One again, today I was glad I had the DA brakes. This tiime I was descending the other side of the same mountain, just a few km away from the deer incident, and I got the closest I've ever been to a bear (a cub, actually) who had a somewhat unpredictable walk/trot across the road - fortunately it decided to get moving just in time - perhaps less than 20 cm separated us. The good news is that it was smaller than the deer, the bad news had I hit it would have been that it was still a lot bigger than the LW dog, and I suppose the mother bear was just out of sight in the brush and would have finished me off if I hit her cub and crashed.

Replacing steel bolts with ti on my stem was not my best move. The good news was I broke one after I finished a fast decent resulting in my bars slipping forward. I'm a big guy and the grams saved were small. Me bad.

Another bad buy for me was some 2006 Zipp 303's with 24 spokes r and 20 f. Lasted 3000 miles. I hate walking home in road shoes. My new Edge rims are sooooo much better thank you

As to brakes, M5's are light and powerfull. Plenty of stopping power even on carbon rims and my large size, its the only WW brake I would feel safe recomending for those over 90 kilo

Had some handling issues with some wimpy forks. Some of the WW stuff I got in the late 80's and 90's were breaking all the time.

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WW Velocipedist Gargantuan

I've always suffered from a ww mental-block when it comes to brakes. I just don't want to lose weight there at any expense to performance. Luckily Record Skeletons are light, have plenty power and if you get the pad/rim combo spot on and the setup right, you will stop very, very well.
This is not the case for uber-light brakes - as you can easily work out by the amount of ZG's on ebay etc. And who can afford to 'try' AX brakes only to find they are crap too. Not saying they are mind, but....

Incidentally, for all my other bikes I use dual-pivot Records from before 2004 or 2003 or whatever. They are slightly more dynamic on the rear.

Its like someone said earlier about performance car upgrading. You often see turbo-nutter-madness cars round here with limp drum brakes on the rear. Hedge-magnets. At worst, death-machines.

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www.wheelsmith.co.uk

hedge magnet
genius!

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Used to race....got too wrinkly and old Updated: Racing again! Thought this was unlikely! Eventually, I may even have a decent race!

Her fault. Poor judgment on her part.

@HammerTime2: I'm glad to hear both you and cub are safe, and you live to enjoy to ride another day.

Compare a bike to a Ferrari with Dura-Ace/Record/Red as silicon-ceramic disc brakes or KCNC as drum brakes. Which will stop faster?

So right you are, losing grams should come with a gain in performance, both for bike and rider! Though, far too often than not, lighter is stupid.

It was her fault indeed, for crossing while misjudging my speed. Had I not put KCNC brakes on the bike I could've stopped in time, I'm used to always having full control over my bike. A faster bike also decelerates faster.

Nevertheless, I went to visit this lady last week at her shop (she's an artist who works with glass) and we had a good chat with a delicious cup of tea and she told me she was happy to have me "bumped" into her, be it under somewhat less than ideal circumstances. She makes such nice stuff, I may even consider buying one of her creations...

Sorry to hear that you had an accident.

But, I am a little surprised also. I've been using a set of those "crappy single-pivot brakes" for about 6 years, up until about a month ago. They definitely took more force at the levers than the Ultegra's I'm running now, but in a emergency situations I have still always been able to stop fast enough that I would've endoed if I didn't shift my weight way back.

I hope the KCNC brakes are better than the old single-pivot brakes....cuz I just bought a set of the KCNC.

Rob

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"Speed kills...oh well, we've all gotta go sometime!"

i'd rather weight weenie my body first then the bike! Its cheaper!

on the real though. I cut weight off by frameset choice and seat. the parts of the bike i never thought about WW'ing were my brakes, handlebar/stem and crankset. Even thought i know any part can fail i just feel more secure with DA crankset/brakes and thomson stem/seatpost and Deda Newton handlebars. thats my .02...

Carlos

man--you guys might think of another place to talk about non--WW items

but again--as insane as i am (using AX calipers and unraveled 1/2 of the cable strands for lighter weight)-i might belong in a mental institute

I have actually been thinking of drilling out the Orions calipers as there is a lot you can do here!

*****Wow, drilling out Orions and unravelling cables! THAT'S dedication to the cause!!!!

Please tell me you don't weight 100kg and like descending alpine passes with brakes like that!


Billy

LOL--no i am at 165 pounds and no alpine passes!!!!!

And this year's Darwin award goes to ...

Maybe you can combine efforts with HanSolo http://weightweenies.starbike.com/forum ... hp?t=35880 by putting your brakes/cable on his bike with (to be?) drilled out seat (and top?) tube.

+1 Sounds like a real genius!

Don't drill those ax brakes..CF relies on fibre length for strength and drilling will not be as "cost free" as carefully drilling Aluminium..you will get failures, I think. Kinda an expensive way to lose 2 gram....and then there are the hospital bills to consider!

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Used to race....got too wrinkly and old Updated: Racing again! Thought this was unlikely! Eventually, I may even have a decent race!

Why dont u start drilling where it counts most?
Maybe start here: