Thoughts on braking

I have a mountain bike, and I go riding in the australian bush a lot.
A lot of the times, there are tracks, with extremely steep descents.
The sort of thing which I can barely pull my bike up by hand when I
need to go back. They usually have gravel/small rocks on them, and I
find its often easies to just lock my wheels and slide down skidding,
often for a vertical distacnce of 50 meters or so at a time. YOu need
to have good balance though.


On Thu, 07 Aug 2003 21:36:05 -0400, Rick Onanian
wrote:

On Fri, 8 Aug 2003 00:08:29 +0000 (UTC), asqui
wrote:
As for the "death trap" comment: A front brake is a death trap because it
can be misused and cause an accident, but a rear brake is not a deathtrap
when the only way for you to stop with it from speed involves sliding all
over the place and possibly under the wheels of another vehicle?

Don't forget the whole reason you're panic-braking in the
first place: to avoid a hazard in front of you. The rear
brake [used alone for panic-stopping] is a deathtrap because
it won't accomplish anything.

When I was a little kid getting my fun out of skidding as
long as I possibly could, I found that with a little more
speed I layed a LOT longer track. I can't imagine what
would happen with the speeds I reach now and the tiny
contact patch on my 700x23c @ 125 psi tires...I bet I
could maintain my speed skidding down a moderate hill.

Dani

"Arpit" wrote in message
I have a mountain bike, and I go riding in the australian bush a lot.
A lot of the times, there are tracks, with extremely steep descents.
The sort of thing which I can barely pull my bike up by hand when I
need to go back. They usually have gravel/small rocks on them, and I
find its often easies to just lock my wheels and slide down skidding,
often for a vertical distacnce of 50 meters or so at a time. YOu need
to have good balance though.

Exactly the kind of behavior which damages trails. Perhaps it is less of an
issue because of the low rainfall in the outback, but skidding down trails
in wetter areas messes up the drainage and results in water using the trail
as a conduit - which results in greater erosion. Learn to decend without
skidding. A rolling wheel provides greater control than a skidding wheel.
Brake to the point just before lockup. See how easy it is to decend when you
aren't sliding.

-Buck

Beleive me, this doesnt cause any erosion, some of the rocks are
gravel, but some are as large as your head Also, by locking the
wheels, and deflating the wheels to about 10psi, I get much better
traction than if i roll. Rolling I've had my brake pads melt.

Note these arent bike tracks, they are abandoned walking tracks. Only
the rangers drive through them on VERY chunky 4wds.

On Sun, 10 Aug 2003 19:53:24 GMT, "Buck" j u n k m a i l @ g a l a x
y c o r p . c o m wrote:

"Arpit" wrote in message
I have a mountain bike, and I go riding in the australian bush a lot.
A lot of the times, there are tracks, with extremely steep descents.
The sort of thing which I can barely pull my bike up by hand when I
need to go back. They usually have gravel/small rocks on them, and I
find its often easies to just lock my wheels and slide down skidding,
often for a vertical distacnce of 50 meters or so at a time. YOu need
to have good balance though.

Exactly the kind of behavior which damages trails. Perhaps it is less of an
issue because of the low rainfall in the outback, but skidding down trails
in wetter areas messes up the drainage and results in water using the trail
as a conduit - which results in greater erosion. Learn to decend without
skidding. A rolling wheel provides greater control than a skidding wheel.
Brake to the point just before lockup. See how easy it is to decend when you
aren't sliding.

-Buck

On Mon, 11 Aug 2003 01:04:42 GMT,
wrote:

Armpit writes:

I have a mountain bike, and I go riding in the Australian bush a
lot. A lot of the times, there are tracks, with extremely steep
descents. The sort of thing which I can barely pull my bike up by
hand when I need to go back. They usually have gravel/small rocks on
them, and I find its often easier to just lock my wheels and slide
down skidding, often for a vertical distance of 50 meters or so at
a time. You need to have good balance though.

Oh! You're so manly. How do you do it. I certainly can't balance
that well...

hahahahah, dunno, its hard, but becomes easier when you see a 10
meter drop on either side
I assume from the way you tell it. I don't know what you
call extremely steep but it isn't more than 40% grade because a
bicycle with a rider on it will endo before that. You don't have to
go to the Australian bush for such trails.
Aussie bush is within cycling distance from my house big national
park
Mountains are full of
trails that approach and exceed what a bicycle can descend. There are
some well known passes in the Alps Col Ferret and Passo San Giacomo,
for instance, where MTB's have no advantage over a road bicycle
because the bicycle must be carried uphill and must be wheeled
downhill by the rider who restrains it by using the front brake.

Yep, I did that the first few times going on those paths, too scared
to do otherwise :P But the weight of a steel kmart-i-cycle and the
fact that my front AND back brakes were rarely enough from stopping
the bycycle sliding when i was wheeling it forced me to learn quick

Of course there are local trails as steep as that but they aren't
famous mountain passes.

Well, not all of it is steep, you get some flat bits to reast, and its
good if you go out of control, I think i mentioned one of my brake
pads melted off once.

You probably need to re-evaluate what should be ridden and what should
be walked.
Yes, well, the distinction blurrs when you don't care about the bike
surviving the trip. Heh, I used to ride bmx bikes, and well, i broke
the chains :/ then I realised the tracks I was cycling on were for
stunt motercycles.
Skidding doesn't prevent an endo, because if it achieves
constant speed then it is no different than letting the brake shoes
slide with the front wheel wheel rolling.
Yep, except the surface area of 2 mountain bike tires inflated at less
than 10psi on the ground is greater than 2 brake pads.
If you get any useful
effect from your rear brake, then it ain't steep.

I get a useful effect. comfort

Jobst Brandt

Palo Alto CA