dynaryder

Amen. Hoping the rain we're supposed to get Wed is a soaker and finally cleans the roads.

My first winter commuting,I had snow pack up in my V brakes and wound up glancing off a car. Bought a bike with discs and never had any more issues. I've found disc pads to last much longer than rim pads,they require less setup(no toe-in,height,or yaw),no rim wear,cleaner,and they don't care how true the rim is.

Shimano Roller brakes suck. I've had them on the rear of several bikes,and they're on both ends of our bikeshare bikes. When the shoes are new they can be very grabby,and if you drag the brakes too much they can get glazed. And they just don't have very good feel at all. I've heard better things about drums from companies like Sturmey Archer,but Shimano Rollers suck.

Hydro rim brakes require pretty much no adjustments,and the pads are easy to replace,but they still rely on how true the rim is,and still wear on and dirty up the rims. They also have to be kept clean. The pads are thicker than on discs,and the pistons travel further. If they get very dirty,they can tear up the seals and require a rebuild.

alan s 

Anyone who hasn't used hydro disc brakes has no idea just how good they are. Whenever I take my road bike out with rim brakes, it takes a bit of getting used to the lower braking capability. I almost ran off the road once due to too much speed and not enough brakes, failing to adjust to the rim brakes.

noglider 

alan s, with all due respect, I suspect the difference is not the braking power but the hand force required to evoke the required braking force. New brakes can stop you well with the tiniest touch of the levers. Old brakes require man hands. My Campy Nuovo Record brakes stop as well as the rest of them. I just have to use my manliness. I could have a "stopping race" with anyone.

alan s 

Could be the hand force, but I'm able to exert much more with hydro disc brakes, and therefore have greater stopping power. This is most noticeable for steep downhills and emergency stops. I'm comparing Ultegra brifters to SLX discs.

noglider 

OK, then I just must be stronger than you.

dscheidt

I rode my beater bike today, for the first time since november (maybe October!). It's got rim brakes, my nice bike and usual commuter is disks. On the way home, I rode through a stretch of mud, on the road, where snow has melted, and all glop has ended. It was surprisingly deep, and I ended up with mud all over the wheels. For the rest of the way, I had no brakes. Or very little brakes, at least. The brake shoes on that bike are almost new in front, I dont' rember what the rears are like. They just got loaded with sticky wet mud, and couldn't clean any more off the rims. That's never an issue with disks.

Andy_K 

Hand force is definitely the issue. When people talk about braking power, I think they almost always mean braking power relative to the same pressure applied at the lever. Those of us with small hands have a particular issue with braking from the hoods with drop bars because it's hard to create leverage with short fingers. The theoretical maximum braking force is fairly irrelevant. What matters is how easily, comfortably and consistently I can stop the bike.

cwar

+1

noglider 

I guess the ratio of braking power per amount of force is relevant for people with limited hand strength. For people like me, strong enough to apply any brake fully, it's not relevant.

The first time I tried V brakes, I was frightened.

cyccommute 

You still get more than twice as much precipitation than we do here in Colorado and you don't have large trucks running around dumping more grit on the road 5 to 10 times per month on purpose.

Our 15" of precipitation per year comes in weird patterns as well. While the coastal parts of Pacific Northwest experience more regional precipitation, our precipitation is much more regional. Even snow storms can be rather localized. We've had incidences where Aurora, which is 25 miles from the mountains, will get 15" to 20" of snow and Golden which sits at the base of the mountains...literally...gets a couple of inches.

Rain is even more widely spread since the majority of our rain comes as intense thunderstorms that can be highly localized. You can go from downpour to dry in the space of a city block.

The problem is that our roads tend to be warm before the snow falls. We can go from 65F to 30F in less than an hour. That happened just last week. Snow hits the roads and melts quickly than freezes quickly.

By "wet and greasy" I take it that you mean wet and slick. As noglider pointed out, disc brakes actuate a little more quickly in wet conditions (but not enough to make that much of a difference, in my experience) but that doesn't make the road less slick. The limit on braking ability on any vehicle is not the brakes but the tires. You can stop the tires dead with the brakes on most bicycles in wet conditions but that won't stop the bike.

I've tried them. I don't consider them to be all that great. They grab the rotor well but that is only a positive if you want to skid the tires. In terms of fine control they leave a lot to be desired.

gregf83 

I don't know what he meant by 'greasy' but in my experience riding in the winter the rims often get coated in mucky grime that tends to act as a lubricant. It can take quite a while after applying the brakes before they clean the rims and start to grip. I've been commuting the past 6 months and go over a bridge where speeds on the descent are 40-50kph but there are a couple of sections on the descent where you have to slow down to go through a chicane. I've just replaced my 2nd set of brake pads.

I'm riding about the same number of hrs/wk as I have for the past 6 yrs but due to the route I'm on and the muckier conditions I've been riding in I'm going through brake pads much faster. In the previous 5 yrs of riding, about 75,000km, I wore through 1 rim and could go 2-3 yrs before replacing brake pads.

How quickly your brakes and rims wear is heavily dependent on where you ride. We have one popular hill climb in our area (approx 800m @ 6%) and you can do the descent without touching your brakes. On the other hand the 50m bridge I cross has a couple of heavy braking points. It's difficult to extrapolate one person's riding conditions to cover everyone else.

fietsbob

modulation becomes an issue when the road surface gets dodgy.. a skidding locked wheel
is not good for control.

tjspiel

Though it may be contrary to what you believe, it seems the general consensus is that riding in wet conditions with rim brakes eats up a rim quicker than riding in dry conditions. In comparatively dry areas, it may not matter that more sand is used to treat the roads. If you think about it, a single downpour in Denver would probably wash away more sand than days and days of drizzle in Vancouver. Any remaining sand in Denver is going to dry out by the next day and not be nearly as harmful.

And again, though it might not jive with how you think it ought to be, a wetter climate could be a partial explanation as to why some people have worn out more rims than you have.

ratell

I work on top of a hill and ride in the portland rain which is probably why I burn through rims. I was having to replace rims annually which is what prompted me to get a disc brake (I do the disc in front cantilever rear). Braking with disc is better than rim brakes especially in the pouring rain (when I'd have to do the flintstone stop) though most of the time rim brakes are good enough. It's the regular wheel rebuilding that was killing me. With just the front disc I'm able to do 99% of my braking just with the front brake.

spare_wheel

This exactly.

spare_wheel

ohsu?

spare_wheel

A decent hydraulic brake will only grab the rotor with a light touch if it has not been set up correctly. Modulation is one of the main reasons that hydros have dominated mtbing.

fietsbob

washing the wheels and removing road grit preserves the rims .. with little effort,

looking at the brake pads and inspecting them for imbedded grit does take a bit of work, but not much .

reminds me I have to make an Appointment, with the PDX VA Hospital .

ratell

Actually the VA, but same area...

ratell

This is what the mechanics always say. I actually clean my rims weekly and still had them wear down in a year. If it really takes daily cleaning I'd rather run disc brakes and not need to clean (which is actually another benefit of disc brakes your rims stay clean).

Thank you for your service!

Andy_K 

Exactly. When I read suggested routines for cleaning the bike after riding in the rain it always make me laugh. I'd hardly ever ride if I had to do all that every time I ride in the rain. Better to do what you can to minimize the damage and live with the rest.

fietsbob

actually I use the disc brakes to ignore cleaning my rims
and the black anodized IGH lets me ignore the hub shell (camo that big Rohloff sticker)

though I do pull the wheels and clean the disc itself and that keeps them from making so much noise in the wet.
and de gunk off the cog and chain tensioner pulley .. & drivetrain.

noglider 

You don't say!

fietsbob

seems flat track drifting thru a corner really is better with a motor spinning that back wheel ,

but one may do that on a corner in the dirt , downhill .


I'll just Pootle along .. keeping the adrenalin pump at a minimum ...

tjspiel

How many of you that have worn out a number of rims also use fenders? Since I have always viewed fenders as a necessary wet weather evil, I'm always looking for more reasons to be critical of them. ;-)

I've heard that people tend to wear out the rear rims faster than the front which is sort of counter intuitive since a lot of people use the front brake more. My theory is that full rear fenders deflect crud back onto the rims and brake pads that normally would have been thrown free from a wheel unencumbered by a fender.