Spotted: SRAM is Testing Something (But It's Probably Not a Dual Caliper Brake)
We've had a set of spy shots beamed over from the Whistler lift line that seem to show a SRAM test rider with twin caliper brakes fitted to their downhill bike.
Unfortunately, most of the interesting stuff is hidden by a plastic shell but we can take a few educated guesses about what's going on based on what we can see. The most obvious thing to notice is the hose splitter on both brake lines that is used so that one lever can actuate two separate calipers inside the shell. The calipers use a fitting that's similar to SRAM's Level brakes, with a locking nut to attach the hose to the caliper, rather than the banjo that is used on the Code or G2, but we don't know what the lever is at this time.
More calipers, more power?
So why are there two calipers when one does the job just fine for most of us? Well, the most obvious answer would be to increase the power of the brake - twice the calipers, twice the power and twice the heat dissipation.
This isn't the first time we've seen twin calipers on a mountain bike, but traditionally the two calipers have been laid out like a motorbike with each one paired to a separate rotor on opposite sides of the wheel. Those designs didn't catch on in mountain biking though as in reality, riders didn't need that much power at the time.
The RAM URT prototype used twin calipers for its front braking but it was designed for a 6'6" rider who tipped the scales at nearly 290 lbs.
However, with the increasing speeds and weight brought on by 29" downhill bikes or eMTBs, we've seen an arms race for power in the braking world. 200mm rotors simply don't cut it for a large number of riders anymore and 220mm or even 246mm rotors have been developed in recent years.
It could be that SRAM believes two calipers will be better than a larger diameter rotor, but we don't think that's actually what's going on here, and for a number of reasons we don't expect a twin caliper brake to be coming from SRAM in the near future.
It's probably a test rig
We think the more important thing to note is the Quarq Qollector rear disc rotor. We've seen this previously on Cecile Ravanel's bike at the 2017 Val di Sole downhill World Cup but haven't heard much about it since. Four years ago it was being used to measure brake forces, specifically focussing on how much Cecile was dragging her brakes but we've no doubt it could measure other useful metrics.
Having two calipers on the same rotor would allow SRAM to A/B test things like pad wear, modulation, heat dissipation or the performance of two different components. We think it's more likely that we're looking at a brake testing rig that can compare and contrast between setups during a run. Putting both brakes on at the same time allows SRAM to cut out the variables that would change between runs and also save time swapping out parts.
We reached out to SRAM for comment on the photos and they told us they are, "always working on product developments but cannot comment at this time."
What do you think? Is this a clever testing set up or will be all be running four calipers on our bikes in the future?
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Oh wait… SaInTs ArE tHe BeSt!
at this point Sram should just do the honorable thing and commit Seppuku.
Code RSC fit every catagory such as
-Quality 4/5
-Price
-Durability 4/5
-Stopping power 4/5
-Ease of service 4/5
-Consistency 4/5
-Maintinance 4/5
-Part availability 5/5
-Part pricing 4/5
-Warranty 5/5
I dont feel there is anything truly amazing about them, except they work the way they should 99% of the time. I have broken a pair, and I have had one seize up. SRAM delivered in warranty each time with brand new brakes within a couple days.
From the factory, the assembly is a bit lackluster. With a rebuild and some proper DOT grease on all seals, I have had zero issues beyond the regular service required to maintain them.
I feel there aren't really any other companies that are as consistant in all aspects of the categories mentioned that match SRAM on this. While I do agree other brands do excel in several of the categories, none have provided the same consistency in terms of meeting all that criteria as SRAM. I would love to see some other brands prevail however... But SRAM has set the bar.
Shimanos or Maguras are the way to go!
Any one out there run maguras too?
MAGURA. (i got nothing for that one)
Love how often Sram does something neat just to have some hater shit on them for trying. Shimano hasn't updated their DH line in what, 7 years? Stop the fanboyism.
Is you notice and XTR brake or an RSC, the fluid comes out fairly close to the same color as when you initially bled them.
The challenge with the Code Rs is their lifespan. Some work well for a long time, while others shit the bed immediatly. That being said, the swing link does provide better top and power as well as more modulation with a shorter lever throw.
The CODE R have plenty of stopping power, and while they're not as good as my MT7s, they're most of the way there and I wouldn't have any problems riding them on even the most aggressive trails. Are they stellar? Nope, not at all. But, they're quite a bit better than the old Guide brakes and absolutely better than the trash avid brakes.
It sounds like you need someone to teach you how to work on brakes, because mine were never squishy. Even with pads that were almost done. The SRAM CODE brakes are the easiest brakes to bleed on the market because of the caliper bleeder tool.
I do agree the lack of pad advance is annoying as the pads wears.
They do a bit better for me with the heat etc
Last time I had a problem with them was maybe 10 years ago, and they warrantied everything. Rode Whistler 3 months
straight in 2017 without a bleed. New ones have been even more reliable for me.
I still bleed them once a month.
Lever rebuild and caliper rebuilds once a year.
You’re joking, but it’s been 3 years now since riding sram brakes and I’m still suffering from wrist and elbow pain as a result of their trademark brake fade.
At any rate, I'm going to look into this swing link. Is that something I can retrofit onto the R?
This issue was made worse with their non anodized calipers, as the aluminum woukd corrode and contaminate the brake fluid.
I personally would avoid the sram G2 brakes all together as they are just a cheap version of the older guides with a larger reservoir. The code RSCs seem to be consistant and reliable for the majority of riders. I've yet to see any major issues with them in terms of reliability and performance.
While in the short term this may work, long term reliability is unknown and could result in failure.
Once you have completed a good bleed. Ensure the brake lines are in a vertical position with the calipers at the lowest point. Apply a zip tie to the lever and compress the pads together on a pad spacer. Allow to sit for 30 minutes to an hour, tapping the brake line every few minutes. Cut the zip tie, and reorientate your brakes. This works most of the time with any brake with a wandering bite point.
Your best bet is to replace the levers with rsc or ultimate levers if you live somewhere where it’s often cold. The rsc levers are a lot better than the standard levers.
And organic pads are at least as good as sintered when it comes to power. In fact organic ones usually feel like they have a better initial bite to them.
Wet weather grit & mud is the only reason to ever run sintered pads. Admittedly here in the UK it is a solid reason.
If your Codes have no power, you set them up incorrectly, didn't bed them correctly, or contaminated them. It's really funny people posting here to talk down on a functional brakeset inadvertently advertising they f*cked up their brake. Guides have certainly had reliability issues. Codes seem mostly uneffected.
This has all been well known for years, but we still have people sounding off on Sram Codes and praising Shimano Saints. At the end of the day, that complaint is people admitting there was a setup issue that they weren't aware of.
so then, flip your own question, why do people put up with arm pump and shitty braking power by buying sram brakes which are more expensive too? fanboy-ism?
I run sram brakes for those reasons, adding in their warranty is superior to most on the market, the durability of the brake itself is sufficient. I'm unsure why there is such a distane for any brake brand really. Shimano excellent in one area while sram excellent in another. You need to weigh out the odds subjectively and choose accordingly. Your personal distane and bashing of sram in comparison to shimano followed by the comment "fanboy-ism" is rather ironic. It makes zero differance what brake you choose individually, and any dislike for the brand itself in terms of what they produce is one thing, but calling out others for ther personal choice of what brakes they run is quite comical. Who cares?
Code rsc came on my last bike. Bleeds and rebuilds take awhile to reach the replacement cost of somthing marginally better. Untill I cam really ball.out with trick stuff. I'll make them work for as long as I can.
Also, again, if you want to talk real power, you want to talk Magura.
I'm a mechanic and get this stuff on my desk. I just find it funny when people shit all over one brand and prop up another, when both work well in real life. I run 2 piston Hope brakes, so vastly less power than anything in discussion here, and they're still more than plenty.
Enjoy the skids I suppose.
I know a patent attorney when your design is ready!!!!!!111!!
I pay about 30€ for two pairs of trickstuff brakepads and about 60€ for a pair of rotors.
The last time I bought a set of pads and discs for my car I paid about 500€ in total.
The bike brakes are undoubtedly higher quality, but for the amount of material and shipping costs, plus the fact that I'm buying twice as many, I'd expect the prices to be closer to what you quoted.
I think it's super cool of trickstuff to make their consumables that cheap for how high quality their brakes are. I also feel for y'all when it comes to car mods and parts. All I need is a VIN and insurance here, and I could pretty much drive a tin can on wheels. I understand that y'all in Germany have to comply with rigorous inspections and TUV. That said, There's no way I'd drive on an unrestricted autobahn without all cars on the road being in perfect shape
I've never had anything but great experiences with their 12 speed drivetrains (X01 and new GX), brakes (two sets of Code RSCs) and droppers (four flawless Reverbs).
I've run RS until recently and have always been impressed by their easy setup and great customer support (thanks Fluid Function). Not to mention that they are dead easy to service and the upgrade parts like air springs are under 100 bucks.
Hate all you want but SRAM will be getting my money in the future.
That and the fact they keep on changing standards. Now get off my lawn!!!!
It comes OEM on too many bikes. The best thing I can say about them is the warranty is great
Again, just a thought. Looks like there’s definitely not enough gear there but it could still be in very early stages.
The front rotor looks standard to me, can’t see any Quarking. And it’s obviously on a DH bike. Dual calliper testing is the simplest explanation
I run 203 rotors and 4 piston calipers, and wouldn’t want to go back to weaker brakes.
If you live in the flatlands-yeah, it’s more brake than is needed. Bolted to more bike than is needed. But for mountain biking in the mountains, big brakes are awesome.
But on the other hand, the larger the piston area, the less piston motion per lever motion. So squeezing these to the bar will only move the pistons a tiny amount, right? In other words, wouldn't you have to set the brakes up with the pads basically on the rotor, dragging constantly?
Maybe that doesn't matter for the DH use case...?
One system that has kind of an elegant solution is the Shimano Servo Wave. It changes the ratio inside the lever so the pads move quickly towards to rotor and when they touch, the ratio shifts so that you get more power. So that's elegant, in theory at least. In practice, it seems quite a few people have issues with this system.
Or....
It could be SRAM adopting Honda's Combined Brake System?
I loved these crazy heavy forks back then and the design was incredible!
Nothing „cultural inappropriate“ there, just an amazing working fork (for the time) that also happens to look the part!
Every oldschool huck to flat freeriders dream died with that ZEB name.
Just as the eliminated the need for a second or third chainring, that's what's going on.
Two smart, wireless or not, sensors, on each caliper (similarly to the Fox live valve), will control the stopping power and liquid flow to each one at any given time.
And then you'll have a single brake lever attached to a single shifter (controller), and it'll leave you with a lever less.
Maybe I'm just crazy..
Engineers: „Hold my beer!“
SRAM will have enough test rigs and setups in the lab to not need this kind of testing in the Whistler bike park queue.
Next for e-bikes... the hysteresis brake as high end motor drives have had them for years.
Maybe it´s just a simple first prototpye to test another way to deal with heat, which is actually to use 2 calibers, or let´s say 2 pairs of brake pads with a bigger distance from each other. The heat directly at the pad area (both pad and disc) is pretty high compared to some centimeters further on the rotor. So you just apply another "brake" where the rotor is cool enought again. I´ve seen this in the batman arkam knight trailer and it actually makes sence (sorry for the long link to the picture)
www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=https%3A%2F%2Fi.ytimg.com%2Fvi%2F0MOyWepku_g%2Fmaxresdefault.jpg&imgrefurl=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3D0MOyWepku_g&tbnid=68VA2zYO0qhOuM&vet=12ahUKEwiUkemN96DxAhXEGewKHTjtADoQMygHegUIARC_AQ..i&docid=aVZ2b6gajnA4UM&w=1280&h=720&q=batman%20arcam%20knight%20brake&ved=2ahUKEwiUkemN96DxAhXEGewKHTjtADoQMygHegUIARC_AQ#imgrc=KulIj_sT1QpNfM&imgdii=WwqOgIOcrSD6NM
The best position would acutally be on the oposide side of the rotor. But when you keep weight ratios, price, new standards in mind, maybe a smaller distance like 10cm and smaller cylinders might be a sweet spot here. So they might test different distances and cylinder diameters right now. For that the cover. Maybe just 2 level cylinders mounted on a plate
With that said, if anyone has a audio clip of a bike with 2 sets of 2-caliper SRAM brakes going downhill in the wet, that could be fun to hear.
I haven't touched the drivetrain since the initial break in and it shifts crisply and perfectly every time. I've serviced the fork once and still haven't touched the shock (I know, doing it this weekend), and love the performance.
That being said however, I've bled the brakes five times following SRAM instructions and the feel still sucks. I read a post recently about how to pressurize the caliper at the end of the bleed to get rid of the squish. Going to try that this weekend.
Twin calipers seems like a step down from just designing a six or eight piston single caliper though this might be a way to test a lever that can displace enough fluid for an upcoming eight piston caliper?
With this much brake on one bike there's definitely a stick-in-the-spokes joke to be made here somewhere.
Maybe a double Reverb?
ep1.pinkbike.org/p4pb9520036/p4pb9520036.jpg
Expand your vocabulary!
Sram engineers-"We can fix that. We'll add junctions and more hoses."
You would have a ~26” rotor and a bonus of rim stiffness potential.
m.pinkbike.com/news/article2707.html
Recharge one’s ebike and stop at the same time??
Thing is this, most of these standards are avoidable. Hub standards have a good reason behind them. 15mm axles are dumb, yet still seem to be prevalent, and when it's all said and done, we still have an epic good time... All the BS in the middle keeps it interesting, and simply feeds forums like this for people like you and me to have a good old fashioned debate on how we feel on a personal level about it.
While I don't agree with alot of standard on the market, somebody along the way felt it was a good idea... Trivial or not... It is what it is.
(and after testing, including the methods you suggested, they might veer to design some other, similarly powerful 6-pot or bigger 4-pot, etc)