I want to see pictures of your rare, uncommon or stupid high end cantilever brakes. Once again I am really subscribing to the retro MTB crowd here, but all photos of vintage french cantilever are certainly appreciated and welcome.

I'll start. I don't have at the moment, but here is a photo of some Avid tri-align lifted from bikepro

Here are some funky examples from the 1940s and 50s as illustrated in The Data Book:

Thanks for those illustrations, mr. Thompson! The quick release on those old Mafacs are pretty cool. So are the other drawings but I got a thing for those. The ones on the bottom are a little less suitable for cyclocross I think.

Wow! Talk about over the top cable configurations, many cool ideas there.

Amazing how similar those ones with the pivot above the pad are to the later roller cam designs etc...

Here's some photo's of 1930's era Resilion Canti's (click the picture for a larger image)

Note in the 4th and 5th handrawn examples posted by JDT, looping the cable through a roller in the saddle wire hangar and then anchoring the cable back onto the frame is a simple pulley systems that doubles the mechanical advantage at the caliper.

My Tektro brake booster came with an alternative hanger similar to this design

How does that work? My brain does not understand!

It appears that initial pull of the cable will move the right cantilever until it contacts the rim. The remaining pull will push on the housing and move it down, rocking the link at it's pivot, thereby moving the left cantilever.

I have a set of NOS tri-aligns but apparently 3 of them are missing little cylindrical barrels where they slip onto the cantilever posts. I don't know if I'll ever be able to find those parts.

Ahh, there's nothing new under the sun, I guess...

I like how the arms are independently adjustable:



But the big difference with the more modern roller-cam is that the shape of the cam means that the mechanical advantage changes as the pad approaches the rim.

This thread is already awesome.

i love those nifty braze-on quick releases! i wonder why they never caught on.

The coolest cantilevers that I ever owned were Onza H.O. brakes, you gotta have the Chill Pill hanger to go with it, it's still one of the nicest designs in my opinion.


As far as unique or mind bending... nothing beats the Brovedani ABS Anti-Lock cantilever! Pure delicious madness!!!


Here is a link to a bunch of cable actuated brake treats:

https://www.blackbirdsf.org/brake_obscura/mtb.html

Enjoy!

-D-

That pointed to the interesting WTB Widget brake:


I was drooling on one (on the rear end of a Trimble mountain bike) at Velo Cult. I think it's time to go have a beer there.

debatable as to how cool they are, but I have to mention the Scott-Pedersen SE (Self Energizing) cantis...if only cause I still have a bag of them that I never did sell.

Shameless plug, but if these float anyone's boat, I'll let 'em go for a song.
https://s179.photobucket.com/user/unw...l?sort=3&o=103
https://i55.photobucket.com/albums/g1...s/IMG_2583.jpg

The new paul mini-motos look super similar to these:

I'm tempted, but I read some stuff that scares me.

The Onza's are pretty cool, but they are so insanely chunky. They look heavy though they may not be...

I used Onza pedals for a long time before I tried SPDs... man those things were a bad idea...

I am presently building up my Concorde Columbo and it features canti brakes, however; I got the bike as a bare frame. With that in mind, I have no idea about what the original cantilever brakes were or looked like. Does anyone know of any good quality Italian made canti brakes that will fit my Concorde?

If not, I have decided to go with a set of Shimano canti callipers. I have a set on my higher end Ross mountain bike that I do like and I even managed to find an identical and orphaned set that was once fitted to an early Richey mountain bike. For now, they will have to do...

I like my Onza's on my Dakar, I just picked up all the replacement hardware in SS for them. I also like the Pedersen/Suntour SE's I picked up for the rear of my DB Topanga. Although not Canti's the Suntour Rollercam brakes are cool as are my Magura Race Lite Hyd Rim Crusher brakes.

Glenn







I also liked the Dia-Compes that were on my Mongoose ATB, they worked really good for what they were,

That's just to weed-out the timid...real he-men have no fear of riding with danger!

Seriously, if I thought the self-energizing feature was such a great idea I'd be riding with danger myself.

And by "a song" I mean pay for shipping and you can have 'em all....he-man.

Edit: sale pending...

And EDIT 2: SOLD

there's a set of those Onzas in the parts box at my co-op, but one of the arms is cracked.