hammer11

I had some cheapo (but brand new) tektro canti brakes given to me. Like the $10 ones. I have them set up with the correct road brake levers (also tektro, short pull), and they don't stop for crap.

They are set up correctly.

Will better brake pads make a difference?

Or are they just cheap brakes that need to be ditched?

reptilezs

better pads may work better but i have never been happy with the avid shorty 4s on my cross bike. lowering the straddle cable height will get some more power out of the brakes though.

wrobertdavis

I converted an early 90's hybrid bike to drop bars and road brake levers. When I first put it together, the brakes hardly stopped the bike. I adjusted the brake pad stem positions to move the cantilever arms further outward. It made a huge improvement in braking - brought it to acceptable levels. Then I changed wheels to a wider (24 mm) touring rim and they started squealing badly. I adjusted them again and this helped some but did not eliminate it. I replaced the pads (Kool stops) with Velo Orange no-squeal pads and that cured the squealing problem with no loss in braking efficiency.

TurbineBlade

I am a former cantilever brake hater -- turned into a big fan by simply figuring out how to adjust them properly.

If you have low profile cantilevers (where the arms don't stick out too far) it is really important to extend the brake pads FAR inward toward the rims when the brake arms are at rest. This compromises the clearnance between the wheel and the pads somewhat, but gives MUCH better power....that's the trade-off for using low profile cantis. I couldn't stand my tektro oryx, then after moving the little convcave spacers around it stops with as much power as my v-brakes.

As the other person said, you also need to lower your straddle yoke as far as possible for maximum leverage.

Higher quality pads help as well....but probably not as much as proper set up.

Any cantilevers can be made to have excellent power....you just need to tinker a bit.

sonatageek

I agree that set up is really critical and have personal experience with the improvement that a set of Koolstop pads can also make.