture is worth a thousand words..

290139

I see from the picture that the terms chainstay and seatstay are sort of meaningless. I'm somewhat surprised that you have a flex issue with V-brakes on those stays since they're bridged pretty close. You might improve things by adjusting the toe-in to a minimum, such that when the wheel is rolled against a slightly applied play it twists the brake only until the shoes lay flat. Excess toe-in costs you travel and reduces braking power, inadequate toe in can cause chatter or squeal, so you're trying to dial in just the right amount.

If, once you've done that, you still have a flex problem, buy a cheap booster. Weight differences aren't a big deal, and any booster will keep the bosses from flexing open when you brake. But given the location, make sure to buy a slim line booster so it doesn't create heel clearance problems.

Not to sound like a condescending prick, but the Avid Single Digit 7's are V-brakes not cantilevers and the Rans Rocket is not the classic diamond frame bike. What constitutes the chainstays on the Rocket could be open to interpretation to some, but to me that rear brake is mounted on the chainstays. A picture is worth a thousand words..

290139Don't worry, it's difficult to sound condescending when you are wrong. Both standard canti's and V-brakes are cantilever brakes; the proper name for a V-brake (which was a name coined by Shimano) is a "direct pull cantilever". Common usage has resulted in the old style cantilever brakes being called "canti's" or "cantilevers" and "direct pull cantilever" brakes as "V-brakes", but both are cantilevers and the bosses can be called by either name regardless of the application, but "cantilever" bosses is more common amongst those that work on bicycles for any length of time. I also think that is was presumptuous of you to think that the members of this forum would readily know that a "Rans Rocket" is a recumbent, a simple descriptor to that fact would have speed the process along faster.

I see from the picture .... given the location, make sure to buy a slim line booster so it doesn't create heel clearance problems.


heh. look at that picture again. I don't think Heel clearance will be an issue with that back brake. :)

It doesn't have to be carbon to work.. one alternative, made to fit a ring lock, to lock up your wheel

for some installations, AXA makes what is a brake booster Arch,
with mounting holes for the lock. on it..
Ring locks stop your wheel from rolling, going around the wheel


Bene Sugg: also making what is a long cable run irrelevant (NB: looigis .02 below)
Dropping cable brakes in favor of German Magura's hydraulic rim brakes ,
HS 33 (22 a bit less $)
[ is the best rim brake Ive tried, fits V and Cantilever bosses]

they include brake booster arches (steel) as standard..
have been made For over 10 years
[but as most bikes are built up with Asian components, not common, in the US]

heh. look at that picture again. I don't think Heel clearance will be an issue with that back brake. :)

So right. So any big fat booster will work.

Don't worry, it's difficult to sound condescending when you are wrong.

Retro grouch, meh..me too in some ways.

Yes direct pull canti ding, ding, ding. I'm no young chickadee retro, having wrenched in shops, co-managed a shop and owned more than double the number of bikes listed in my signature. I don't mind being corrected on bike tech/terminology, but it has not been atypical in my experience to have known of professional bicycle mechanics who were lost when it came to dealing with hub gear repairs and the proper way to remove and install cotters on older bikes, just as some of us old timers become flustered working with some suspension system components. Don't even get me started on the dumb stares I and other recumbent riders have got taking their bents/trikes into 'pro' bike shops (often overheard: "hey Bob, how do I get this thing on the Park?"). Anyway, as Sheldon used to say, "..even I don't know everything about bikes" - and yeah, I'd run into Mr. Brown back in NE at the swaps, Classic 'vous, and English vintage rides back in the good old days before all those shiny GU packets littered our roads and consumer wunderkind bought the latest iPads and $5000 carbon fashion statements off Competitive Cyclist to ride a half dozen times a year (c;

FWIW: Looks like there's a fairly long length of brake cable housing going from the lever to a stop on the frame. Spiral brake housings, even so-called low compression housings, have a fair amount of compression. Yokozuna makes brake housings with longitudinal strands, like compressionless shifter cables. These are wrapped with an outer flat metal band to hold them together against the high tension in the brake cables compared to the lower tension in shifting cables. In my experience, these housings can make a considerable improvement in brake lever firmness.

FWIW: Looks like there's a fairly long length of brake cable housing going from the lever to a stop on the frame. Spiral brake housings, even so-called low compression housings, have a fair amount of compression. Yokozuna makes brake housings with longitudinal strands, like compressionless shifter cables. These are wrapped with an outer flat metal band to hold them together against the high tension in the brake cables compared to the lower tension in shifting cables. In my experience, these housings can make a considerable improvement in brake lever firmness.
i think you may be on to something here. From the picture, those "chainstays" look pretty beefy and the distance from the brake bosses to the dropouts is pretty short so their flex should be minimal. I wouldn't be at all surprised if the cable housing is more to blame than the frame.

I'm using Avid SD7s on a Surly Cross Check that has longer and thinner seatstays than the Rans. The rear braking is quite solid but the cable run is much shorter and more direct.

Looigi has a good point. I think I'd upgrade the rear brake cable/housing and/or (better yet) upgrade the front wheel/fork to a big disk brake. But maybe the OP has already done so...

Is this what your looking for? I do agree the stays the brakes are mounted on don't look too fragile in the pic.

OK I only have one bike (a B.D. SS I don't ride much) with V brakes so I am not too familiar with how they should feel. Just what do you mean by "Vaugue" feel on your brakes? If your riding slowly through your heighborhod at say 15mph and your grab the levers do you stop? Are you riding the rear brake on long down hills? Your not experiencing brake fade? ( I know you don't often hear of this one single bikes, but the OP does live in the SW and if he is rolling off big hils/Mountains around Flagstaff it is something to think about)

This type of Booster?

http://i.ebayimg.com/t/BMX-NOS-V-Brake-Cantilever-Carbon-Brake-Booster-68g-/00/$(KGrHqEOKm4E4D2Kj)hsBOM72Jf6mQ~~0_1.JPG

There used to be lots of aftermarket makers of these back in the late '80s early '90s.