It's really hard these days, unless you want to buy used. My old S5 finally died, and I was looking to maybe go rim brake again, and I basically couldn't unless I wanted to go with used frame and used wheels. (which I considered).

But I opted to just throw in the towel and go disc. Which I have to admit the braking *is* better. My deciding factor was I like tubeless wheels, and I just can't get the best in tubeless wheel tech in rim brake.

What do you mean about noisy brakes due to crap on the roads? Are you talking about water or grit getting on your rotors and causing them to squeak?

Yes, precisely. As soon as it rains, then it gets really noisy and it sure rains a lot in North Florida.
Also, I'm not mech savvy (not really interested in doing any of that myself, but maybe I should) and with disc brakes it can get a pain, whereas with calipers, you can just open them if need be.

Disc brakes take about an hour to learn and then the same issues you face with rim calipers can be fixed by 'opening them up' aka pulling pads quick, reseting pistons, checking pad wear, etc. Some people think they are finicky because they don't take the time to align the caliper, pads, and rotor correctly from the beginning.

Overall, they (hydro disc) function the same as a car. Pull on the brake lever and the brake fluid goes down to the caliper. The fluid that used to be in the master cylinder of the brake lever is now pushing against the pistons in the caliper. The pistons move out, pushing the brake pads closer to and eventually making contact with the rotor. Once you release the lever, the fluid flows back into the master cylinder and the pistons reset.

I've been on disc brakes for 2 years now and the only time other than bleeding brakes/replacing pads that I have to pull the pads is when I've had the bike on the Kickr and forgot to put in the spacer for the rear brake. A quick 2 minute reset of the pistons and you are set.

All fair points. Youtube recommendation to learn?

As far as noise goes the first step for a new bike or new pads is the bedding the pads.
If you don’t do that from the get go they can make noise.
Also riding on the road contaminants from the road can get on the rotors and contaminate the pads.
I would wipe the rotors off after a ride ( isopropyl alcohol)
For the pads ( if they are contaminated) you can put a few drops of alcohol on them and light them up, removed from the caliper of course.
Pad selection can come into play I use organic pads not metallic
Are you using SRAM or Shimano , I like the feel and pull of Shimano .

There are a few holdouts. The Giant TCR is still *available in a rim brake version, as are a few high end builds (and then there’s always the custom route)

*available meaning listed on the website, not necessarily available to purchase given the bike shortages these days.

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Yep

Brake Setup
Shimano: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jFq7TbtgrD8
SRAM: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6_T9lAufgUo
SRAM II: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r5bHJzJFo6U


Caliper Centering
Shimano: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uvLkjI79aEY
SRAM: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r5bHJzJFo6U


Bleed
Shimano: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_wHesMliu40
SRAM: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2mxzFomRYNg

Awesome. Thank you!

This needs to be made into a sticky on the main forum page!

When all else fails, most of the disc brake problems of the sort you describe that I have seen ultimately come down to the mounts needing to be faced. Especially with flat mount brakes, which really have almost zero capacity to adjust for out of plane mounting points. *Every* good bike shop/mechanic should have the tools and know-how to do this, and it should be a routine part of prepping a new bike prior to sale. Neither is true at this point in time, unfortunately.

Working on an article about this for the main page right now :)

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Tech writer/support on this here site. FIST school instructor and certified bike fitter. Formerly at Diamondback Bikes, LeMond Fitness, FSA, TiCycles, etc.
Coaching and bike fit - http://source-e.net/ Cyclocross blog - https://crosssports.net/ BJJ instruction - https://ballardbjj.com/

Well the bike shop that initially assembled it did a horrendous job. The bars weren’t tight enough and got loose as soon as I got less than perfect road. I didn’t crash but close. There were many other issues that I fixed somewhat. The brakes aren’t an issue I’ve been able to deal with.

Ugh.
It's probably a pretty safe assumption that they never checked the face of the brake mounts, let alone faced them.
Flat mount brakes really do need to mount to a close to perfectly aligned surface, and it's pretty damn common that frames are far from that when they arrive at the LBS. Easiest "tell" is when you simply can't get the pads to sit parallel to the rotor, or you think you have them aligned and then they go out of alignment when you tighten the mounting screws.

Poorly aligned pads mean they run much (relatively speaking) closer to the rotor so they are more prone to making noise and are more intolerant of imperfect rotors, and in operation they are more likely to squeal, as they don't make contact with the rotor correctly at initial bite.

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Tech writer/support on this here site. FIST school instructor and certified bike fitter. Formerly at Diamondback Bikes, LeMond Fitness, FSA, TiCycles, etc.
Coaching and bike fit - http://source-e.net/ Cyclocross blog - https://crosssports.net/ BJJ instruction - https://ballardbjj.com/

or you think you have them aligned and then they go out of alignment when you tighten the mounting screws.

Front brake on my last gravel bike did this and it was maddening. Wish you’d dropped this knowledge when I had it!

@francois - once you do it a couple times (and assuming they’re faced correctly) it literally takes a minute to make adjustments.

Definitely try to get used to discs.
I've run discs on mountain bikes for near 20 years. They really are the best thing since sliced bread.
As for raining lots in Florida... 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣. Try Northern England to understand rain. And riding on cold wet shitty roads.

Seriously - the reason I like discs is they involve so little maintenance compared to rim brakes. (As a comparison- how often do you bleed the hydraulic car brakes or clean the car discs etc. Never !)

All I do is once in a while take the pads out just to check the wear, and wipe off any crap around the edges. And as per another poster, if the wheel is out I'll wipe the disc with a bit of IPA on a clean rag.

Compared to getting grit embedded in rim pads that rodger the rims senseless, or alu flakes plucked from the rim, disc brakes are a godsend.

Also if the pads are running too close to the disc, many levers have 'free stroke' adjustment these days - ie how much pad clearance there is. It's small screw under the rubber hood. (In addition to the 'reach' adjustment for how far the lever is off the bars)

If you do need to lever the pistons back, be careful - they are a brittle plastic (phenolic - like bakalite).

Hmmm ... I didn’t say anything about cold (I did live in Montreal and Chicago though... so northern England ? Meh ;))

But just for comparison... Leeds gets 27in of rain a year. Gainesville, FL gets 50in. We get a LOT of rain. It just falls in much shorter periods of time here rather than your typical UK drizzle. And it turns a lot of roads to crap.

Point taken re disc brakes though :)

Working in a shop and seeing and hearing the issues with disc brakes from the mechanics, I opted to stay with rim brakes for my recent purchases. Sadly, between the lack of play, bent rotors and varying pitches and sizes of thru axles I figured in a couple of years hopefully they will be better and standardized. Funny when our mechanics took my bike out and jumped out of the saddle to sprint on my bike, they said they loved how they didn't hear that "tick, tick" of the brake rub they often hear with disc. From very high end to entry level, it is a very fine line to get them right, which I do not see in rim. While I seldom ride in rain and feel they're imperative in mountain bike, my wet ride the other day in Clermont Florida gave me braking that was fine.

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Kiwami Racing Team

I *really* need to get this article cranked out and up on the site!

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Tech writer/support on this here site. FIST school instructor and certified bike fitter. Formerly at Diamondback Bikes, LeMond Fitness, FSA, TiCycles, etc.
Coaching and bike fit - http://source-e.net/ Cyclocross blog - https://crosssports.net/ BJJ instruction - https://ballardbjj.com/

All your problems could be solved if you stopped riding in the rain and instead used that time to bing watch Netflix while embracing the gut.

That tip is for free. The next one will cost ya.

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Adrian in Vancouver