upgrading brakes old dawes horizon

[trickydisco]

Hi,

I recently bought an old dawes horizon that i'm told is around 20 years old (and it's seen around 10 miles from new!)


Now the brakes are pretty rubbish as you can imagine and i want to upgrade. At first i thought i could just change the brake blocks to some modern ones (kool stop) but after doing a bit of research i'm told the i would have a problem as the wheel rims are steel. Is this right?

As i want to keep it retro (i know, i know.,. it's not as retro as some of the bikes on here) I might be looking at buying a set of pauls racer brakes (providing they will be a big improvement)

So what do you think? should i look at

* Upgrading the brake blocks
* upgrading blocks and the whole unit
* upgrade to some alu wheels?

 

[trickydisco]

 

[TheGreenRabbit]

Hi,


* upgrade to some alu wheels?

I would start here, steel rims and water not a good mix

 

[legrandefromage]

They look like ally rims - fit 'dual pivot' brakes for the best effect - you wont even need to change your levers

 

[trickydisco]

fit 'dual pivot' brakes for the best effect

Any old style one's you recommend?

Just realised i can't fit the pauls racer brakes as they're center pull

http://www.paulcomp.com/racer.html

 

[RussellandKirk]

Campag Monoplanar

 

[trickydisco]

Hmm.. after reading this i think i'll go with dual pivot


http://mikesimagination.wordpress.com/2 ... -thoughts/

They function super smooth and provide the most reliable brake assistance money can get you.” Hmm, I agree with the first part, here’s a pic, and they are rather lovely if you like vintage stuff, rare in this condition too:

I did smile though at the second part. I have memories from early racing days of descending with a set of these brakes… like all single-pivots of the era, relative to modern dual pivot designs, they had the stiffness of a banana skin resulting in many white knuckle experiences when I overcooked things on technical descents

 

[RussellandKirk]

Campag Monoplanar

Article rather supports my previous statement

 

[pistol13]

Hey,
Road brakes were designed to brush of speed so as to keep up momentum.
Single pivots are excellent brakes and shimano 105 slr are considered the pinacle of these. Buy some, for not much cash.

 

[RussellandKirk]

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Retro-Campagnolo- ... otohosting