How do you properly use the front/rear brakes?

A shy person asked:

Quoted message said:

I always wondered. Is there a proper way to discriminate the use of front and rear brakes? I
like the front brake better, because it gives much better deceleration since weight naturally
shifts forward as you decelerate. Rear brake skids easily and I'm not a big fan of it.

You're on the right track.

See also sheldonbrown.combrakturn.htmlOpen ↗

Sheldon "Stop!" Brown +-------------------------------------------------+
| I will be appearing in the Midsummer Revels | Boston Children’s Museum, June 20 | (I’ll be the
| front of the Dragon) | This is a FREE show! revels.orgrevels.orgOpen ↗ |
+-------------------------------------------------+ Harris Cyclery, West Newton, Massachusetts Phone
617-244-9772 FAX 617-244-1041 harriscyclery.comharriscyclery.comOpen ↗ Hard-to-find parts shipped Worldwide
captainbike.comcaptainbike.comOpen ↗ sheldonbrown.comsheldonbrown.comOpen ↗

opinion #2 the front wheel turns the bike, supports the bike.the rear supports and drives the rig
along with a puny 1/50 hp. Not much power transmission for to overwhelm the good rubber stiction
back there. aha! more excess grip at the rear wheel. and the current status is that more or less the
bike is always turning. The Great Walenda only made it look easy. So, even if you're deeply involved
in countersteering(and leveling out and maintaining the straight ahead
f/r tire stiction with weight going straight down thru the frame into the contact patch is the
raison of countersteer) down to the 7-ll, the rear has more excess adhesion capacity to use up in
braking whilst the front, busy turning and supporting has less. taking these non-ideas to their
basic conclusion-cooking along into the favorite mitty turn-where some expletive deleted has
spread sand overnight-and the rider mitty brakes while leaning into to it or as approved leaning
against it and hello tooth fairy. Too much for the front wheel. But,feeding in the rear brake
first gives the rider a wee bit extra time to gauge the surface and correct if sliding what with
that extra sick over the front who is really working its butt off trying to lead the bike's weight
thru a corner. then, ease on the front and balance. crashing rear slide out first is more fun than
crashing front slide out first. but s.brown is correct. there's more brake up front 'cuase the
weight goes in this direction. and this continues overworking the front stiction.And if one really
wants to STOP the front's the way to go.

RE/

Quoted message said:

I always wondered. Is there a proper way to discriminate the use of front and rear brakes? I
like the front brake better, because it gives much better deceleration since weight naturally
shifts forward as you decelerate. Rear brake skids easily and I'm not a big fan of it.

Right-or-wrong, the way I do it is to apply relatively constant force on the front brake - so it's
doing the "heavy lifting", so-to-speak - and then fine tune by modulating the rear brake.

The exceptions are mud, loose gravel, and anything else that might make the front wheel wash
out. On those surfaces I'll either reverse the priority and go really slow or just stick with
the rear brake.
-----------------------
PeteCresswell

g.daniels said:

the contact patch is the raison of countersteer) down to the 7-ll, the rear has more excess
adhesion capacity to use up in braking whilst the front, busy turning and supporting has less.

What a load of [censored]. Stripped of all the seemingly-fancy words, the idea is that since there is more
weight on the rear, it will brake better. However, once you start slowing down -- this being the
point of braking -- that situation changes. In extreme braking, in fact, the rear will lose all
traction -- or stiction, or whatever you want to call it.

As a simple example, it is a trivial matter to skid a rear wheel braking on dry pavement. If the
rear wheel had all that traction, this would be impossible. What is impossible is to skid a front
wheel. You do an endo first.

Quoted message said:

taking these non-ideas to their basic conclusion-cooking along into the favorite mitty turn-where
some expletive deleted has spread sand overnight-and the rider mitty brakes while leaning into to
it or as approved leaning against it and hello tooth fairy. Too much for the front wheel.

As far as I can make out from that, the idea is supposed to be that a sandy corner is "too much" for
front wheel braking. Like rear wheel braking would work there.

--

David L. Johnson

__o | It doesn't get any easier, you just go faster. --Greg LeMond _`\(,_ | (_)/ (_) |

Use the front for stopping and serious slowing, the rear for minor speed modulation and at times of
questionable traction.

May you have the wind at your back. And a really low gear for the hills! Chris

Chris'Z Corner "The Website for the Common Bicyclist": geocities.comczcornerOpen ↗

Chris Zacho 'The Wheelman said:

Use the front for stopping and serious slowing, the rear for minor speed modulation and at times
of questionable traction.

Two additions to that. The rear brake is primarily a back-up. Use it when the front brake breaks.
Also, I tend to use the rear brake when slowing in a paceline, hoping that the rider behind will see
it in addition to my called-out "slowing". This used to work better, when there was more visible
movement of the brake, but with current tight pad/rim clearances the brake doesn't move very much.
But it is still something I watch on the bike ahead of me when in a paceline.

--

David L. Johnson

__o | This is my religion. There is no need for temples; no need for _`\(,_ | complicated
philosophy. Our own brain, our own heart is our (_)/ (_) | temple. The philosophy is kindness.
--The Dalai Lama

"(Pete Cresswell)" <[email hidden]> wrote in message "]news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

RE/

Quoted message said:

I always wondered. Is there a proper way to discriminate the use of front and rear brakes? I
like the front brake better, because it gives much better deceleration since weight naturally
shifts forward as you decelerate. Rear brake skids easily and I'm not a big fan of it.

Right-or-wrong, the way I do it is to apply relatively constant force on the front brake - so it's
doing the "heavy lifting", so-to-speak - and then fine tune by modulating the rear brake.

On normal surfaces, you're better off not using the rear brake at all.

David L. Johnson said:

Chris Zacho 'The Wheelman said:

Use the front for stopping and serious slowing, the rear for minor speed modulation and at times
of questionable traction.

Two additions to that. The rear brake is primarily a back-up. Use it when the front brake breaks.

... and that implies using it often enough that you know that it _does_ work. :-)
--
David Damerell <[email hidden]> flcl?

David L. Johnson said:

Two additions to that. The rear brake is primarily a back-up. Use it when the front brake breaks.
Also, I tend to use the rear brake when slowing in a paceline, hoping that the rider behind will
see it in addition to my called-out "slowing". This used to work better, when there was more
visible movement of the brake, but with current tight pad/rim clearances the brake doesn't move
very much. But it is still something I watch on the bike ahead of me when in a paceline.

You could toe-out the brake shoes so they squeak horribly, thereby giving an audible warning.

--
Ray Heindl (remove the X to reply)

using the rear first then the front may give balance rather than aggression in using the front only.
oaf course, many unbearably aggressive people are talented to the point where balance occurs
naturally bringing their cerebellar/frontal lobe connections past the temporal to competition on a
serious level and then sometimes,crashing. on the other hand, it is possible to balance the brakes,
balance (and learn balance if not naturally gifted) and enjoy the day.swoop swoop

while the non-racer must, off course, defer to the racer on questions of bike handling and braking,
the final answers lay in cycle r/d of honda et al and probably deeetroit but then agin maybe not
deeeetroit. the lab cycle machine, variable and hooked to servos/sensors for geometry-road
surface-tire stiction-brake pressure, computer programed to actuate,record and analize nay!
correlate both input and output FOR TWO WHEELS(not one on most areas of this planet-cepting
hanna-barbara) the entire gamut of braking insanity, EXISTS!!! and may have trickled down the the
posties mechanics and carbonfiber frame designers. Like, there's alotta dinero at steak here. Stand
up and submit!!! for the benefit of all humanity. oh, sure, like welding in another frame member for
a panhard rod. pass the bud. so, disregarding reality. at what point in front brake application does
the lessening pressure on the rear cuase the cycle arrow arcing thru space to destabilize with both
laws of total available road surface contact area and directional stability as the rear comes around
walenda? I assume the racer, having done this over and over to the point of infinite beauty and
grace,has sorted thru the progression and knows the answer. enough already.

Jerry C? said:

I always wondered. Is there a proper way to discriminate the use of front and rear brakes?

You could just leave the question stand, but...

Quoted message said:

I like the front brake better, because it gives much better deceleration since weight naturally
shifts forward as you decelerate. Rear brake skids easily and I'm not a big fan of it.

As often, you answer your "question" as though you didn't really want to know. Just the same, you
could peruse the FAQ, as in:

draco.acs.uci.edu9.15.htmlOpen ↗

Jobst Brandt [email hidden] Palo Alto CA

I think top-posting is appropriate here as I don't know how to snip the original. From g.daniels, we
have unintelligible drivel - again. Is it some kind of "hip" typed diarrhoea? Am I missing
something? Or is it just public spurting? Mark Lee

"g.daniels" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
"]news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

while the non-racer must, off course, defer to the racer on questions of bike handling and
braking, the final answers lay in cycle r/d of honda et al and probably deeetroit but then agin
maybe not deeeetroit. the lab cycle machine, variable and hooked to servos/sensors for
geometry-road surface-tire stiction-brake pressure, computer programed to actuate,record and
analize nay! correlate both input and output FOR TWO WHEELS(not one on most areas of this
planet-cepting hanna-barbara) the entire gamut of braking insanity, EXISTS!!! and may have
trickled down the the posties mechanics and carbonfiber frame designers. Like, there's alotta
dinero at steak here. Stand up and submit!!! for the benefit of all humanity. oh, sure, like
welding in another frame member for a panhard rod. pass the bud. so, disregarding reality. at what
point in front brake application does the lessening pressure on the rear cuase the cycle arrow
arcing thru space to destabilize with both laws of total available road surface contact area and
directional stability as the rear comes around walenda? I assume the racer, having done this over
and over to the point of infinite beauty and grace,has sorted thru the progression and knows the
answer. enough already.

[email hidden] draco.acs.uci.edu9.15.htmlOpen ↗
******************

quand vous l'obtenez à la fourchette dans la prise de route – Berra I

Brandt's most excellent discourse weighs heavily on me, an average rider, an average commuter, and
whoa an average commuter for god help me, I am average and no longer aspire to 9/10th's speed down
the road having done that and in general survived to tell the tale. Besides! As with most of my
friends, my eyesight and reflexes left with old age, wisdom crept in, and I got tired of the
expletive deleted 300lb cycle falling on me than scraping me off the pave so to hell with it.
Penicillin! Brandt on the other hand extols SPEED!!! GOD SPEED!! Hey jb, itsa nice day. Slow down
dude!! Well, maybe JB chose an engineering point to start off with, MAX SPEED, and then qualified
the MAX SPEED CONCLUSIONS with some waffle-ling about real world road surfaces, rain, oil, the
unbearable(ever hit a bear? Expel…) and off course the average unmentionable's inadequacy at
countersteering while casually, that is SLOW DUDE!! (READ RETARDDEAD) at only 75% MAX SPEED, weaving
down the road lika fu… broomstick for expl.!! Well, that's America. MAX MAX MAX. Maybe he's
incubating future riders of the peloton thru the window of opportunity. Cool! Cooler to convert the
discourse and weight those real world subjective data conditions as most important and leave the
racing as a separate category rather than the main category ah but that isn't gonna sell racing
geometry is it? See BM ‘s yearly bike review two years past when the economy wasa really cooking on
spec dough. Gee, I sound like Ralph Nadir. The average reader can quickly(ooppps) see the thread of
MAX running thru the entire six pages lika subversive subliminal element while the ever varying road
surface languishes with brief mention. "Oh, you ran over some coon slick at 9/10th's and broke your
arm in three places? It'll heal, don't let it bother you, think MAXSPEED MAXSPEED and you'll be back
screaming over the coon slick with a new Colnago in 6-7 months.No problema!" This BS(mine) is off
course an exercise in following the logic of the discourse(JB's) to its fallacious absurdity and
disregarding the fact that real world conditions were mentioned as qualifiers to the MAX SPEED
ETHIC. Engineer/cyclist. Primo. And don't forget, lives in CA where the gnomes come out at nite and
scrape the coon slick offen the streets.

The problem, briefly noted in passing, delineated by the lab testing equipment and further defined
by charley smith who said "bodies in motion tend to stay in motion" and then began designing brake
systems that brake the vehicles rear first for arrow stability before the unsprung weight heaves
itself forward to the front wheels [censored]-nilly depending on the walenda vector then applies the
front with more force than the rear. Lookit the little holes if you don't believe me. No, not the
ones in your backyard! Those are from horny space aliens. Now, a word from a sleepy trucker just in
over the snow from Bismark.See any cyclists out there, Curtiss?" Nope, but I hit a big coon" "I wuz
sleepy" "But we kept the rear in the back thank the Lord ABS." AND A WORD FROM A TOURING FRAME
DESIGNER!! And off course JB counts several touring frame designers as friends or conversational
acquaintance and has digested those opinions into the cited discourse on braking. Does chainstay
length and rear rack weight alter the credo max breaking front wheel braking to the point of rear
wheel lift-off as the way to brake? Does the chainstay/baggage factor increase the need for coon
slick factor awareness? Only Bruce Gordon knows for sure. But seriously, there's appoint here where
the frontbrake only-max speed no longer makes sense(and we passed it several hundred words ago)
Riders could be grouped into categories of: slow(ooopps) or casual, touring/commuter, sport
touring/commuter, sport, sport/mitty, sport/racing, racing, competitive racing. Who gets to balance
front and rear brakes? Who needs MAX BRAKING MAX SPEED?? Who hid my hub adapter? It was said that GP
motorcyclists made excellent GP FI drivers, in the rain, as the bikers exquisite sense of balance
gave an pronounced advantage over the car throwers. FINALLY, (and don't send me nasty emails that
whining that you can't read this or it doesn't make sense-if you can't read it don't read it-go out
and MAX BRAKE MAX SPEED under a bus) there's this question-if a bike, gear and rider weight is X and
two tire contact patches are Y(math, dig it we quantify here) X/Y=1 with 1 as say 200lbs from 20 mph
to 0 mph in 50 feet then how does braking improve when X/.5Y=2 not to mention the
insidiuous,sometimes monumental granitic forces of imbalance foisted on the unwary as the "rear tire
lifts off". Rocket science!!! "the rear tire lifts off!" Does the peloton do this? Where do we
stand? Outsight! How much faster can front wheel only be from rear first then front. That's almost
both at once now with modulation for the surface traveled while decelerating. And whater the Odds?

quand vous l'obtenez à la fourchette dans la prise de route – Berra I

g.daniels said:

quand vous l'obtenez =E0 la fourchette dans la prise de route =96 Berra=

I

Glad to see that Yogi was no more grammatical in French than in English..=
=2E

Quoted message said:

Brandt's most excellent discourse weighs heavily on me, an average rider, an average commuter, and
whoa an average commuter for god help me, I am average and no longer aspire to 9/10th's speed down
the road having done that and in general survived to tell the tale. Besides! As with most of my
friends, my eyesight and reflexes left with old age, wisdom crept in, and I got tired of the
expletive deleted 300lb cycle falling on me than scraping me off the pave so to hell with it.
Penicillin! Brandt on the other hand extols SPEED!!! GOD SPEED!! Hey jb, itsa nice day. Slow down
dude!!=20

This is a bum rap, Gene, or should I say gene. That's what braking is=20 all about, you're going
faster than you want to for one reason or=20 another, so you use the brake. What other purpose would
there be for=20 brakes?

Whether you want to slow down from 35 to 30 or from 5 to 0, braking=20 procedure is the same.

Now, some times you want to slow down or stop in a hurry, other times=20 you just want to slow down
gradually.

For gradual slow downs, any technique works, but gradual slowdowns are=20 not the situations where
your life is on the line.

When you need to slow down in a hurry, you'll be more likely able to do=20 so without losing control
if you have previously developed good braking=20 habits.

Anybody who rides in traffic may need to brake suddenly and unexpectedly =

as the result of the boneheaded actions of some other road user.

Indeed, this is more critical for the urban commuter than it is for the=20 alpine descender, because
the mountain roads don't have much cross traffi=
h.

Inasmuch as I can decipher gene's stream-of-conciousness maunderings, it =

appears that he's advocaing a position that some cyclists should use=20 substandard braking
procedures for reasons that may be clear to him, but =

not to me.

All of the objections offered to front-wheel-only braking relate to=20 problems that might occur in
maximal braking conditions.

For the low-speed putterer, none of the imagined dangers of front wheel=20 braking are at issue.

See: sheldonbrown.combrakturn.htmlOpen ↗ for more

Sheldon "Stop!" Brown +-----------------------------------+
| A smoking section in a | restaurant is like a peeing | section in a swimming pool |
+-----------------------------------+ Harris Cyclery, West Newton, Massachusetts Phone 617-244-9772
FAX 617-244-1041 harriscyclery.comharriscyclery.comOpen ↗ Hard-to-find parts shipped Worldwide
captainbike.comcaptainbike.comOpen ↗ sheldonbrown.comsheldonbrown.comOpen ↗

Quoted message said:

[email hidden] draco.acs.uci.edu9.15.htmlOpen ↗

-lost in prior snip-

"g.daniels" <[email hidden]> quoted in message
"]news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

quand vous l'obtenez à la fourchette dans la prise de route - Berra I

-snip-

Quoted message said:

quand vous l'obtenez à la fourchette dans la prise de route - Berra I

Alta Vista's translation utility: "when you obtain it with the fork in the catch of road "

--
Andrew Muzi www.yellowjersey.org Open every day since 1 April, 1971

"g.daniels" translated:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

quand vous l'obtenez =E0 la fourchette dans la prise de route - Berra I=

Quoted message said:

=20
-snip-
=20

Quoted message said:

quand vous l'obtenez =E0 la fourchette dans la prise de route - Berra I=

A puzzled Andy Muzi said:

Alta Vista's translation utility: "when you obtain it with the fork in the catch of road "

g.daniels's literary references are not as arcane as those of, say James =

Joyce. This is a not very good translation of a famous Yogi Berra=20 quote, viz.:

"When You Come to a Fork in the Road, Take It!"

I would have translated it as:

"Lorsque vous trouvez une fourche dans le chemin, prendre-la"

This pun doesn't translate too well, unfortunately, partly 'cause the=20 French don't use the same
word for an eating utensil (fourchette) as for =

a split in a road (ebranchement, bifurcation or fourche according to the =

TrueTerm dictionary in my Cli=E9.)

Here's what Babelfish comes up with:

"Quand vous venez =E0 une fourchette dans la route, prenez-la"

Sheldon "Sometimes I Actually Understand g.daniels" Brown
+------------------------------------------------+
| Nobody who has anything to do with bicycles | has _all_ of their marbles, and some of us | are
| certifiable! | --Sheldon Brown |
+------------------------------------------------+ Harris Cyclery, West Newton, Massachusetts Phone
617-244-9772 FAX 617-244-1041 harriscyclery.comharriscyclery.comOpen ↗ Hard-to-find parts shipped Worldwide
captainbike.comcaptainbike.comOpen ↗ sheldonbrown.comsheldonbrown.comOpen ↗

Quoted message said:

[email hidden] draco.acs.uci.edu9.15.htmlOpen ↗

all trips to the store or around the block are fraught. and given the assumption puttering is not
concentrating, as puttering is less than average,not good enough,yes!! not up to snuff, puttering is
fraught. all fraught situations have gradients, you know-this is more dangerous, that is less so, ad
nauseum and under the bus. Really hard to tell.Sometimes. In developing reflexes down to both hands,
right-left, from your otoliths and whatever else you're using for balance these days, one(or more)
should consider that god gave us rear brake to use as a brake. And that two wheels require balance
for to enhance an upright position in forward motion. Brace!! Surely yawl brace, no?
Allors!!!Merde!!! brace!! Maybe a post on DQ Bracing?? ah, merde, my cone... expletive deleted. The
development of MAX FRONT WHEEL BRAKING, requires balance. Let's say itsa raining on the strand and
conditions are sub par. Less than JB's MAX BRAKE description. JB advocates balance ina roundabout
sorta weigh. NO, seriously, the data are weighted to speed and you're a gonna say no weighted toward
efficiency reducing speed to friction and ima gonna say cool but that MAX does one no good iffn ura
on ur face and then ur gonnaa... compare me to joyce and that's somewhat off course but that's cool
but i prefer faulkner. I digress or maybe you digress.hard to tell sometimes. Anyway, The discourse
seems to look down it's nose at braking in less than MAX BRAKE conditions but what do I know maybe
GP Cyclists in sunny California never brake in the rain. WAAAHOOO!! Right? Are unicycle more pop on
the san andreas?? So, with a load on the rack, us "puttererers," another demeaning look down the
nose at a more adequately described group,this fast is good slow is bad stuff is total BS, balance
the rear wagging cycle and proceed to modulate the two brakes for CONDITIONAL MAX BRAKE rather than
FRONT WHEEL MAX BRAKE.The discourse is the same, only the data are alleviated, spread out so to
speak,MAX is still MAX but the MAX is too the road surface not to the GOD SPEED.

STAY OFF THE GUARDRAIL AND THOINK TWO NOT ONE!!! ENTER FRONT WHEEL MAX BRAKE WITH BALANCE
AFORETHOUGHT!! Most become faster rather than born fast like you and me. development thru balance is
critical at any level but Olympus but even there...the gradient is inescapable.

And what about LOAD and CHAINSTAY LENGTH;increasing factors alter the need to weigh data to GOD
SPEED rather than CONDITIONAL MAX BRAKE??? HEY?, where's the scatter diagram? The thougth of bearing
down into the roundabout at 110 mph on my suzuki and having only the front brake allufasudden...
merde! everyone scatter!

as for yogi sez- I tried imperial latin but the gradient...ugly ugly translation so off to the
french and its just beautiful,swimming there, no? apre!! and wathc the gators.

I think top-posting is appropriate here as I don't know how to snip the original. From g.daniels, we
have unintelligible drivel - again. Is it some kind of "hip" typed diarrhoea? Am I missing
something? Or is it just public spurting? Mark Lee

"g.daniels" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
"]news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

while the non-racer must, off course, defer to the racer on questions of bike handling and
braking, the final answers lay in cycle r/d of honda et al and probably deeetroit but then agin
maybe not deeeetroit. the lab cycle machine, variable and hooked to servos/sensors for
geometry-road surface-tire stiction-brake pressure, computer programed to actuate,record and
analize nay! correlate both input and output FOR TWO WHEELS(not one on most areas of this
planet-cepting hanna-barbara) the entire gamut of braking insanity, EXISTS!!! and may have
trickled down the the posties mechanics and carbonfiber frame designers. Like, there's alotta
dinero at steak here. Stand up and submit!!! for the benefit of all humanity. oh, sure, like
welding in another frame member for a panhard rod. pass the bud. so, disregarding reality. at what
point in front brake application does the lessening pressure on the rear cuase the cycle arrow
arcing thru space to destabilize with both laws of total available road surface contact area and
directional stability as the rear comes around walenda? I assume the racer, having done this over
and over to the point of infinite beauty and grace,has sorted thru the progression and knows the
answer. enough already.