Originally Posted by
1989Pre
If there is one steel component that should have a following on modern, rim-brake bikes, it is the brake calipers. The next time you are descending gleefully at 40mph and spot a family of geese making their way-cross, 30 feet ahead, you will know why. No flex. On my 1948 show-piece, I have steel hubs, crank-set, b.b., handlebar, 4-sp derailleur, brake calipers and levers, pedals and toe-clips. I could afford aluminum, but I also like to annoy the swells.
If you look at center-pull brakes, the arm pivot is a lot closer to the brake pad than on side-pull brakes, sometimes about twice as close, so the sidepull arm might have to endure four times the stress of a center-pull arm, because I believe the force on a lever increases exponentially with distance. And many times the arms of early side-pull alloy brake arms are the same size in cross-section as their center-pull cousins. And aluminum being about half the strength of steel, and also much more likely to crack and break from work-hardening under flex, would seem to make an alloy side-pull eight times more likely to break in hard use than a steel centerpull, and four times more likely to break than an alloy centerpull. Modern side-pulls are a lot more compact with shorter beefier arms and I am sure safe. But I have a pair of 70s side-pulls off a Schwinn with very skinny looking arms which I at 200 pounds, do not think I want to gamble on .