cantilevers, mini-v, anything else?

[quintilation]

i have an old kienisis crosslight that i use for single track riding, disused railway lines etc.

it has cantilever brake bosses, i had some wide (dia compe) brakes which where never great, and leathal in the wet.
I have switched to shimano mini v brakes - much better braking but no mud clearance for winter, and they are bit ugly IMHO.

am i missing any other options?

the ideal (though i cannot imagine what it would look like) would be a brake which increases mechanical advantage as they travel - so low MA meaning they travel a long way (and thus normally sit a long way from the rims) and then increasing MA as the pads touch the rim.

narrow cantis have reducing MA as the brakes are applied - which is the opposite of what you want. wide cantis have fairly constant (but low) MA.

or i cold throw the whole lot away and buy a modern bike with discs…

thoughts?

-Steve

 

[Twozaskars]

Are the V brakes actually creating that much of a clearance issue? I imagine the frame behind them is narrower than the brake.

 

[quintilation]

the problem is sticky mud in the winter filling the tiny gap between the brake blocks and the rim (when using mini-v brakes).

the low MA of cantilevers means the blocks move back much further from the rim when the brakes are off, so there is much less chance of clogging.

-Steve

 

[Tsundere]

Pedersons?

 

[Imlach]

why not just use normal v brakes? I can clear 65mm fenders on my Kona with a cheapo pair of Tektro's

 

[Frankenorange]

 

[Imlach]

View attachment 974595

why is it happy to see me

 

[hamster]

If you are running bar-end shifters then full size V's and Tektro V levers is a good way to go.

There is a hidden nightmare in all this with Shimano's change in road lever cable pull in recent years to NSSLR, this may be why you don't get much from the Dia-Compes. Have you tried the Tektro CR720 or Shimano CX cantis? Or even the older (1990-ish) MTB cantis pre-low profile?

 

[bikeworkshop]

For ugly but effective braking, fit a disc front fork and disc setup
Then a standard v brake with an avid travel agent on the back.
You will be able to lock both wheels up in almost all situations, and have plenty of clearance.

But if you want pretty, then live with the performance of shimano cx
It's a good as it got, which is why we then got discs.

 

[quintilation]

thanks all. i am going to stick with the sora mini-vs for now. one of these days a planet-x tempest will call and all this will be forgotten. in the meantime its ok, and a vast improvement on cantis.

-Steve