Mandelbrot

so, I have a GT MTB with shimano v-brakes i recently took apart to paint....
the plastic collars that go around the springs on the brakes (or what was left of them)
were cracked and crumbly from age i guess...
now, of course, I have no springiness in my otherwise pristine brakes...
(well there is a little on the sides with that convenient metal ridge to catch the spring...)
this same issue happened to me years ago.. also with shimano v-brakes and I just rode around
with the pad rubbing a bit forever...

so... are these parts (the collars) something that can be purchased alone?
do they have an official or specific name that may help me find them?
do they make some in a non-plastic variety?

thanks!

operator

Shimano v-brake sets are $14 CAD new. Those parts are not available new.

BCRider

See if there's some sort of hard ABS or PVC plastic tubing you can pick up from a hardware store to replace them? Or just buy some new ones of whatever brand as operator suggests.

Retro Grouch 

V-brakes or cantys?

fietsbob

Yup replace the whole brake , no money in stocking .02 plastic part when things go passe' so quickly

Amazing ! new! and .. well not last years newandamazing

Lawrence08648

I replaced mine last week. I had a choice, $6 for the collars or $10 for a complete set of new brake calipers with pads.

Torchy McFlux

With some things, Shimano never learns. Used to see the same problem with their cheap canti brakes too.
Tektro 837AL are less than $10/pr (pads included) and don't rely on plastic parts to function properly.

Mandelbrot

"With some things, Shimano never learns."

yeah, i worry its not-so-much that they did'nt learn- but that they want to sell you more brakes far quicker than
necessary. (much like permanently attaching the crank to the chainrings)

I had priced a full set before asking this question, and indeed they are by no means outrageous to replace...
its just that they are so perfect and shiny and flawless otherwise that it would hurt to trash 99.5% perfection
for such a tiny and comparatively trivial part that is still flawed.
I dug through the scrap heap and found some stainless and some plastic tubing that might do the trick...
so i'll see how that goes... i'll still be lacking the adjustment screws...

alternately, im looking for a secondary/guest/backup bike.. so we will see what parts swapping and upgrades can be done back and forth with that...

thanks everyone.

Mandelbrot

update-
the bottom half-inch of the cap of a dried-up sharpie marker yielded 2 perfect spacer/bushings to go between
the spring and the lower 1/4 inch of the brake lever post, centering the spring so that its top arm catches the groove in the brake lever.
this warrants the gritty work of turning a few inches of some stainless pressure tube of the same size into a batch of spacers.... and now that im looking at it, I would bet a good hardware store carries a pre-fab spacer of nylon, brass or stainless that would do this deed just the same!
excellent!
thanks BCRider for getting the juices flowing on this one!

Juha

But they're good at it. When I first saw an integrated brake-shifter combo (hybrid bike), I thought it was sleeeeek. The WTF moment came later, when I realised the design means it'll be cheaper to replace the whole thing than try and fix whatever is wrong with it.
Glad you found an alternate solution!

--J

Mandelbrot

thanks Juha!
another victory over abusive capitalism!

my last bike had those damn shifter/brake combos too....
I was thrilled to see this one did not.... then i got to looking and realized
that something had been removed at the factory from the side of both brake handle devices,
apparently by a trembling 4-year old wielding a chainsaw...
this is either the remnants of a once-attached shifter mount, or an epically horrendous job at the foundry.
either way my perception of shimano has dropped to damn near evil... and I will try to look elsewhere
in the future for upgrades where possible...
I'll checkout those tektros Torchy McFlux.. thanks!

additional credit to Retro Grouch- as these are indeed cantys and NOT v-brakes. I incorrectly ass-umed because of the v-pattern pull cables unique to this style that these are v-style breaks but that seems to be wrong...
they ARE cantilever brakes.