Originally Posted by
sacha white
I called Bruce Gordon for racks a bunch of years ago on behalf of a customer who was getting a disc brake bike. I told him I was looking to get racks that were disc compatible and he said "Discs, huh? You know what the problem is with cantilevers? They work well, they're easy to adjust and you can get them anywhere." ...Silence... .....
I was like "uhhh...so you dont want to make the racks?...."
Gotta love bruce gordon
Here are my feelings about disc brake touring bikes.
1. At this time disc brakes are not that common worldwide in remote places (especially hydraulic ones). I feel that a Loaded Touring Bike is a "tool". The best tool is one that can be easily repaired at the worst possible time at the worst possible place - that is why I prefer cantilevers.
2. The most common placement of the rear brake is behind the seat stays. The cable activated disc brakes (the only ones that will work with drop bar levers) stick out so far that they interfere with rear rack clearance.
With the new lower profile hydraulic brakes - they are thinner, so they don't interfere with the rear rack - however, they only can be used with Mountain bike handlebars.
I recently built an expedition touring model with Shimano XT disc brakes. They work fine, but, I prefer drop bars for loaded touring bikes.
3. I agree with Sacha White about using heavier forkblades to deal with the forces at the hub end. The forkblades I use on all my touring frames are already heavier than normal so that is not a problem.
4. Mounting the rear brake in front of the seatstays in the "V" between the chainstay and seatstay makes a cable activated brake workable, but it is more fabrication work. In the future, Mark Norstad of Paragon Machine Works is working on a rear dropout that has the mounts already in this position - they look like a great idea.
Regards,
Bruce Gordon
www.bgcycles.com