Canti problems, help neeed

[Bryan]

Hi,

I'm having problems getting the front canti's balanced. the forks only
have one hole to receive the spring, but I thought this wouldn't be a
problem. I tried putting the canti's on (old XT's) and all seemed to be
ok until I tightened the cable. The left hand brake is constantly being
pulled onto the rim, by the right hand spring. I've tried using the
adjuster screw to move the brake away, but it only makes a very slight
difference.

Has anyone got any idea how I can get the brakes centered, either by
making the spring in the left hand side stronger, the right hand side
weaker, or do I just need to get a pair of calipers (it's my
tourng/commuting bike, not a MTB).

Thanks

Bryan



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[David Nutter]

Bryan > said:

> Has anyone got any idea how I can get the brakes centered, either by
> making the spring in the left hand side stronger, the right hand side
> weaker, or do I just need to get a pair of calipers (it's my
> tourng/commuting bike, not a MTB).

*snip*

First of all it's worth checking that the wheel is centered in the fork:
I've spent ages before now trying to center recaltriant brakes only to find
that I'd carelessly put the wheel in slightly off-centre. IME it's more a
problem with nutted wheels than QRs but is relatively easy to fix all the
same.

If that doesn't work you can either scrounge fresh new springs from your LBS
which should each be at the same tension or physically bend the spring round
using the canti arms as a lever to either open it out (less tension) or wind
it tighter (more tension). It's easiest to do this on the bike with the
straddle wire disconnected so you can judge the spring tension by the rest
position of the cantilevers.

I don't know if this procedures is considered Good and Right but it seems to
work OK.

After you make any adjustments, pump the brakes hard a few times to make
sure the straddle wire is flowing freely through the yoke. Sometimes if the
wire is bunched up on one side of the yoke it can pull the brakes off-centre
temporarily.

HTH.

Regards,

-david

[Peter B]

"Bryan" > wrote in message
...

> I'm having problems getting the front canti's balanced.

Further to the other advice ther are two types of straddle wire:
The older one is like on old centre pull brakes and sits in a hanger
attached to the main cable. All that needs to happen is that the hanger is
in the centre of the straddle wire.
The later types employ a "half" straddle wire and a hanger through which
passes the main cable to the opposite canti.
The main cable should have a sleeve that makes it and the "half" straddle
wire equal lengths from the hanger, you could play about with the length of
this.

See: http://www.parktool.com/repair_help/howfix_cant.shtml and note pictue
in para 16.

And the excellent: http://www.sheldonbrown.com/cantilever-adjustment.html

Pete

[stephen pridgeon]

"Peter B" > wrote in message >...
> "Bryan" > wrote in message
> ...
>
> > I'm having problems getting the front canti's balanced.
>

Bryan,
I've had this problem on my rear canti for the past two years. I'm
going to fix it by buying those mini-Vs reviewed in C+ this month.
Life is just too short to prat around with brakes.