tramptrade 

I have this circa 1997 Cannondale Killer V500 that has always had very weak brakes. The rears are almost non-existant, and the fronts are too weak to handle the whole job. To make matters worse, I ride heavy - as in loaded panniers and a trailer. It's not uncommon to be in the 300 lbs of rolling weight range when you include bike, rider, dog, trailer, and whatever gear / supplies are in the panniers.

I have had this bike to 3 separate bike shops and none have been able to get them working right. Part of the problem is that they do not ride the bike, even when I instruct them to put their heaviest staff member on it and ride it. They just set them up on the stand, get the wheel to stop, and consider the brakes working.

Some facts:

- Center-pull cantelevers
- Rims are aluminum, clean, in good shape - rear is new with less than 100km on it.
- Pads are decent quality, lots of meat on them, and clean
- Cables were replaced last year, and the last setup was done approximately 100 km ago
- Aluminium frame with no disk mounting options
- Front fork is an older Bomber with no disk mount options
- I have been told by 2 mechanics that the bike will not accept V-Brakes

Unknown:

- Whether the levers have an effect. I don't want to change them and end up no better off. They "seem" to be in good working order.
- Whether cantilevers with a wider angle / longer arms would improve things, or if this even an option.
- Whether different "super" pads would improve anything at all. The rear brake just feels like it's running out of pull if that makes any sense, even though I cannot pull the lever right to the grip.

I have included a couple of pictures here to show the setup.

I am currently working towards a new bike, but that is a few months away yet, and in the mean time, this is my daily rider. I live in a very hilly area, so having bad brakes is a really big deal. I am planning my rides to utilize the least hilly routes, but it's getting a little old to have to ride 7 km just to go 3 km safely.

The local Cannondale rep simply told me I need a new bike. When I told him that I could not believe that Cannondale would put out a production bike with no brakes, he just shrugged and pointed me towards an $800.00 hybrid with disk brakes.

I really hope somebody here can suggest something. When I do buy a new bike it will either be a long tail, or Surly Disk Trucker, not a light weight hybrid.

Feel free to ask any and all questions. I will answer as best I can, and can provide more images if needed.

maddog34

first... try a set of Kool Stop Salmon pads... you WILL be amazed at how much more braking power you will have!

second... have the new pads set up by a COMPETENT, EXPERIENCED, mechanic... the ones on your bike are not aligned correctly... nope, not at all.

Also...brake pads tend to get harder as they age... your pads may have hardened to the point where no amount of set up will make them work well... BUY THE SALMON Kool Stops.

when set up correctly, Canti brakes have far superior braking, compared to most V brakes... this is why CX racers use them. Your present set up is further reducing your available braking force... Canti brakes are difficult to align... the post type are even more tricky to set up... Find a better mechanic, with experience in setting up your style of brakes.

the reason the shop said you couldn't switch to V brake is because the levers appear(from the pics) to be Canti specific levers... Canti brakes use a shorter cable pull ratio.... 25mm max, compared to 35mm max for v brake.... Canti Brakes and V Brakes use the exact same brake pivot post distance from the wheel rim... but the LEVERS are different.

get the Salmon Kool Stops, have them set up correctly... then prepare for lever modulation/nose wheelie practice. My DB Ascent is set up with Kool Stop Salmons... i rare use more than one finger to stop it in a hurry... seriously... ONE FINGER braking.... the brake arms are almost identical to the ones on your Cannondale, btw...

also... there are far superior canti brake sets available... do some shopping on Ebay, then read some reviews on ones you find interesting... just run a search on google or Bing for the particular brand and M ODEL you like, with the word "reviews" added to the search...

GoldenThiefBug

It's hard to tell from your pictures, are the pads fully touching the rims ? It looks like the upper part rubs first and at an angle.
Also, the canti's bridge cable seems kinda low, too close to the tire, meaning less braking power because it has a lesser mechanical advantage. Do you read a letter behind the Shimano link where the cable is guided? Is it the same letter front and rear ?

frankenmike 

Grippier brake pads are a fairly inexpensive thing to try. Also, the set-up of your cantis seems slightly wrong from the pics. The section of the actual brake arm where the pad-stem attaches should be more or less straight up and down- i.e. parallel to the plane of the rim -when the pad is engaging the rim, not while at rest. The picture appears to have them already parallel while at rest. Could just be the angle of the photo. FWIW, I switched out some cantis for v brakes with good results on one of my bikes.

79pmooney

The first thing I would do is get new cables and the bridles that go from a hockey puck style disc on one end and bare cable the other. Also two of the straddles (or whatever they are called) that the primary brake cable is clamped to and the bridle is pulled by. (Ask for the hardwear to make the old Mafac cantis work.)

Now you can play with the geometry all you like. I would set them up to get the arms as low and horizontal as possible, tipping the pads down to stay on the rim. (Google Mafac cantilever and take a look.) Try making the bridle long and the saddle high (ie the primary cable short). Don't cut yhour cables until you like what you have, just tidy them up with neat loops and scotch tape until you know you like what you have.

I am betting you can make quite decent brakes out of these for under $25. But those miserable cable you have now have to go. They save manhours at the assembly level and have no other redeeming value. (You may have to file the discs on your new bridles a little to get them on. Go ahead. Just do it gently.)

Edit: You will probably need to slide the arms to the brake pads in after you rotate the arms down. Since you have to loosen the bolt to adjust the pads anyway, this will not cause you any extra work.

Ben

InOmaha

The lever arms on those brakes are too short. Friction is a function of surface roughness and the force applied perpendicular to the wheel face.


I'd buy a set of Deore T610 linear-V brakes. The arm length of those looks to be double or triple what you have on your setup and should multiply the horizontal force considerably. It shouldn't cost more than $50 if you go new or less if you find some used. All it takes to install is the right sized allen wrench. Your cables might be long enough.


You could go cheaper with a BR-T4000 or BR-M422 but they're probably shorter then the T610 and with the load your carrying, saving $20-30 might not be worth it long term. The more expensive XT stuff might be overkill.


I've locked up a front wheel and went ass over handlebars using these brakes and I'm 235 lbs so I know they work. Given that, using two would likely stop 300 lbs.


Any mountain bike longer arm brake you find would help.

dabac

Your bike CAN take v-brakes. But you might need other brake levers, or some clever small gadgets called Travel Agents. And you might need to rework the rack attachment.
(And why are you using P-clamps when you have rivnuts higher up the seatstays?)

Smooth post cantis are a bit awkward to set up. Tends to have you wishing for a 3rd hand.
But in overall stopping power, cantis tend to do OK - If set up correctly.

davidad

https://www.rivbike.com/collections/...tilever-brakes

dabac

No.
Or at least, not quite.

The lower - the straighter the straddle cable is - the greater the mechanical advantage.

But then you'll lose mechanical advantage as the straddle cable goes higher. Makes for a weird characteristic.

corrado33

Haha hahaha no.

Not at all.

V brakes are superior to cantis, hence why v-brakes have superseded them. Cyclocross riders use cantis for mud clearance. Nothing else.

V brakes are the logical physical evolution of cantilever brakes. All of the force from the lever is transmitted into the brakes, unlike a cantilever, where half (or more) of the force is wasted pulling the brakes "up" rather than "in." V-brakes work TOO WELL, that's why they need a different pull ratio than cantilever brakes. Ever try a v-brake with a short pull lever?

As for the OP.

Cantis are hard. The particular kind you have are some of the hardest to adjust correctly.
First off, get them centered. They are not currently centered.
Secondly, put the pads BELOW the rim, slightly pointed up. Your right pad is correct, your left pad is wrong.
Third, try putting more of the pad out from the brake itself. Some of those old brakes work better with the pad far away from the arm, and others work better with the pad really close to the arm (with the arms adjusted so the pads end up the same distance from the rim.) Changing the distance from the pad to the arm changes the force vector for the pads pushing against the rim, and sometimes it helps.

Most importantly, you're missing half of the straddle cable for your rear brakes. It should look like this.



You are missing the housing on the one side. That would make the brake not work... at all. Every time you squeeze the brakes the straddle cable is sliding up and down the brake cable, severely reducing the force you can put on the brakes. There are some straddle cables that do not require that bit of housing. Yours is not one of those.

Your bike CAN take v-brakes, but you'll need new levers or travel-agents, as mentioned above. I used to hate v-brakes because they're ubiquitous on cheap bikes. But decent (read, not off of a wal-mart bike) v-brakes work extraordinarily well and are much easier to adjust than cantilever brakes. I recently switched out a set of old deore XT (read, not cheap) old cantis on my commuter for relatively cheap avid v-brakes, and the v-brakes outperform the cantis in every way. (I had adjustable levers so I didn't have to replace them.)

I will admit though, the kool-stop salmons are nice pads though. But they're likely different for your cantis vs. v-brakes, so make your decision on which brake you want first, then buy the pads.

Lastly, contrary to popular belief, the kool-stop salmons are actually some of kool-stop's HARDEST pads. Not the softest as most people would think. Braking on a bike works by the pads quite literally ripping parts of the aluminum rim off. That process takes energy, removing it from the energy of the moving bicycle. That's why really worn rims have concave brake tracks. Harder pads more effectively "dig in" to the aluminum, and stop more quickly. Softer pads are more gentle.

dabac

You can't consider brakes only.
Brakes and levers work together.
And since rim brakes tend to need the same kind of travel regardless, to clear the rim, engage, with reasonable lever travel, it pretty much becomes a zero sum game.
To get the same amount of pad travel from a brake with longer arms, you need levers that are proportionally longer too.

So no, longer brake arms is no guarantee for greater pinch force at the rim.

corrado33

Or a lever that has a properly adjusted pivot point.

Levers can certainly make a difference. If you use short pull levers with v-brakes, you get brakes that are WAY too touchy. If you do the opposite you get brakes that don't work. I think there is more play with the leverage/lever arm length than you give it credit for.

Regardless, yes, brakes and levers do need to be matched.

InOmaha

They a system, that's for sure. But with the setup he has if he replaces the brake end only he should be able to generate more leverage and get more force at the pads with the same hand force applied to make the bike stop better.


Just play around with the spring adjustment and pad stud concave washers to dial it in some.


Or replace everything on both ends at the same time. I'd try just the v-brakes and adjustments first.

rosefarts

The most amazing part of this is that you've got a functional Killer V. I broke 2 of them back in high school (when they were new) and I weighed 130lbs and never had a load on my bike. I bet if you look close, your frame is cracked, negating the need to set up your brakes.

If you look on ebay, you can get Avid Tri Align 3 canti brakes and levers, they are very expensive. I had them eons ago and loved them. I remember them being much simpler to set up than most canti's. They worked great too.

Other stupid tricks we used for better braking... SIS housing instead of brake housing. Wears out quicker but isn't spongy. Sand the wheels shiny with medium grit sandpaper. Pine tar or even road tar on the rims (we did this, don't do this).

Are there kinks in your cable or housing? Are all of your cables stops in place and is the housing cracked, pushing through, or otherwise compromised. If all else fails, Magura still makes rim brakes.

Seriously, check your chainstays and the weld of the V. I bet your frame is cracked.

cyccommute 

From what I can see both the front and rear link is missing the housing. I agree that they won't work properly but, even with the cable housing, Shimano's link wire doesn't work all that well any way. Changing over to a yoke and straddle wire will improve the braking.

Trevtassie

Corrado is on the money. The small reaction tube is missing from the saddles. I'm surprised the brakes even work. Get new saddles and get new pads, Salmons or the hybrid Salmons, preferably with removable inserts, so you just need to swap the inserts when they wear out. Move the pads further out from the arms, so the arms are further out. When setting up the pads equal length pieces of plastic tube slipped over the posts helps with setting them right. At least it's one less set of octopus arms you need to hold everything straight while you tighten things up. Toe in, wrap a small zip tie around the leading edge of the pad. But really Post Type pads should never have seen the light of day. Whichever committee designed them needs a good whipping with a brake cable. Much easier to ditch them and the levers and get a set of V brakes.

tramptrade 

Excellent feedback everyone! I knew I could count on you guys. I have a lot to consider here.

I may just pony up for completely new canti setup - levers and all and just be done with it. It's amazing that 3 separate shops did not pick up on the fact that the setup was not only wrong, but incomplete as well.

tramptrade 

The bolt on one side is fused to the frame and cannot be removed. The other one had the head twisted off by the last LBS I took it to. I have not gotten around to drilling them out. This bike has been a challenge from day 1.

Trevtassie

If you want to be a real tightass, you don't need to buy new saddles. Just use a length of brake outer slipped over the cable, go looking at some other old bikes to find the right length.

worry

Im running kool-stops on my cruiser bike which is like a 1988 hardrock. the brakes are not v or canti's. theyre u-brakes. so its not totally the same situation as yours. they do work better than the shimano pads that used to be on there.

Also, I ran across this last night on the internet. Im seriously considering doing one on my bike

tramptrade 

No frame cracks - this thing is solid. I have it setup for road / light touring / utility, so it does not get beat on at all. My days of big drops are well behind me.

For off-road stuff I have a built-up Brodie, but even with that bike, my knees can't take a heavy pounding any more.

tramptrade 

That's a pretty clever solution! I have no issues spending the money if the results are worth it though.

chorlton

Look...



I know nothing but I have experienced swearing a lot at such things when I tried to set them up. It is 15 degrees of horrible and you will need 24 fingers per all 5 of your hands in order to set them up. I mean... look at them. Someone tried and then gave up. It is permanently obnoxious rubbish.



Spot the difference... The pads are bolted on through slots but... in addition the hardware includes, best words I can think of, gimbals. Go buy some V brake brake pads to see. Why did they do that?

And.. yes your bike will accept V-Brakes with the caveat of clearing other stuff. I spent two days of misery having bought new cables and straddle wires trying to set up similar to what you have at the moment and the result was permanently rubbish.

Of course there may be 'harder' people out there than me but I binned them, with additional swearing because I like shouting at bins, then dialled Ebay for some V-Brakes and got them fitted and set up in about 20 minutes. ABSOLUTE BLISS.... and I do not care if the noodles go rust themselves because I'll just go and buy some new ones.

tramptrade 

I am considering this option as well. I will still need to find somebody who can set them up properly the first time. Once I see how they should be I should be able to make small adjustments as needed.

LesterOfPuppets

+1. You can make your own with cable housing and ferules.

+1. So much better.