v brake opinions

[tom1989]

ok well looking for some help on vees for the rear.
what is a good vee brake?
can they are they as good as maguras? do they need much maintance? cables make a lot of diffrence.
reason i am asking is that i have had a lot of problems with my magura recently and thinking of goin vee.
i would prob go for a sd7 all round with standard cables with some vee adapters to allow me to run magura pads on it. prob stick like a tecktro booster on aswell or maybe nothing at all.
so what are they like? worth it? well that set up give me good enough power etc?
atm i have a rear rb lever blade on a magura with koxx bloxx on grind.

[davke]

just try

[tomeleyskins]

I'm all into maguras, but the best V i've ever felt was an Avid Ultimate lever/caliper with Nokon cabling, was stiff, and held really well. If I had V mounts instead of 4 bolt, this would be the set up i'd use.

Personally, I find that the V converter things for maguras are just not up to the job.

Hope this helps.
Tom.

[tomacropod]

a search will yield you a lot more information than you can gain in this thread.

I will say this though - my favourite type of rim brake is a v-brake by far. I find them to be more powerful, cheaper, easier to set up and maintain, and lighter. I've used a number of different v-brake set ups but cannot recommend using V's on a 4-bolt frame. Run the brake you have the mounts for. V-brakes on a 4-bolt frame will be (and are, I've tried) terrible and a magura will be much better.

A standard magura lever is much better than those RB levers.

- Joel

[KyleT]

I will say this though - my favourite type of rim brake is a v-brake by far. I find them to be more powerful, cheaper, easier to set up and maintain, and lighter.


- Joel

It is evident that you have not had your maguras set up by the skills of
Joel Whitburn! :bigthumb:

[tomacropod]

I've had them set up by the skills of Joel McFarlane-Roberts - more names, better brakes. I konw how to set them up, it's not hard. Their design and function is simply inferior, however good setup helps a lot.

- Joel

[trialsian]

The key is to run a booster and use derailleur cable housing instead of brake housing... any brake housing is meant to flex some for brake modulation... whereas, derailleur housing does not flex so that you get crisp shifting... I am running Spanish Fly pads, Avid Ultimates, and Tar... I love it. V's can save you somewhere around 1 pound over Maggies.. and are much easier to maintain and tweak. I would recommend anything from Avid... I have the ultimates, which are just like all the others, but have the arch to create parallel pad movement. Good luck.

[lowside]

1 pound just by switching to v-brakes in the rear from a magura?

[Cryo-Cube]

derailleur housing does flex less?
I really dont think so, if anything it should flex as much as brake housing...
have to test that out sometime

[Elan]

my avid ultimate combo with koolstop salmons and full length xtr housing was balls. if you thre4w in some plaz crv's then i dont see how it could get much better.

[jmkimmel]

XT lever, XTR housing, cheapass old avid sd3 arms. Don't really know how much better they could get. As far as feel goes, they are as solid as my avid mech front brake with the same housing and lever. I'd say spend your money on the lever and housing, not on the arms.

[octomoule]

LOOOOOLLLLL

[raimund-aut]

I have the Ultimate calipers at home, but at the moment I am riding Maguras.

I think the Ultimate Avids work much better with the original Ultimate lever. I ran them with XTR levers and I was not so satisfied. But nevertheless I like Vees. You can run less tar and modulate better. When you like manuals and stuff it is definately the better brake setup. I have Magura + Grind at the moment and when I do manuals the brakes are too strong.

The biggest problem with the usage of Vees is that most of the frames have too narrow brake mounts. If you run a wide rim, you cannot adjust your brake properly. If frames with extra wide brake mounts would be available, I would probably get one.

If you consider Vees on 4bolt Magura mounts, don't buy a converter. They all don't work well. Try to find a good mechanic who is able to make a custom converter for with a strong booster for you. But then the saved weight is gone again.

[cdionne]

I would agree with the derailleur housing swap in theory, but I used it once in a pinch and the first time I got on the brakes it exploded. There's not much keeping the strands together besides the outer plastic casing.

[tomacropod]

brake cable outer has a spiral reinforcing to hold it together under high torque. Derailleur housing has a longtitudinal reinforcing which makes it stiffer but it will split very easily under braking torque.

Don't use derailleur housing except for on completely straight sections. Having said that, use avid flak jacket brake housing without any breaks.

- Joel

[hello?]

ive got ultimates in the rear on my bike. sd 1 avid lever regular brake housing and cable. they work excellent and i havent had any problems with them except maybe getting the pads to line up with the rim square but thats it. some other people have tried my brakes and love tehm. they find there better than there maguras but taht could just be the way they have them set up.

[AgrAde]

if i was going to buy a complete setup for v-brakes i'd probably end up with deore non-parallel push callipers, CRV pads, cheap cable inner and outer with the ends ground flat and an ultimate or xt(r?) lever. and a booster.

i couldn't really justify spending more on the cabling or calliper arms. it'd be better if i did but i doubt i'd gain any useful increase in performance. maybe a stiffer feel but meh, i quite like having a small amount of flex.

that said, don't take advice from me because the feel of my rear brake is shit at the moment. that's just because i can't be bothered maintaining it :dunno:

[tomacropod]

the rear caliper is the LEAST important component of the brake - as long as it's non-parallel push. I used the deore ones, they're fine. Pads, then lever, then cables are of subsequent importance.

- Joel

[Eaven]

How can you run shifter housings for v brake housing? the cable diameter is smaller, i can't fit a brake cable in there.

Unless you're using shifter cables as brake cables?

[tomacropod]

some shift outers will work with some brake inners. Often you're right though, they're not compatible.

- Joel

[ONE EYE]

for those of you with v brakes, what rim are you using dx32? the reason i ask is i am getting a frame with v mounts and i am afraid that with that rim that the v arms will stick out past the seatstays amd end up hitting my legs. i know people that use vees with a narrower rim, they dont have that problem, but i think i might. please let me know what rim you use. also have you tried taking off the spacers on the pads to movw the arms closer to the wheel?



How can you run shifter housings for v brake housing? the cable diameter is smaller, i can't fit a brake cable in there.

Unless you're using shifter cables as brake cables?
you probly using 4mm housing and not 5mm. try the 5mm it will work.

[jmkimmel]

On my BT, with a DX32 it's fine. I had to put slightly smaller spacers between the pads and the calipers, but no big deal. It really just comes down to how far apart the canti bosses are on your specific frame. Mine measured around 100mm if I remember correctly, and work pretty well for 20-40mm wide rims with avid calipers.

[ONE EYE]

On my BT, with a DX32 it's fine. I had to put slightly smaller spacers between the pads and the calipers, but no big deal. It really just comes down to how far apart the canti bosses are on your specific frame. Mine measured around 100mm if I remember correctly, and work pretty well for 20-40mm wide rims with avid calipers.
what pads do you use? i am getting a bt 6.0. i want to use plaz crv pads. i know that they are kinda tall/thick.

[felix]

i am getting a bt 6.0. i want to use plaz crv pads. i know that they are kinda tall/thick.
I'm running a DX32, Ritchey Pro Logic calipers and 13mm thick pads on my 6.0. It fits without any problems.

There are two versions of CRV backings, with 7mm or 9mm thickness.
The pads with the slim backings will fit, but I'm not sure about the thick ones.

[tomacropod]

I used a dx32 with plazmatic pads and the standard washers - no problems.

- Joel