Thursday, July 16, 2009

Keep moving

The ZR Ti (I really need to find a nicer name for it) concept bike is moving along.

Wheel size, has been decided to be 26" instead of 650c for more practicality.

The brakes will be cantilever type.


Road caliper are made to be light and aerodynamic somehow, but the braking power is not as powerful as Cantilever (or V-brakes)
Cantilever have a kind of "out of date" image since the arrival of MTB as mass market which was fitted with V-brakes and their "more powerful braking"
V-brake are powerful to block the wheel which is pratical for technical off-road riding

Blocking the wheels on a road bike is not practical, we don't want to block the wheel, this is when we lose control of the bike and cannot stop it (this is for this reason ABS is now standard on most cars and some motorbikes)

Well, coming bike to my concept bike.
The braking system will be Cantilver type. It offers best braking modulation with road type brake lever.
Why not Disc brake?
Because disc brake are heavier than rim brakes, also with road bike style brake lever, it is possible to mount only mechanical disc brakes, which are much heavy than hydraulic ones and finally, disc brakes will block the wheels too heasily on steep down hill roads.

Cantilvers are also mounted touring bicycles carrying a lot of weight around the world. This confirm their toughness and reliability.

Finally, the weight/cost performance is also great with Cantilevers compared with road caliper style.

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