Brake Upgrade from Chorus

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Leviathan
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by Leviathan

Hello
Ive got Chorus on my new bike and the combination with new carbon clinchers isnt super sure for my 90 plus kgs coming down hills.
The Ultegra I had on my last bike seemed to me to have better raw stopping power (not SO bothered about modulation..)
So I was thinking about an upgrade. Dont wanna go the "EE" route, so I want to know if the Super Record Brakes are better, or just lighter, or if the Dura Ace is a better option. Dont mind the difference in finish of DA versus chorus, but nor sure if the supposed difference in cable pull ratios makes any difference?
thanks.

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bremerradkurier
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by bremerradkurier

I found my skeleton calipers felt a lot stronger after switching to Yokozuna's compressionless housing.

Daniel1975
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by Daniel1975

Where do you buy them for Campy?

alcatraz
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by alcatraz

Upgrade your housing. Make sure calipers have no arm play. Check if you are using the best pads for your wheelset.

What wheels do you have?

Going down hills it's ok to brake hard but don't drag your brakes.

Experiment with different carbon pads. Descend in the drops so you have more leverage on the levers.

/a

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tommasini
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by tommasini

SR vs Chorus will be no different in stopping power.

Do you have dual pivot front and rear now? or single pivot on the rear?

With carbon rims what pads are you using......as that may very likely be the issue instead.......if campy carbon rims (and for most others too) it's highly advisable to use their fantastic red pads.

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Leviathan
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by Leviathan

Thanks for the ideas so far..

I think the housing is a good idea, although the last time I had Yokozumas I pretty much had to cut them with a machete as nothing else seemed to cut through the steel.

The wheels are a German online Bike shops, Bike-components.de, "Fletchwerk", but they are basically the same woven rims as Schmolkes. Nice wheels, plenty rigid enough but the braking strip has no surface treatment whatsoever. Im running swisstop black prince which are their recommended pads.

My last wheels were Fulcrum racing quattro carbons which, with the Campagnolo red pads and Ultegra brakes, had best in class stopping, so its just really in comparison to them. Not an issue of dragging brakes, trust me, as I live at the bottom of a Cat 2 hill and ride often with ride guides here who are much fitter than me so I have to use the descents to catch up!

I really just wanted to know if either Campag SR or Dura Ace calipers would be much better, looks like not.

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Miller
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by Miller

Jagwire also do a good compressionless cable, they market a road bike brake cable kit called 'Road Pro'. Don't make the mistake of thinking this will do a full length cable run for discs but it will be fine for caliper brakes.

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MayhemSWE
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by MayhemSWE

Miller wrote:
Thu Jan 25, 2018 8:44 pm
Jagwire also do a good compressionless cable, they market a road bike brake cable kit called 'Road Pro'. Don't make the mistake of thinking this will do a full length cable run for discs but it will be fine for caliper brakes.
There used to be a "Road Pro XL" kit specifically with longer brake housing/cables but it seems to no longer be available… :?

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Calnago
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by Calnago

I would stick with your Chorus calipers. As Tommasini noted, you won't get much more from going to Super Record except a "bit" smoother action and some ti bolts. I really do prefer dual pivots both front and rear. The single pivot rear is lighter, but the whole "better modulation" thing was marketing BS from campy when in reality they were trying to best Shimano in the weight department. Truth is, what makes for good modulation is a combination of a few things... 1) how smoothly your levers operate and pull the cables (can't go wrong with SR here for sure), 2) how smooth and friction free your brake housing is which includes ensuring perfectly square and "open" ends, ferrules where appropriate, Teflon liner bits where necessary to get around edges such as internal carbon frame entry/exit points; and 3) how true your rims are, as rims that are out of true will create high spots and pulsating/grabbing actions as the high spots hit your brake pads while you're trying to brake, and if that happens you have no hope of smooth modulation no matter how great your rim brakes are or how perfectly they are set up. I'd stick with Campy cables, they're good and flexible (not to be confused with compressible). I've experimented with Yokozuma and hated them. Super stiff and awkard to work with and I seem to remember they were thicker so you couldn't even use a nice metal ferrule with them. As mentioned, pads are critically important, but unless the braking is particularly bad, I would first stick with the recommended pads for your rims. The Campy red pads are fantastic on campy carbon rims, and I would probably have put them on a bike that was spec'd with Lightweights that I was building, except that would have voided the warranty. So I got the Lightweight specific pads and they were amazing (amazingly expensive as well) on the Lightweights. Didn't compare them to using the Campy red pads on the Lightweights as there was no point, the braking on the Lightweights with their specific pads was that good.

One important distinction between the Chorus calipers and Recrod/SR calipers. The Chorus calipers give a bit more tire clearance all else being equal. Found this out as I was building up the Koppenberg and using 27mm Vlanderens. The SR calipers wouldn't cut it, so I opted for the Chorus calipers, knowing there was just a bit more clearnace and voila... that was all I needed to make things right. It's not tons more, like maybe 1.5mm, but sometimes that's all you need to go from it's "ok", to it's "perfect". Should add that it also depends on your frame's design as well when it comes to clearance issues.

Also, don't use the Shimano 9100 calipers with Campagnolo levers. I was trying to use them on my Koppenberg (since the clearance with the 9100 calipers blows the Campy skeletons out of the water) before I had to resort to the Chorus calipers. I use the 105 calipers (kinda the same basic design as the 9100s) on my rain bike with Campy levers with no issues, but I found the difference was that on the rain bike I have standard rims (~20mm at the brake track). The pull "rate" between the Campy and Shimano levers is progressive, but in different ways. One pulls more cable faster at the beginning of the pull, while the other pulls more faster at the end of the pull. This didn't seem to matter with the narrow rims. But when I tried the Campy lever/ 9100 caliper combo with the newer Campy Boras and 24.2mm rim width, I just couldn't dial them in to an acceptable level of performance. Which was a shame, becasue the 9100 standard mount rim brakes are really fantastic. So, on anything but a "standard" width rim (maybe I should call that "old standard") I'd use Shimano calipers with Shimano levers and Campy calipers with Campy levers.

I'm not a fan of Direct Mount brakes at all as I don't see any advantages over Standard Mounts. Most are uglier and more complicated than their standard mount equivalents, with the exception of Shimano, where both their DM and Std versions seem to look and function identically, and even have the same maximum tire clearance. And the Bontrager speedstops on Treks look absolutely hideous to me, but they have a feature that I don't know if other direct mounts have. There's an adjustable cam type of mechanism apparently then will allow you to optimize the progressive nature of the pull to match whichever levers you are using. That would have solved my compatibility issue between Shimano and Campy mix/match I was trying to make work above. And since Bontrager speedstops have no real affiliation to a complete group set, that's a good adjustment to have.
Last edited by Calnago on Thu Jan 25, 2018 10:15 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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bm0p700f
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by bm0p700f

there is no upgrade from chorus. only lighter.

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Leviathan
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by Leviathan

thanks chaps, all helpful info. Im not 100% happy with the cable end where it meets the calpier so think ill start there before trying other cable outers..

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