Roller brake vs long drop dual caliper

[Brucey]

IME erratic braking with roller brakes means that there isn't enough grease in the brake and/or that there is something strange (like intermittent water ingress) going on in the cables.

cheers

[le.voyageur]

Other people's experiences, with these brakes, seem to contrast with my own, which was 4 years of all weather commuting and never a problem. No doubt they dont stop like the modern hydro drop bar brakes, but the performance was still good. I never once had any doubts about using them to commute into central london. I do remember that performance tailed off and I had to get grease.

[MartinC]

I once had a bike with a rear roller brakes. I used it mainly for city commuting and short runs. The roller brake was perfectly adequate and predictable (more so in the wet than a rim brake). I did maintain it and it got the occasional squirt of grease. I once took it on holiday and riding down a long hill with the kids in Tipperary I burnt all the grease out of it and it immediately became noisy and totally unpredictable. But it is a long way to Tipperary...................

[breakwellmz]

They`ve gone!
Is there a way of removing what seems to be a heavy lump (the modulator assembly i assume)from within the front hub to use it as a regular wheel, or is it a pressed in never to be removed item.

[Abradable Chin]

Brucey is the only man to have seen inside the inner sanctum of the Nexave hub. I think he said it was like a stack of belleville washers, to act as a clutch.
I would use the hub as-is. If you've moved to rim brakes, the clutch will be being bypassed anyway, and you'll just be carrying a tiny bit of extra weight around.

For those who continue to use roller brakes, the washers could be glued together to make slippage less likely, but I suspect most people won't be able to undo the ring to get to them, although I am reasonably certain the clutch almost never activates, even during hard braking, and it is falsely maligned as the cause of the lazy braking of roller brakes. I have occasionally experienced stupendous braking from my front roller brake, and I've thought "what just happened there?" and "I wish it would do that all the time" rather than deliver the riding on a thin layer of sand version of slowing.

[Brucey]

I've seen inside a generator hub with a roller brake mount and it was astonishing how much extra metal was required to add this functionality. I've not seen inside a Nexave front hub (not meant to come apart BTW) but I believe it is pretty much like a stack of Belleville washers as described above. But not as much extra weight; hardly a big issue on a typical bike fitted with roller brakes anyway.

I'd use the hub as is or use a different/rebuilt wheel.

cheers

[breakwellmz]

Thank you chaps.
"Not meant to come apart BTW"-now that sounds like a challenge!
I wonder how it does assemble/dissemble? It was just an extension of having to strip out the bearings and fit a different axle really.
As well as washers i assume a great big spring as well.

[Brucey]

Belleville washers are springs; in the USA they are known as 'disc springs'.

cheers