If you are running 105 brakes and find them spongy..read on
Discussion
I have a 2010 Felt F75 as a winter/training bike running Shimano 105 groupo and have never found the brakes to be particularly good. I have tried just about everything to get the performance more confidence inspiring (have Campy Athena and SRAM Force on my other bikes and both are excellent by comparison).
I have changed the brake blocks for Swiss-stop which helped a bit, changed the Felt OEM cables for Shimano cables, spent hours fettling with the setup, but always had to grab huge handfuls of lever to control speed on hard descents and had the levers against the bars on emergency stops.
Yesterday I changed both gear and brake cables to Jagwire Road Racer Pro's and feck me - night and day! The replacement cables are teflon coated and coupled with compressionless external kevlar coated housing - no idea if this is just marketing guff or actually contributes to the performance but if you are suffering from iffy braking with 105's I cannot recommend this kit enough as a replacement, the braking performance really is 300% better than it was - to the point where I almost sent myself over the bars the first time I went to stop!
I have changed the brake blocks for Swiss-stop which helped a bit, changed the Felt OEM cables for Shimano cables, spent hours fettling with the setup, but always had to grab huge handfuls of lever to control speed on hard descents and had the levers against the bars on emergency stops.
Yesterday I changed both gear and brake cables to Jagwire Road Racer Pro's and feck me - night and day! The replacement cables are teflon coated and coupled with compressionless external kevlar coated housing - no idea if this is just marketing guff or actually contributes to the performance but if you are suffering from iffy braking with 105's I cannot recommend this kit enough as a replacement, the braking performance really is 300% better than it was - to the point where I almost sent myself over the bars the first time I went to stop!
te.Equally, watch for cable pull ratios. 5700 (105) and 6700 (ultegra) pull more cable than the previous x600 series. Put new levers with old brakes, stopping is awful. Put old levers with new brakes, you may have issues adjusting, or may go over the bars.. mixing shimano brakes with campy levers.. I haven't a clue...
Athena braking is fantastic, as is Force but the 105 setup has always been disappointing (as has the indexing).
Aside from the cranks which are Ultegra the setup is all 5600 105 - so should all work together. I had changed the original cables for Shimano about 18 months ago because A; it was getting on and I didn't trust it, and B; the braking was just shi7 - my hope was that ditching the Felt cables for Shimano would improve things but nah - still crap.
I serviced the winter bike yesterday (literally took the thing apart and cleaned/greased/lubed every moving part - does not look the 10,000 miles it has under it's wheels), and decided to change the cables at the same time as they had 18 months of very caustic and grubby miles on it.
I had read some good reviews on the Jagwire Pro set so decided to give them a go (cheaper than Shimano and could not be any worse) - the results are fantastic, mix of swiss-stop and Jagwire seem to have done the trick! I bought my set from the Wooly Hat Shop for £21 - cheap as chips......
Aside from the cranks which are Ultegra the setup is all 5600 105 - so should all work together. I had changed the original cables for Shimano about 18 months ago because A; it was getting on and I didn't trust it, and B; the braking was just shi7 - my hope was that ditching the Felt cables for Shimano would improve things but nah - still crap.
I serviced the winter bike yesterday (literally took the thing apart and cleaned/greased/lubed every moving part - does not look the 10,000 miles it has under it's wheels), and decided to change the cables at the same time as they had 18 months of very caustic and grubby miles on it.
I had read some good reviews on the Jagwire Pro set so decided to give them a go (cheaper than Shimano and could not be any worse) - the results are fantastic, mix of swiss-stop and Jagwire seem to have done the trick! I bought my set from the Wooly Hat Shop for £21 - cheap as chips......
Can't fault my 105 brakes with SwissStop pads. They don't require much force at all and the levers only pull back an inch or so when pads are set close to the rims. Plenty powerful enough for very steep descents.
Maybe this was an issue with older 105 models? Bought mine about a year ago.
Maybe this was an issue with older 105 models? Bought mine about a year ago.
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