(picture just for the attention) I have tried everything to make my brakes more powerful, cleaning the rotors and the brake pads, replacing the brake pads, sanding the rotors and degreasing it, yet nothing's still improving, I tried brake bedding a couple of times, but it's still pretty weak, I don't have money to buy hydraulics, please give me tips on how I can improve it.
by Wafflethug22
45 Comments
Try aligning the calipers such that the outer pad is slightly closer to the disc than the inner pad. This was how I got the best results from Avid mechanical brakes.
Did you replace the brake pads like for like or did you get a better set?
Organic brake pads.
Upgrade to hydraulics. It’s cheap. Shimano MT200s are a bang for the buck!
A couple times might not be enough for bedding. Try doing it like 10 tens times per wheel at least.
Did you actually wear the brakes in after all the things you did?
How much braking power are you looking for? Mechanical vs hydraulic improves modulation and feel. Yes hydraulic is stronger, but mechanical is good enough to throw you off the bike or lose control.
Who has an issue with bike brakes not stopping fast enough? This sounds more like they need to be adjusted. Shorter pull to stop.
I’m assuming you’ve already tried the normal adjustments, I find moving the stationary pad in towards the rotor can be a game changer if you haven’t tried that already. There’s usually an hex head or torx bolt on the right side of the caliper that controls the pad’s position.
You could replace the outer cable with compressionless housing, it’s expensive but good and should last a long time. Jagwire make some, I’m sure other companies as well.
Aside from that, bigger rotor and the necessary adaptors are always an option but I think you should be able to adjust these so they’re usable.
Those levers look like they are for cantilevers/short pull. Your calipers are likely a 4:1 long-pull.
So are you saying that the wheels still rotate when you’re pulling with all your strength on the brake lever? You can’t cause a lockup / skid with the rear?
So either cable is slightly too long, or pads are not working / contaminated or discs not working / contaminated.
Have you tried using the barrel adjusters to adjust the cable tension a little? Those levers look a little on the cheap side so perhaps the adjuster / end caps are on very soft metal (I’ve seen that on kids cheap BMXs in the past for example).
Hydraulics are the way to go though. Fit and forget. Or at least, they have been for me.
Linear housing, like shifter housing but the 5mm for brakes. It will provide more power transfer, less compression. Also, organic pads, but they’ll wear faster (usually not a big issue).
For disc brakes of any kind, the bedding process is absolutely crucial. It’s the difference between barely stopping and getting thrown off the bike.
Search YT for Rides of Japan’s “bedding in brake pads”. He’s got an over-the-top bedding process that is guaranteed to work. Even the most basic disc brakes will benefit from it.
Mechanical disc brakes can be very powerful, the biggest difference with hydros is modulation and the strength required to pull the levers, not stopping power.
How much space is there between your brake pads and rotor? Have you tried the pad adjustment screw?
The single best upgrade to mechanical disc brakes is to replace the traditional cables and housing with compressionless housing. Make sure to use the appropriate cable end caps.
Unlike a lot of people here, I think mechanical disc brakes can be great and work just fine, with high quality calipers and a proper setup.
Proper adjustment is the key to getting the best performance from cable actuated disc brakes. You will never get the feel of a good hydraulic brake but you can get good performance. I would suggest looking at the manual for the brakes and start from step one of the setup guide.
Are you using compression-less cable housing?
My suggestions: confirm lever pull ratio is correct for MTB. Replace the cables – the front looks way too short in your photo and cables/housing can stretch. Make sure housing is seated correctly with grommets. Clean the rotors with isopropyl to remove any residue. Replace the brake pads and do a proper bed-in.
Mechanical disc brakes don’t have the same modulation and feel as hydro and require more hand strength, but they should be more than capable of locking up the wheels with a hard pull.
Your pads and rotors sound contaminated. Get new pads and brake clean the rotors if you can’t afford new ones
Bigger rotors, makes a substantial difference. You’ll also need adapters for the calipers then.
And compressionless cable housing.
Better levers might make a difference.
But as so many has said, Shimano MT200 is gonna be better and they are cheap, Bigger rotors and the adapters will work the same on those if you wanna go there in the future.
Disk brakes are insanely powerful mechanical or otherwise.
Clearly something is wrong with your set up. Take it to a proper mechanic if you can’t figure it out yourself.
99% of riders mechanical disk brakes are more than powerful enough. Only difference with hydrologic is the feel
You already have disks and adapters you just need the hydro brake they can be had very cheap new or used. Check out shimano and tour local used market.
You can’t make mech.disk brakes stronger without money invested , a larger disk brake will be slightly stronger but a hydro disk brake will be many times more stronger.
Well worth the investment.
Dont have terrible calipers and brake levers. Thats what gives you the mechanical leverage needed. Swap to some shimano m375 (or bb5/7) calipers and tektro or sram bb5 or bb7 standard pull levels. Can usually get stuff like that at an lbs for cheap used. I got an avid bb5 caliper with good pads for 10$.
I dont like hydraulic brakes on low end bikes.
Genuinely- it’s very cheap, replace them with hydraulic. I got a $60 set of shimanos on amazon and the different is absolutely massive. Nothing you can do to the existing brakes will come even remotely close.
Trust me, this is worth it. It changes the entire feel of the bike. It’s a game changer, and it’s as cheap as upgrades get.
You have a fascinating combination of things going on with this bike that I both love and question simultaneously. If it were my bike I’d just spend the somewhat small amount of money on hydraulic brakes. Some of the parts you have on this cost way more than the minor but significant upgrade would be.
That fork alone is probably worth more than some basic hydraulic levers.
Stop messing with them and let them bed in.
I bought a gravel bike, it had hardly been ridden. Brakes were terrible. Messed with them for quite some time, nothing helped.
Turns out I needed to just let them bed in. It takes along time for brakes to truly bed in.
Bigger brake rotor…go from 6″ to 8″.
Go one size up on the discs, obviously you’ll need to change adapters too..
Yokozuna compressionless brake housing. It’s expensive but it’s the best housing.
Increase the rotor size
Paul Klampers is you want reliable mech brakes that are fully serviceable for life. MUSA
Please consider hybrid disc brakes if you wish to use your existing cables.
Please consider hybrid disc brakes.
As others have said, the Shimano MT200 are fantastic for the price. As with all disc brakes, they need bedding in properly.
Maintenance-wise, lots of people are put off by hydraulic brakes because of having to bleed them every now and then, but bleed kits are cheap, and it’s a very simple job. If you know what a spanner looks like, you’re already more than capable.
Loads of tutorials on YouTube as well.
That frame wants its lefty back
How old are your cables and housings? New ones are cheap, and high quality cables and housings are not much more expensive than cheap ones. Aside from what you’ve done, that’s about the only thing that will improve performance, if in fact your cables and housings are worn or low-quality.
The main power advantage for hydraulics is less of a loss between your fingers and the pads in hydraulics, because you have less cable stretch and housing compression. The more you can minimize those mechanical losses, the more of your finger power is translated to the pad surface.
The other problem is cheap mechanical brakes are much worse than good ones, and most bikes these days that have mechanical disc brakes have them to be as cheap as possible. I have some old Avid BB7s that are still awesome brakes with the only minor annoyance being that you have to manually adjust for pad wear every now and then (which does have the benefit of helping you to be aware of pad life). I had some cable-operated Tektros that were complete garbage. In my experience, the difference between cheap hydraulics and expensive hydraulics is less pronounced.
Unrelated, but at first I was thinking thats a cool Cannondale setup. Then I looked for longer, it’s impressive to fake every component ! 😂
I’ve used some people’s surly with avid BB7 brakes that feel amazing, couldn’t feel the difference between that and hydraulic.sur w you have to adjust the pads occasionally but that takes 10 seconds. I think pad material and good rotors make a huge difference as well as a proper bedding procedure
Bigger rotors and adapters is the easiest and cheapest, hydraulic brakes are much better though.
The ones we use recommend at the shop are the
Shimano mt 200 series, I have had them on my bike for 2 years with no problems. And I can lock up a tire with one finger.
The Shimano deore brakes are better slightly but do cost more.
Don’t buy sram hydraulics they are a pain to service.
Put a ‘Trek’ sticker on the brakes
The best mechanic disc brakes are the SRAM BB7 those things are super strong
Correct levers?
I’ve never found a mech brake that was insufficiently powerful, and this is on heavy touring bikes.
Usually it’s a pull mismatch or the cable’s coming loose, or the like…
It say “picture just for the attention” but I’m assuming this is your (OPs) bike and I’m assuming it’s a setup
That’s been on the bike for some time.
Things you can do to this bike are….
Change the brake levers. This should absolutely be done first. These levers appear to be older cantilever brake levers and plastic. Get some aluminum V-brake levers (the cable pull rates are different), also lengthen the hosing on the front brake to give it a slightly better curve/line.
Not all mechanical disk brake calipers are created equal so get some quality ones like SRAM or Paul’s (there are others out there) or even a hybrid caliper. At which point you might as well get a set of hydraulic brakes (assuming you can return the levers).
Metallic brake pads work a bit better than organic/resin make sure you bed the pads on the rotor properly or they will not stop as well as they could).
epic bike, looks like mine
https://preview.redd.it/adabru9q0y4f1.jpeg?width=4160&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=ee7a46bcf549b4bdf8effd3eb6a43144b1196d4b
Couple of things I can think of:
– these brake levers look like they might not be the right type for disc brakes. I don’t know the pull ratios off the top of my head, but discs do have a different ratio compared to cantilevers and v brakes.
– What kind of cables do you have? For disc brakes, I would recommend compression-less housing, this gets rid of the spongy feeling and makes the brakes a bit more powerful.
– What pad type do you use? Not all pads can go on all rotors and some pads need a lot of heat to work properly.
– larger rotors increase power. Edit: the maximum rotor size you can run is stated by the manufacturer, going larger can get you into a lot of trouble.
– Cheap calipers can be very underwhelming.