Location of Hoods on Bars of a Classic
 

http://bikeforums.net/attachment.php...hmentid=366847After buying the proper width bars I set them up as I would my current ride and found out the hard way that setting up the bars for riding on the hoods makes using the brakes very hard. The reach is to far to difficult to reach from drops and not smooth and easy that I can really use them from hoods. Did I screw up or do I need to drop them farther down to use in drops only position. I bought new Nitto's old school bend nothing fancy. The brakes just sux. But I do love the bike. That being said how can I tell if I can fit 28's on the frame? :thumb:

How can we answer you if we can't tell what color it is? Which is another way of saying pics would help.

I mount my brake levers so that the end of the lever is in line with the straigh part of the drops. After that its practice to ride on the tops and use two fingers to pull the levers.

1-What kind of brake levers?
2-What kind of calipers?
3-What kind of bars?
4-Where do put your hands the majority of the time?

A pic would help, but personally, I ride the drops, so I put them forward enough for 2-finger actuation in the drops. That doesn't mean I can reach them from the back of the drops, but quite reachable. To do this, I run a straight-edge along the bottom of the drops and position the brake lever's lower end on that edge. This can also be done by putting the bars on the floor, making sure they rest on the drops, and positioning the levers so the bottom of them is just touching the floor (i.e. 4 points of contact on the floor, with the back of the drops having the most area of contact). This works for me when I want to use the hoods, usually only approaching a blind intersection or a "maybe" stoplight. Generally, if you "fit to the drops, you'll be fine on the tops." It sounds a little like your reach is too long on the bike, either the frame, stem, or bar, probably a combination of them.

Good luck.

I find it depends on what kind of levers you have also. I changed the Mafac levers on my wife's bike to DiaCompes because she couldn't reach the lever no matter where they were mounted.

Utility.....place them so they work for you.

I never ride on the hoods, and since stopping is a nice feature to have, brake placement is put where I best reach then while forward in the drops. If I'm not in the drops, my hands are on the curve where they sweep forward or just on top. I tend to switch hand position around when the tinglies hit.

A small variant on RobbieTunes & Wulf's suggestions is to move the bottom of the lever 1 to 2 cm above the straight line from the drops. This 1 to 2 cm is shown in the Rivendell catalog, page 12.

Yup, that's why we do things :rolleyes:

You can't stop when you're on the hoods? Do you have bad arthritis or something?

http://bikeforums.net/attachment.php...hmentid=366833Here she is during my ride today...The groupo is 1980's Galli I think good stuff.

Well... I ended up using the advice in a Rivendell YouTube video.

*shrug*

I have found that several Vintage Levers have a very long reach - When mounting it puts the lever way out there - In 1975 Giovanni Liotto Jr fixed this on my wifes Gipiemme brake levers by sliding a small gizmo spacer of aluminum into the top of the lever - It was just enough to bring in the lever a cm in without compromising its stopping power - I don't know if this was a common fix and for the life of me I cannot remember its exact build dimensions - It looked a little like those DiCompe quick release tabs but slid in the front of Campi, Gipie, and Universal type levers - Spotted more than a few of them being used as allot of the Italian riders had small hands...