I wonder if they now will also release a disc brake SC.

Jeroen

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Owner at TRIPRO, The Netherlands

It is interesting to see how fast disc has hit the road, VS how slow it has been to tri bikes. Still no disc model of Trek SC, Canyon, Giant and only recently a sub 10k offering from Specialized.

Love my Salsa Warbird gravel bike with disc brakes but I'll be a rim brake rider on the road probably until the very end. I had a custom titanium bike built in 2014 which I absolutely love. It's rim brake and I've got no plans to convert it to disc. I probably should start stocking up on brake pads soon before they get hard to find.

On the other hand, there haven't been new *rim* offerings of those either. TT bikes have kind of stalled in the past 5-6 years. I think Cervelo is the only major big TT bike manufacturer that's done a recent top-to-bottom overhaul?

Of course the TT lifecycles make changes slower, but it's still been pretty fast. The bikes I can think that have been released in the last 4 have been disc-only: Cervelo, Argon, Diamondback, Ceepo, Pinarello, Cannondale. The upcoming Scott is disc-only. Updates to rim brake bikes have primarily been to add discs and do little else: Felt, BMC, QR, Parlee

Used bikes will stick around a long time. Brake pads won't be hard to find for maybe 10-15 years.

I still use a rim brake cycle cross bike for myself my wife and my daughter and have a slew of them kicking around the garage that I lend to the juniors if we ever have a season. The cantilever brakes continue to suck as much as they have for decades but I have such a pile of equipment including wheels brakes and such like that making the switch to different technology would be extremely expensive. The good news is finding used equipment for cheap is pretty easy.

The one thing that seems to be a common issue with disc brake roads bikes is when people ride in the rain they get some oil and such from the road blowing up onto the pads and then the bike squeals like crazy until the pads are replaced

The new SuperSix still has a rim brake option:
https://www.cannondale.com/...-105?sku=c11750m1048

Interesting comment, one of the random thoughts I had on a boring work zoom call was with all the major frame makers seemingly moving to disc, how much longer will Shimano, Sram et al continue to support or iterate rim brakes?

Granted there are millions of rim brake bikes on the road that will need new parts especially now with Covid having my LBS closing 2 days week to keep backlogged work orders to 2 weeks (assuming they can get parts) but will they soon license out that line and let it go?

Pretty much all rim brakes used one of two pad styles, and even then you could replace shoe and pads on the rim calipers.

On the other hand, every sodding disk brake seems to need different shaped pads and so I am highly fearful about the availability of some disk pads way before rim brake pads ceasing to be available.

+1

Look what happened when OEM on old cars dried up. New companies jumped in and started making replacement parts for them decades later.

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The more people I encounter the more I love my cats.

Likely far longer than that, although selection will thin quickly.

Availability for legacy support usually lasts a very long time. There are still a few new 27" rims being made, even though that size has been obsolete since about 1990, and even though nearly all bikes with 27" wheels can take 700c wheels without much fuss.

I wouldn't be surprised if:

1. SRAM doesn’t develop rim brakes for its top 2 groups starting now or with the next generation,
2. SRAM stops rim brake development first.
3. Shimano continues rim brakes for some time, at least 3 generations.
4. Campagnolo ends it’s rim brake development after Shimano.

We seem to be down to a 3 year development cycle right now. That could change, we don’t know.


One caveat for Campy is that they seem to have outsourced their rim brakes to Tektro for the current generation of 12s groups. I don’t know if they are able to keep developing rim brakes themselves. And actually, I would guess they developed the brakes in house but asked Tektro to manufacture them.


I bet the sort of people who ride Campy would gladly pay for good, Record or higher level rim brakes. The thing is, once you outsource the manufacturing, I don’t know how feasible it is for them to re-start it. Maybe they keep outsourcing the manufacturing and eventually the brake design? I don’t know.

I would be really interested to know what percentage of SRAM AXS road group sales are rim vs disc

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Matt

rim brakes are dead for anything but the lowest budget bikes and legacy designs. The popularity of carbon clincher wheels was the last straw. Not many Tri bikes have been significantly overhauled as its seen as a low return segment. I can't think of any situation I would want rim brakes over disc-- none. And I have a rim brake Speedconcept. I would like thru axles, disc brakes ect, but it seems to be low on Trek's to do list. Oh well. At least the new Domane SLR is fire.

If you even care what type of brakes your tri bike has then maybe you don’t get the idea behind a ‘race.’ Unless you live and race in the mountains of course.

The new emonda is 4 pounds heavier than it was a few years ago. What a joke. There's a reason Ineos sticks with rim brakes.

Maybe because the Pinarellos are a bit on the chunky side - possibly the heaviest frameset in the World Tour - and they've had enough trouble getting down to 6.8kg that they had to swap in some sketchy wheels on climbing stages. The disc brake Pinarello might be even harder to get down to weight.

But there are certainly disc brake bikes under 6.8kg.

Edit: And what do you mean the Emonda is "four lbs. heavier than 4 years ago?" Recent reviews of the new one range from 6.8kg for a 52cm to 6.92kg for a 58cm, with no manufacturer spec components - no special effort. I have a hard time believing these bikes were 4 pounds lighter in ~2016.

Edit edit: Ah, you must be comparing these new bikes to the special edition SLR 10, speced with tubular wheels. I guess that's fair that you'd be hard-pressed to get these new bikes down to ~11 lbs. It's true that if you're going full non-UCI weight weenie, the rim brake tubular wheel is still the way to go.

Think this is very far from the truth when wheel companies now are coming up with better aerodynamic wheel profiles that aren’t feasible with a rim brake track.

Some people also train on their race bikes, which makes brake useful.

Also time trials - as opposed to tris - often have technical courses that require braking into turns to be competitive.

I personally find the Trek SC brakes easier and faster to adjust than the Ultegra hydraulic discs on my Open UP. Wheel changes are also quicker and easier. It also seems like I’m always ending up with the slightest rub of the disc rotor and while I’m sure I’m only losing a fraction of a watt, it’s annoying.

The braking power of discs is great for descents, but on my tri bike I don’t need the extra power (vs rim Hed Jets with koolstop salmon pads) and wouldn’t want to sacrifice the ease of use and aero benefits for the sake of better braking. But everyone has their own scorecard of where things rank in personal importance

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Matt