which brakes for an 80s rider?

I'm doing up my 80's Andy Powell: - which brakes? Need to be better than the Shimano 105's currently.

OCD groupset brand matching isn't a priority, but points for beauty, function and lightness.

It's a rider - would early dual pivots be wrong or a sensible step?

Are Dura Ace better than Superbe Pro?

Are any of the less-obvious makes really good: Dia Compe, Mavic, Modolo?

Shimano 6400 dual pivots are really good, I just built a full 6400 bike and with swisstop pads they are really impressive.

Dia Compe were making some lovely brakes back then Royal Gran Compe also I think they made the Superb pro for Suntour, Dura-Ace were nice too, but none of them really worked particularly well. I think Modolo were considered to be slightly mechanically more sound than others.

Modolo side pulls were much more powerful for a given effort than campag equivilent. I dont remember dual pivots being available in the 80's.

Modolo Professional where very nice indeed & quire rare these days

Altenburger did some 'dual pivots'

The 'modern' dp came in for the the 1990/1 year so if you are not feeling the love, the mid 80's Shimano single pivots are very very good when combined with the correct lever. Dont mix old Weinmann levers with shimano calipers for instance. I'm running some 1986 Red S levers on some very modern dp and the levers do not really pull enough cable.

found some weinmanns

I’d look at why the 105s are lacking...

Decent sidepulls (which the 105s are) when mated with appropriate levers and setup with decent cables and pads are very nearly as good as dual pivots, certainly good enough for all but extreme use.

However they can be quickly rendered pretty useless by bad cables/pads or being mates to levers with the wrong pull ratio...

On reflection, I can't bring myself to put dual pivots on - might as well just ride my modern bike. And the 105s are only poor in comparison to modern stuff - I think they were the first to showcase SLR?

So really, it's about change for change's sake, or to fit something a bit cooler (like the look of those Modolos).

Thanks for the responses - think I'll man up and ride it a bit more until one gin-fuelled evening when a chi-chi set of xxxx brakes present themselves, and I'll have no choice but to press BIN.

I believe these are Altenburger by another name and also the same as the GB SYncro which I had a pair of for a while in the 60's. No idea what happened to them! However, all a bit to early for an 80's bike I reckon.