MikeDee wrote:The R550 is the best brake of all of them. They use ez to adjust pads. Stay away from the brakes that use unthreaded brake pad posts. They are a royal pain to adjust. Kool Stop also makes thinline pads, if you don't have enough clearance. Put the small spacer on the inside too. The Tektro's might be OK too, but in general, old fashioned wide profile brakes don't work as well.
BR550 is a low profile canti. The snag with all low profile cantis is the way the mechanical advantage alters with the straddle yoke position....
When the yoke is high, the MA is low, and when the yoke is low the MA is high......what we actually want is the other way round, when the yoke is low we could do with low MA, so the pads approach the rim quickly with little lever movement, and when the yoke is high(er) we want high MA so we stop.
(this also happens with mid-profile cantis, but the effect is nothing like as great)
The solution is to put the barrel adjuster in the straddle wire......
Tektro do this on one low-profile canti, that I'm aware of.
The maths is all here......
http://forum.cyclinguk.org/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=57410Its true that low profile cantis have a maximum MA that is higher than mid-profile cantis, but they are harder to live with. You can start the day with excellent brakes, but a couple of hour's roughstuff or a wet hilly day ride can dramatically reduce your braking.
As above, I don't think the R550 will set up as a mid profile, but i would avoid thin pads and I would deploy the thick spacer to set the arms as far apart as possible.
) so I'm considering putting these onto the frame as the studs are 78mm apart.
)