On a side note, I was in Wal-Mart and they had bikes with disc brakes.

Funny you mention the cheap Tektros. I have some mechanical discs on my single speed townie bike that I believe are cheap Tektros... and they never make noise.

Also - the backing on the Campy pads. I think there's something to this. Generally speaking, automobile disc brakes are very good and don't make noise. The problem with bikes is that weight is at such a premium, that you don't find any of the anti-squeal parts like pad shims (behind the backing plates), or springs to hold things steady. I also have a feeling that just by nature of everything being so light, it's more prone to vibration and noise. The only automobile I've had trouble with brake noise was an early 2000's Ford Ranger pickup... and it's because the OEM pads had backing shims that wouldn't stay in place, and one even cracked. Replaced them with new OEM pads - same problem. Replaced them again with nice aftermarket pads... solved. With bicycle disc brakes, you have the pad backing directly contacting the piston (with no shim at all)... methinks this is the root of a lot of issues.

I am always on the look out for better brakes for my gravel bike. According to your research, what are the best mechanicals you can get? Thanks.

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TRP Spyre for their Dual Piston Design (which moves both pads evenly as opposed a the single piston that moves one pad, pushing the rotor into the other pad).

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The springs on autos are to stop them rattling when not braking, nothing to do with squealing.
Pistons directly on the back of the pads is a bonus for preventing sqeeling/ noise/ motion.
Auto brake systems have continuous contact between pad and rotor even when not braking.
Auto systems can be optimised for stiffness and damping, not weight.

The problems on bikes arise from flimsy bendable discs that can oscillate and pad compounds that grab and release.
Less than desired stiffness from caliper mounts doesn't help either.
Cast iron discs and heavy rubber dust seals might not go down too well with the bike riding crowd.

Shimano seem to have very few problems with disc brakes, sort of tells you what the real problems are.

The issue I've heard about quite a bit with Spyres is that the adjustment bolts for the pads aren't indexed (BB7s are), and they rely on a loctite to hold the adjustment. TRP has a Youtube video about it. Basically you have to keep re-loctiting it. I don't have personal experience with it.

I know the pad-spreader springs you're talking about (my Honda had them), but my Subaru has these little clip spring dealies (technical term) that contact the backing plate shims. They look like they're there to keep a constant contact to reduce/eliminate squeal. But I could be wrong.

As far as the backing plate shims go, again I couldn't explain it from a physics / engineering standpoint, but from everything I've read, they're there specifically to eliminate noise and squeal. And in my personal experience with my Ford, it's the only car I've had noise problems with, and it was directly related to the shims not staying in place and cracking.

Your point on rotor thickness and caliper mounts - I think this is a biggie. Also, there's one that a lot of people don't know about which is fork / head tube stiffness. If this is too flimsy, you get "brake tuck" where the fork essentially wants to fold underneath the bike as you brake. It can cause a catch-and-release cycle as the fork bends (and then bends back to its original shape) very quickly that causes shudder and squeal. I had this on a CX bike with a cheap carbon fork... that went away when I put a heavy steel fork on. Nothing else about the bike or brake system changed.

I'm giving Shimano another shot, and just bought some CX77s. I had one set in the past that worked really well, but the pad spreader spring would "walk" to one side, causing it to contact the rotor. It was strange, and everything else was in perfect alignment. Maybe I just got a rare "bad one" from Shimano.

I guess us "gifted" people have to make up for you people with 10 thumbs.....

If I was touring with a loaded bike I'd rather have disc brakes that are going to work more consistently regardless of the road or weather conditions.
I've had four or five sets of hydraulic disc brakes over the last twenty years or so (25 if you count the Rock Shox/AMP D1 hydraulic-over-cable calipers) and I've NEVER had a leaky hydro line. Hope, Shimano, and the aforementioned RS/Amp brakes. Aside from the AMP rotors, which were pretty skimpy in retrospect, I've never had to true a disc either, even with regularly packing the bike into the back of my car (front wheel off). Multiple wheelsets drop into a frame and fork without needing to realign the calipers. If that is not the case then the hub is not made to spec.

Disc brakes means that if you do mildly bend a wheel, your braking is not automatically compromised. So the need for a replacement wheel would be reduced if anything.
Pads? For touring it is still commonplace to take along a couple of extra spokes "just in case" - it is basically zero extra burden to pack a set of replacement caliper pads. Hell if it's that big a deal, pack an extra pair of discs. Until you need them for the bike you can use them as fancy beer coasters.

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Less is more.

Reading through this thread, I think that I'll be sticking to rim brakes for the foreseeable future for my road dedicated bike.

The only time that I would want disc brakes would be if I were to go riding in Europe in the Alps, or the Pyrenees and have to deal with super long technical descents. In my local riding - I never have that, and even when riding in the few places I've been to in North America with bigger mountains, the descents encountered are not that technical in nature.

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Steve Fleck @stevefleck | Blog

See, I read this and wonder wft everyone is doing to have so many "issues"

Fleck and TC on their "rim brake" bikes ;)...

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Chris
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“Life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside in a cloud of smoke, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming "Wow! What a Ride!”
― Hunter S. Thompson,

LOL!

Thanks, Chris! :-)

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Steve Fleck @stevefleck | Blog

Just replying to myself after spending about 90 minutes setting up disc brakes on ONE bike today (note this was a ground-up setup... starting from in-package aftermarket brake parts, cables/housings, bare frame - to a completely finished / adjusted brake setup). I've heard of a few people that have simply had "no" trouble with discs, and it astounds me. Are they just lucky? Or can they not hear the 'ting ting ting' of a rotor rubbing? Am I cursed, or just overly nit-picky?

It was a set of Shimano CX77 mechanicals with all OEM hardware and Shimano rotors. Once they're finally dialed, they work fine. But the rotors must be PERFECTLY straight (which they're not from the factory) due to the super tight pad clearance. It's a flat mount frame, but the industry has half committed to that new standard, and there are very few flat mount mechanical discs (TRP Spyre is the only one I know of). I got Shimano flat-to-post adapters, which work, but add a bunch of weight back. And, this whole system relies on all of the parts to be flat and paint-free... and experience tells me that this is almost never the case. The Avid CPS bolt system fixes this well, but I imagine it's patented, which is why you don't see it elsewhere. My calipers ended up fairly straight, but not completely straight relative to the rotor - which is why I had to true the rotors to be as perfect as the eye can see.

Not to mention that either my frame, or one of the adapter bolts was not playing nice (bad threading), and I had to find a replacement high quality steel bolt from my parts bin to replace it. The front brake seems to be doing some of what I had in the past, which was the pad spreading spring walks left or right some times, causing the spring to hit the rotor ("ting, ting, ting!"). This one seems to be staying centered reasonably well if I place it with my fingers right in the middle, and hope it doesn't move.

So - it all works. It's quiet (provided that front spring stays put). It feels fine. Was it worth 10 times the setup time of standard rim brakes? Yeesh - I don't think so. And if I was traveling with this bike or swapping wheels, I cringe to think of doing this all over again. I have what looks like 0.5mm of "freedom" on either side of the rotor.

Put on a pair of gloves and true the rotor where it’s “tinging”. Just a light bending (push/pull) on the rotor. Simple fix..

Have diac brakes on both road and tri bike, no issues at all with changing flats or putting it on the direct mount indoor trainer.

As long as you dont push the brakes without the rotor between the calipers you will be fine, if you dont trust yourself or dont want to take risks, just run around with one brake spacer and you will be fine.

I really don't know if Disc brakes are a pain or not. But....

I just did 55 miles this morning on the Premier Tactical Triathlon Bike (center pull rim brakes) in misty conditions, heavy rain and clear skies. We were on rollers, flats and relatively fast switch back down hills (36 mph) in the wet ... no issues.

Then tonight I was watching the Tour and the announcer was saying that the Pro athletes were doing 40 mph on all sorts of road conditions (Road Bikes) and all the bikes were on (old technology) rim brakes. He actually said old technology :-)

Now, I don't know how many triathlon athletes are doing 25 - 40 mph that can't stop in a triathlon ... most of my friends are around 20 mph - I do know that I could stop averaging 21.5 in all road conditions for 55 miles in the wet.

I am told that 99 percent of all the current bikes on the road are rim brake bikes. I guess the hype is about the other 1% of bikes that are sold or hoping to be sold.

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Dan Kennison

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So you’re not planning on offering a disc brake bike anytime soon? Also, what hype?