Brake upgrades

[Mark G Montague]

Any one with some pearls of wisdom on how to upgrade the pitiful brakes on my 1950 mk4 square four thanks Mark

[JohnnyBeckett]

hi you could go for a full width hub or a twin leeding hud or a disc brake they have all been done to a Ariel it all depends how far you want to go

[simon.holyfield]

Any one with some pearls of wisdom on how to upgrade the pitiful brakes on my 1950 mk4 square four thanks Mark

What have you done so far? Mine are relined, several years ago by a local specialist (you may get a better lining from Villiers Services now) and were carefully set up to match the shoe radius to the drum, and then adjusted. They are not too bad as these brakes go but it is obviously very subjective and depends on what you are used to.

You say Mk4 - I assume that's a typo and you have the half width hubs?

[Mark G Montague]

Mk1 that's a typo, I have not riden it yet as work to do on it the shoes are adjusted, the the cable is too, when I pushed the bike back into the garage down a smal slop on the dri as you need a bit of run up too get over the lip of the garage I was quite alarmed by the lack of stopping power, I have only a 7" drum single leading shoe. The cable I think could be better as I pulled so hard stopping it the lever touches the grip, so cable is quite stretchy so that's first thing I am looking at. Dragonfly say the looking at doing twin leading shoe setup but it's in development. What have people doing in the past my mountain bike with v brakes is better at stopping.

[Mark G Montague]

Yeah half width hub would later mk2 hub be better

[Mark G Montague]

Well I like to stop did not want to change the look of the bike but stopping power is essential to the point all vehicles I own have uprated brakes as you need stopping power.

[Simon.Gardiner]

Mark

The single-sided brake isn't usually too bad. I rode with one for years and considered it to be pretty useful as these things go, although it'll never be in the same class as a set of big twin discs.
Also, the single-sided hub is often considered to be less trouble than the later (1956-on) full width hub unit.

As Johnny says there are a variety of upgrades than can be done relatively easily, from the 8" single-sided BSA hub, to the (almost 8") twin-leading shoe drum from /5 and /6 BMWs and (more tricky) single discs.

However, from what you've described it seems to me that your front brake needs its setup carefully checking out.

SG

[Julian Murphy]

You might also want to consider having the braking surface in contact with the shoes skimmed. If its out of round, that will not be helping.

I skimmed my FWH and took out <0.010" (10 thou), and is now much improved.

[paul.jameson]

You have a PM.