HawkeyeBike

I just started riding last year pretty seriously to lose weight. I ride a Giant Escape 2 but I'm thinking of buying another bike and I want to get a road bike so I can put in longer miles. I've been looking at different bikes and I want my next bike to be a decent bike. I've told myself my budget is around $1500-$2000 or more if it the bike is worth the extra "bells and whistles." I know I want to have Shimano 105 set on the bike. I haven't decided if carbon fiber is a must or not. The other thing I'm wondering is if disc brakes are going to be the future on the bikes? I've been looking at Giant, Cannondale, Trek, and Specialized road bikes and the upper tier of my budget they have the disc brakes. Will we see less of the wheel brakes going forward and more disc brakes? I know if I get a bike with wheel brakes it's not recommended to upgrade it later to disc brakes. Any thoughts on this? I know the bottom line is to go with a bike that I'm comfortable with. I'm just looking for a bike that has the "bang for a buck." It must be my Dutch heritage in me. Thanks for your input in advance.

datlas 

No more than electronic shifting is the future. In other words, higher end you will see more of them, but regular caliper brakes are fine, just as mechanical shifting is fine.

HawkeyeBike

Thanks for the reply. This will help in my decision making unless someone says something different. I've been leaning towards the Giant Defy 1 road bike.

bt

I hope not.

hueyhoolihan

buy now. don't wait. get disc or not. componentry is changing fast these days, if you wait for things to settle down, you'll be waiting forever. better yet, get something 10-15 years old. it will already be out of date, just as functional and you won't have to worry about it. but i know you won't, i remember what it was like to want a new bike. exciting...

2702

I enjoy both my bike's hydro bikes very much. Much less effort and you stop NOW. The Carbon Defy bikes are all disc brakes now and the 105 one is fairly priced as most Giant bikes are.

cafzali

This question has been discussed a lot on the forums in the last year. Generally, though, it's important to remember that almost never has the emergence of an incremental technology meant the obsolescence of something else. This isn't like going from horse and buggy to an auto. Disc brakes solve something that's an issue for some, but not for the vast majority of riders. My current brake pads are 3 years old and I ride more than 1,200 miles a year in rolling terrain. That said, I love fast descents and ride roads where I know I can handle them, which influences brake use.

Stucky

I will not have a road bike with disc brakes or electronic shifting- so it's NOT the future for me!

I can lock my wheels up with rim brakes...so they are already more powerful than need be.

Just another gimmick. No doubt, a good number of people will jump on the "latest and greatest" bandwagon- and then in a few years, everyone will be realizing the foolishness of having discs, and they'll likely fall by the wayside, and some new gimmick will appear ....

rpenmanparker 

I don't care what the future on road bikes is. As long as disc bakes aren't the present, I'm good.

hueyhoolihan

but now you can lock them up with just one finger!

2702

Well Anti Lock brakes will soon be standard on all motorcycles and it was not too far in the past ABS brakes were a luxury.

Dave Mayer

Disk-brake equipped bikes are heavy and unnecessarily expensive. Unless you are loaded touring, disks are unnecessary on road bikes. Nothing screams out "Fred" more than a new road rider on a disk-brake equipped bike. One positive: it creates some sales hype for the sorry and impoverished bike industry. Ditto for 11-speed drivetrains.

As far as 'progress', remember the must-have item for 1992?: front suspension forks for road bikes.

Canker

anything more than 8 gears in the back is stupid too

cale

Two wheels adds needless complexity, I've never had to oil my shoes.

hueyhoolihan

i put vaseline on my boots several times a year. does that count?

Long Tom

Dude. TMI!

To the OP: good rim brakes are pretty awesome. The bar is high here.

Ice41000

Yes. Just as MTBs changed years ago, it will happen to road bikes exactly the same way.

hueyhoolihan

please do not change the context of a post of mine to one with questionalle content. then quote it as if i had written it. i have children and an x-wife. these things can be googled.

please remove it. i'm serious.

p.s. i don't hate you. it's just that it could be a problem. you know?

thanks.

johnnywhale 

Seriously!
If someone had googled it they would realize mink oil is far superior to Vaseline for boot usage...

HawkeyeBike

Thanks everyone for the responses. Yeah, I noticed that all Giant Defy carbon bikes all have disc brakes. It looks like if I don't want disc brakes I would have to go back a year or find a different brand. Any good suggestions on a bike that you can most of out of "your bang for a buck?"

hueyhoolihan

i admire the post's simplicity.

unterhausen

I recently saw an article written by a weight-weenie type who had very lightweight discs on his road bike. Unfortunately, he then chose to ride his brakes down a mountain, overheating the rotors. It didn't end well. I'm aware that people have done the same with rim brakes, but it's a lot harder to do. I wonder if discs will be a short-lived phenomenon on road bikes for this reason

rpenmanparker 

Are SRAM's hydraulic disc road brakes back on the market? I thought I saw an ad for a bike that had them the other day.

bigredkevbot

Even if they are the future, I will be forever stuck in the past/present. I highly doubt I will ever buy a true "road bike" with disc brakes. Rim breaks are fine for me.

datlas 

I thought ISP's were the future of road bikes. Wha'happened there??