79pmooney

I would NOT drill. Maybe just superstitious but I have lived (barely) through a fork crown failure. And braking power is way overrated. Power enough to take you over the handlebars is plenty. A modern aero brake lever like Tektro will give you that with your Diacomps using Koolstops and good cables and housings. I am using very close to that combo on two bikes currently. Both have more than enough power. (I "detuned" one of my two dual pivot bikes with V-brake levers. Better stopping by a lot after I did that since locking up is so much less likely. I will probably do the same with my best bike or replace the Shimano dual pivots with SunTour Superbe if I run across a pair.

Drilling may be perfectly safe. But the consequences of a failure there can be very high. The failure I saw caused a 5 day coma and cost me seven years of my life.

Ben

jgcycle

New cables and Kool Stop Continentals did NOT make my old 105 or 600 brakes much better. The Tektro nutted version brakes did - period. Wish I could stick my Domane 105s on vintage steel.

If you're barreling down a hill and someone pulls out of their driveway or some oldie makes a left in front of you, you need the stopping power. Once going down a big hill on my Ironman I was squeezing the life out of the 600 brakes for 10 minutes, no thanks.

noglider 

Agreed. I have Campagnolo Record (late 70's or early 80's vintage) sidepulls on my McLean. I could not want better brakes. There is a big "however": I have long fingers and strong hands. When people do side-by-side comparisons of brakes, they think the brake with more leverage is more powerful. By one measure that's, true, but I can stop as fast as anyone else on any other bike.

I do agree that Weinmann/Dia Compe sidepulls suuuuuck.

I feel drilling your frame and fork for brakes is just fine. Just make sure you do it straight and use the right sizes.

You could use some nice single pivots, provided you're strong enough and willing to squeeze hard. Single pivots are very elegant. As the pads wear, they don't need readjustment, whereas all other designs require it.

Switching to dual pivots is fine, too, if you prefer, especially if you currently have those sucky Dia Compe brakes.

Bikedued

The Dia Compe's on my 84 Club Fuji were some of the best brakes I ever had on a bike. The Arabesque 600's on my Super Le Tour 12.2(transplanted) work just fine too. Granted I don't ride in the mountains or ever plan to. That would be an ideal application for new technology. Of course you would never find me barnstorming a descent with road disc brakes. They work fine for a little while of course, but....,,,,BD

reg

Speaking from experience- its a big pain in the ass. I almost didn't get my ultegra DP's in because of the way the fork is.

Plus I had to order those brake pad holder that lower the brake, all sorts of swearing. plus 3 sets of housings just to get it right.

Bottom line:

Is my braking so superior to single pivot and would I do it again? does it look that much better?

yes its better but the feel is not as linear at all. And no I would never do it again. Nothing beats a simcromed pair of diacompes.

My advice, polish up a pair of diacompe's and put those red brake pads (kools stops) on them and get fresh cables and housings and rebend the spring to get that brand new feel and adjust them very close to the rim with 2 wrenches on the main nut.

squirtdad

you don't drill the rear brake at all, just the backside of of the fork. and if i were guess the amount of metal removed is about a gram or less... metall shavings.

Pars 

I have done a couple of Trek frames which the front was already recessed mount but the back was nutted mount ('84 Trek 400 and '86 Trek 500). Actually the 500 was already done, though they had drilled all the way through the back brake instead of just the front (back hole from the brake perspective). On the Trek 400, I used a unibit by hand/vice grip to just drill the back side of the brake bridge, and it wasn't too difficult. I see no reason not to switch to recessed mount if need be. If it were a very valuable frame, I might not do so however.

That said, I do agree with Tom that good sidepulls with good pads work just fine for me. I never had a problem with my '70s Campy Records, even with the stock pads. They are great with the new production Campy pads. I run them now with some late '80s Campy Athena aero levers, which probably helps though. They seem to brake almost as well as the Tektro DPs on the 500 with Kool Stop pads.

noglider 

A bunch of folks went to Kissena Velodrome today to ride some laps, try each other's bikes, and just hang out. It was the first time in a few months that I rode my track bike. And I had reason to think of this thread. I was reminded that I drilled my fork to accept a recessed nut brake. It already had had holes for a brake, but the old kind. I feel no guilt about this form of "drewing."