TRP Cable Pull Disc Brakes Surprisingly Good!
 

I just purchased a Salsa Warbird that came with TRP Spyre mechanical disc brakes and I thought the first order of business would be to change them out for hydraulics but holy crap, these brakes are pretty damn good. Anybody else have good luck with these or have any tips or tricks to make them even better? I have some non-hydraulic di2 shifters that are going on soon so I though about upgrading the rotors to Dura Ace and the pads as well since they take the same style pad as Shimano. Any thoughts?

The Spyres came on a Raleigh Tamland I had for awhile. I was perfectly happy with them. I never had to adjust them except for setting the lever pull to my preference. I appreciated that they never rubbed like I've seen on some hydraulics. Folks who know a lot more about brakes than I say hydraulics are much superior but I wouldn't be bothered by having the Spyres again.:thumb: Be sure you have the "new" compressionless brake housing where appropriate.

Yeah, I gather they are the go-to if you’re not going hydraulic. I have them and have no issues.

I have them on my Rove ST. I have no need for anything "better"--these are killer.

The TRP Spyre and Hy/RD are well known excellent calipers.

While I still prefer hydros, Spyres absolutely SLAY Avid BB7s. Wouldn't hesitate to run them on either of my disc brake bikes.

I wouldn't bother with the Dura-Ace rotors. The ice tech rotors look cool, but are totally unnecessary for gravel unless you do very long, technical descents that warrant the cooling. The slotted TRP rotors are pretty good, and have built in wear indicators!

As for cable vs. hydraulic, I think it's absolutely shameless that Salsa sells a gravel bike for $2,800 /w cable brakes, but with compressionless housing the TRP Spyre and HY/RD both work well. A lot easier to setup and adjust / service in the field as well, but requires more periodic maintenance.

I thought the same thing but after thinking about it, I was really in the market for a bare Warbird frameset that costs $2,100 so finding this bike complete, locally, and on Sale for $2,500 made sense.

The plan is to upgrade every single piece on the bike and put the takeoffs on another Gravel frame to sell.

Did you say Salsa, Warbird, and Sale in the same post... lol.... Nicely done, you win sir

dvdslw if you’re having a hard time rationalizing an upgrade, I can help: the Yokozuno Ultimo lets you keep your DA levers, but the four-pot calipers improve power and modulation, but also look way sicker than either Spyre or HY/RD!

You’re welcome! :thumb:

I agree--had BB7s on a rigid 29'r and I thought they were pretty great at the time, but the Spyres are at a different level.

I have Spyre SLCs on one bike and really like them. They are simple to install and maintain, they operate very smoothly, they're not prone to squealing, they're easy to set up to avoid rub and they allow you to use pretty much any mechanical lever. They're not quite as powerful or smooth as the hydraulic setups I have on four other bikes, but they have great modulation that works well for road riding. I also like the ability to adjust the pad clearance super easily.

We custom build gravel bikes for some racers and some builds easily exceed $5K. Several clients specify cable actuated Hy/RD or Spyre calipers for their reliability and durability. They are proven to be extremely reliable, easily field serviceable, and are a great option for the tortures of long gravel rides.

The spyres are very nice, got them on my new Warbird last year. So far I've had to adjust them twice just to get the pads closer to the disc, but no complaints whatsoever about their stopping power, even on a ride I did last year that went into a cloud! The Warbird is pretty awesome too, the last 9 months have been amazing. What drivetrain did you get?

Dave

I'll have to check them out, Thanks!

I got the bottom end Sram Apex build with the 42/11-41 1x drivetrain, I pretty much bought the bike for the frameset with the plans to upgrade just about everything, or everything? So far I have some Ultegra di2 shifters and a set of Spinergy GX wheels. Now I'm trying to decide if I want to go 1x or 2x? So far the 1x has been fine but I wonder how much better it would be to tighten up the gaps on the cassette?

Yeah, I couldn't believe it either, Thanks!

oh cool, I have the same bike! 2019 model. I haven't really noticed too much of a gap with the gears, for me at least, no plans to change to 2x. Got a road bike also, and that is a Shimano 105 11-28 cassette. Almost feels like the gears are too close together. For now the things I want to change are the bar tape to something more cushy, and go to a Absolute Black 38t chainring bc I climb a lot of hills. Eventually wheels too though, the wtb i23s are nice, but the hubs aren't the fastest rolling. The more you ride the bike, the less you will notice the cassette gaps. Of course ymmv.

Dave

I had Hylex hydro brakes on my bike and replaced them with Spyres and RRL levers. I hated the shape of the Hylex lever hoods (subjective) but without doing a bunch of risky experiments, I don't know that any other levers would work with Hylex calipers. Using mechanical brakes allows menthe freedom to use whatever cables and levers I want.

the Hylex system has a little more stopping power, but this is a bike ridden on roads and smooth singletrack—it's not a trials bike—so the braking performance of Spyres is more than sufficient.

I run TRP Spyre mechanical disc brakes on my road bike, paired with Deore XT rotors (which are surprisingly light) and they're really, really good. Using mechanical Dura-ace levers at the moment. Just periodically adjust pad spacing, swap the pads when they're worn and that's it (I think I'm using Decathlon brand semi-metallic pads at the moment, kinda howl in serious rain but brake well). Bloody good brakes.

They need a slight bit more effort than hydraulics but I like the modulation, and they just don't give me any grief, squeal, rub or anything.

I was going to get some Shimano centerlock rotors to go on my new wheels that are in route from Spinergy but I really like the performance of the TRP's so much I ordered another set of rotors from them. They are also half the price of the XT's or Ultegra/DA rotors which helped make the decision easier too!

I had an older generation of the spyre's and had a lot of issue with rubbing and overall crappy stopping power. I was ready to crush them in a press when I decided to replace the cable and housing first just to make sure there was not something else going on. The existing cable and housing were new. Come to find out there was a small area in the housing that was catching the cable and created a little spur. Once I put the new canle\housing on, it performed so much better. I eventually sold that bike a couple of years later and the new owner is still using them.

Agree, I have a similar setup on my road bike. They are very good for road riding. On really steep and technical descents I get into occasionally on my gravel rig, I can appreciate grx hydraulic brakes on my gravel bike but who does that on a road bike anyway? I wouldn’t hesitate to buy a road or even a gravel bike with these brakes so long as I didn’t steep ride single track regularly.

Do you ever have customers request SRAM or Campy drivetrains and HY/RD brakes?

My bike has an 11sp Campy Super Record drivetrain with TRP Spyre SLC calipers. Works great.