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Should I upsize my Brake Rotors
NB: Originally posted elsewhere on the Global Riders Network and appears via syndication.
I way around 125Kg and when I went for a ride at Mt York travelling downhill on Cox's trail, I had alot of trouble getting the bike to stop rolling.
I own a 2011 Trance X which came with Shimano Deore XT hydraulic w/7” front & 6” rear rotors.
Im thinking besides loosing wieght I need to upsize my rotors. Although I've been a regular weekend warrior for over 2 years now. Im still a newb when it comes to parts. Whats Brands, designs, costs, etc... should I be looking at?
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Tim,
First i would get metallic/ sintered brake pads, then get 203 180 combination in rotors, if you can, the metallic pads will really make a big difference, do you have 6 bolt rotors or shimano splined rotors?
If you dont get an improvement on these i would be surprised, because xt brakes really are good, but metallic pads work well when heated up, my advice is get the xtr metallic pads, i have used them for a few years now and they are great.
Also, you might be restricted by the size of the rotors on the rear of your bike!..the best combo would be 203 on front and 180 on the rear, with metallic pads.
I am now running avid elixir with 203 f and 185 r with metal pads and by the time i hit the bottom of cox's they were great, didn't have arm pump either, cause you dont need to work particularly hard to get good braking!
Thats why i think that xt brakes are awesome, you just need to upgrade the pads and rotors, it will be worth it!
First stop get some decent pads.
I was getting some fade down the grotto and Bee's Nest with my original pads, I have Elixir CR's FWIW. Chucked in new pads (cheapo Alligator sintered from T7) and they are now sweet.
Running 7" front 6" rear I had no dramas at all pulling up on Sun on any of the downs and I'm no lightweigh either. I absolutely belted down Cox's too and was braking late and hard.
Most shops will do pads and bleed for under a hundred, so its a good first step before forking out for rotors and adaptors.
Would go to sintered pads and a 180 rotor on the rear.If you want a 203 front adapter I have 1 here you can have.
Only problem I've found with the sintered metal pads is that they can get very noisy. Not sure what causes it, but once it starts, no amount of cleaning / filing etc seems to stop it. I may get around to changing out the front pads before I tackle the Back Yamma Bigfoot this weekend, but otherwise it's a good incentive to stay off the brakes as much as possible....
Ture sintered are noisy and it does show your riding buddies how much excessive braking one is doing or when one does something stupid like chickening out and braking in a turn.
They are however worth it in the wet as they last a lot longer as well.
7" for trail should be heaps ... I find 8" particularly on flat stuff are over kill and really unbalances your suspension when your dabbing.
If you have juicys ... I have k9 sintered and kevlar now
cheap too
What brakes are you running not all brake are created equal...
Resin pads grip better than the semi metallic or sintered but don't last as long.
The k9 pads Nerf has are suppose to be great.
Bigger rotors may help as does braking technique. It's all about getting heat out of the system. Brake fade kicks in when things get hot
Braking late and hard rather than dragging will give the heat a chance to get away. This also conserves the pads. I go through about 1 set a year and do a fair bit of wet riding and hard descending and never run semi metallic any more, Organic all the way for me.
Bigger rotors = more metal surface area this allows the heat to dissipate faster too
The new shimano ice tec stuff sounds interesting and you can retro fit the rotors to any brake which the claim gives you 70% of the benefit. Just got in a set to test. Apparently they performed outstandingly in the dyno tests but that was using the ice tec pad too which only fit their new calipers
a good read on brake testing can be found here (doesn't have the new shimano stuff though)
http://www.bikeradar.com/gear/article/how-we-tes...
New pads are the go as others have said, you allready have decent brakes, it's not recommended to go bigger than 7" on quick release forks, if yours are and you do go 8" you'll likely get huge amounts of flex in the front.
Sintered pads I have found to be great, resisting fade when really worked but are noisier for sure, I have 7" rotors front and back, have to be mindful about not locking the back up but once I got used to it I was happy to have the extra for long decents like cox's last Sunday.