bloom87

Hi all.
Not sure i'm posting in the right forum...

I'm looking into transforming one of my cantis into this (per sheldon brown)

"The unit illustrated above is a World Class "V-Daptor." In this case, it has been installed on a conventional Shimano LX cantilever, thus converting a traditional center-pull cantilever into a direct-pull unit [...]"

The main purpose would be fun and, further « frankenbiking » my ride...

but I'm puzzled as to... which small parts I should buy.

Any ideas ?

These v-daptors seem to be missing the mounting bracket... https://www.sjscycles.co.uk/v-daptor-...r-pair-prod83/

GrayJay

See these for more info;
https://problemsolversbike.com/products/travel_agents

(these are actually for adapting V-brakes to non-V brake levers but similar concept).

No cable housing stop bracket is needed (just as with with V brakes). Reports are that the adapter is somewhat prone to breaking cables and can get clogged with mud/dirt if riding dirty conditions offroad.

frantik

I would replace my brake levers with appropriate ones instead of using the travel agent. there are some levers which can be used with either type of brake

bloom87

I think i'm looking for something different. I'm looking to mount the travel agent on a cantilever brake arm (not a v-brake).... it means I should be able to screw and mount the travel agent on the right arm of the cantis..

Edit : this is not a classic "wanna use v-brake with canti/road levers" problem. i'm looking to actually hack cantis into v-brakes....

noglider 

What's the point here?

Captain Blight

This is a stupid idea, and will only end badly.

WNG

+1, it might look interesting and 'fun', but the braking performance suffers.

unworthy1

The main thing you'd gain is you don't need cable hangers for the cantis.
The thing that causes brake performance problems is that the WC V-daptors are designed to pull more cable with less force using that eccentric pulley...that's because they are intended make "short pull" levers work with "long pull" V-brakes.
You put them on a canti and you will get super grabby (read: dangerous) brakes.
If you are determined to do this hack, you need to fit a center-drilled pulley to the V-daptor (and those other brands won't work since you can't bolt them to a canti arm) so the cable pull is not amplified.
Not worth the trouble, IMHO, but could be done if you are really handy.

rhm

My Counterpoint Opus II (semi-recumbent tandem) is from 1984, before the dawn of V-brakes. The front wheel is directly below the stoker's seat, so there's no room for a cable hanger; the cantilever was modified into a V-brake exactly the way OP means, and I'm pretty much 100% certain the bike was designed to have this brake configured this way; there's really no other way the brake could have been hooked up. It's very effective. But I don't remember the details.

bloom87

Ummm...with due respect guys and unless i'm missing something really fundamental here, I don't think that's true.

What you see pictured in the OP are basically v-brakes with extra-short arms. YES they were cantis in the first place, but hacked into linear pull, extra short-arms v-brakes. So I don't think there is any risk in it. I agree that v-brakes are inherently extra grabby... but this should be no more dangerous than a classic v-brake on the front (which I find kind of dangerous but manageable)

To those who say hacking cantis into v-brakes is stupid... and see no point.... I that's say it's cool and unique... I say it's sheldonbrown-y !!!!

pacificaslim

Here's one reason to do it: to eliminate brake chatter. This may not have been a concern in the days of heavy steel forks, but is quite a problem these days with light carbon forks. I run mini-v brakes (with campy levers) to solve this problem, but running regular cantis set up like the opening picture would accomplish the same thing since the cable housing runs all the way to the brake instead of to a frame/stem mounted hanger (which keeps the housing fixed but as the fork flexes under braking, the cable is shortened/lengthened/shortened in a cycle that produces chatter feeling to the rider).