Anyone ever been satisfied with Cantilever brakes ?

Adding a brake booster/arch makes a drastic improvement.

I have XT cantilevers on my Monster Fat. They are a pain to setup but they work just fine for me. I have orange Kool Stops on them. That helps. V-brakes are definitely easier to setup but I have this thing about period correct parts. If you are willing to put in the time to set them up they will do a good job.

FIGHT

The best cantilever brakes I ever had were Gravity Research Pipe Dreams. When I first set them up they were superb but seemed to loose power over time and I could never get them working as well again. But generally cantis are fine just need a bit more fiddling with to get setup how you want them. Compared to modern discs however they are crap.

I think ‘satisfied’ is as good as it gets. Good quality well set up cantis with good pads and nice straight rims on the wheels will work ‘satisfactorily’ in the right weather conditions.

My golden set up was an SS5/987 combo, I got lucky and hit the sweet spot!

The Tektro Oryx on my randonneur will lock the front wheel, no longer constipated.

If anyone can be bothered to take the time to set up their cantilever brakes, they work as well as any other braking system and are cheap to maintain.

The downside is that they rely on the rims as a braking surface so any water or oil will turn into a nasty paste grinding away at your assets

When working you have good modulation, sometimes missing from the more snatchy on/off V-brake

Discs, well, they are the cure all for the cycling business but for me as a rider, they have more against them than for them.

Having ridden with discs since 1995 and the first generation of Hope hydraulics, they were fantastic. But after working with them in a bike shop their flaws became more apparent.

Seals, contamination, lubricant, contamination, worn discs, squealing, contamination, the bewildering amount of pads, contamination, the bewildering amount of standards and, finally, contamination

Yes, customers rode their rims to destruction but the same people then went on to ride their discs to the metal, seized pistons, rotted levers and so on.

I still shudder at the phrase 'my brakes squeal' whenever I hear it or them


So yes, I do find them satisfactory but only because I enjoy the pain and frustration of setting them up right. I like v-brakes too, easy and powerful and I do run discs but they give the most torrid times because they can be just so gosh darn fussy

...but then I also run rollercams, dual pivots, single pivots, u-brakes, centerpulls and drums

but not on the same bicycle

Sadly, routine maintenance is an alien concept to some people, regardless of their brake system. Ride it till it dies rather than look after it so it doesn't.

my SRP 'Mr Grumpy' cantilevers - who said theres something in a name?

What are drums like over their life.
We have a set on the trike never had to look or touch it.