-- Act now! Protect yourself from aluminium pimples and harsh scratching
Best known for his theories on "the continuous vector" and secrets of the auto brain Doctor of Bicycle Engineering Mike P's recent critique of the collar helmet tells us that it is better to maintain properly working brakes to minimise crash risks than contemplate the potential for idiotic inventions.
However, while better braking is a vastly more dignified approach to accident prevention, there is more to braking than meets cyclist eyes, and we all could do ourselves, and our wheels, a favour by practicing safer rim job hygiene.
Mike P explains, with photos
Aluminium galled rims:
"What a crappy rim-braking surface looks like. Those little pimples are aluminium in the process of rolling into small spheres ready for transfer to the brake pad. In that form, the spheres are aluminium-oxide on all surfaces, and become one of the hardest grinding materials around." Mike says.
Before and after grinding brake pads:
"A pad, before and after aluminium removal and grinding clean on a bench grinder. Even light braking was previously accompanied with harsh scratching and grinding sound, and had a kind of hard skating feeling. After wet&dry block sanding the rim’s braking surface enough to remove the deforming aluminium, and clearing the pads, braking is now soft, smooth, progressive and probably similarly as effective as it was when the bike was new," Mike says.
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