Originally Posted by
snafu21
"lthough Sheldon Brown has advocated mounting brakes to only the front hole of forks, which provides even less vertical support, I don't think he tried it with small wheels."
The 2006 Dahon Hammerhead had the front brake mounted on the rear of the front fork. It looked nuts. (20" wheels) A fix for too short a reach is a drop bracket. Sheldon made some.
I made mine out of 1/8" flat alloy bar and put short reach Ultegra brakes on the Hammerhead. They didn't stop any better than the back-to-front OEM caliper. Sold the bike. No brakes = nuts.
Drop bolt won't work for me because there isn't enough clearance under the fork crown. Don't you see for a small wheel
the problem is that the required reach varies as you move ahead or behind the axle? So under the fork crown the required reach is very small, but 1" ahead of the axle (where the brake arms are) the required reach is very large.
Also, for a normal front mount, fork rake improves the situation because it moves the axle more underneath the brake arms. But for a rear mount like your hammerhead the rake has the opposite effect and makes the problem worse...so maybe that's why you had brake performance problems even with a relatively large 20" wheel?