Light tourer alternatives to Surly Crosscheck - with cantis, not discs?

I have the 650s on my best bike, they're very good. Might not be necessary though, there's plenty of clearance for 28mm tyres (and guards) with 5800/6800 and newer brakes.

I've fitted 5800s on a friend's bike. My understanding is that these more modern calipers can cope with the roundness of a fatter tyre, but bikes such as the Spa Audax - and the fork Spa spec to go with the frame - are expecting a long drop caliper so that the 5800/6800 onwards would hit the bottom of their slots before they are low enough for the brake blocks to engage properly with the rim. But I don't know for certain and I'm happy to be proved wrong. 

Yeah, it can be tight - when I ran 5800 my pads were bottomed out. You can get extenders but they'll take some bite and modulation away, to the point you're better off with long drop calipers

Rude.

What about the spurious excuse that he'll be able to build a lighter bike for less money and not be lumbered with horrendous screeching every time he tries to brake in the wet?

I've built up a cantilever brake gravel bike and every time I ride with buddies in anything but the driest conditions I'm reminded that I made the right choice, I'm almost embarassed for them the noise their discs make! Honk honk howl etc.

I would suggest my rim brake frame (Kinesis CX1) to the OP but it's a dedicated CX frame so horizontal top tube, very little seatpost showing, low stack...

IanEdward wrote:

I'm almost embarassed for them the noise their discs make! Honk honk howl etc.

I would be embarrassed too. My discs don't make any noise.

Is there a secret? I've tried different pads etc and only found grease on the back of the pads helps - but it's no panacea.

Well, they have never made a noise from day 1, so unless I can get them to start making a noise, difficult to say. It's a Pinnacle D3, Shimano 105 brakes. That said, none of my mates bikes discs make any noise either.

I'm probably not the person to ask about fettling brakes for silence - never did manage to get the cantis on my old bike to shut up!

For what it's worth, I've never paid any special attention to cleaning them, beyond just cleaning the bike, so no degreasers or sandpaper stuff. The wheels are thru-axle, which I assume helps, since squealing has to be something vibrating in the audio frequency spectrum, so having everything in alignment and correctly torqued must help.

There's a thread here:
https://road.cc/content/feature/how-stop-your-brakes-squealing-188504
This comment caught my eye:

Roberts Clubman wrote:

I bought some upgrade disc brake wheels for my road bike. They squealed from the off. Tried everything - flaming the pads, cleaning the rotors, hot water, cold water. Still squealed. I also experienced noticeable front brake rub when riding out of the saddle.  The front hub end caps were just push-in jobs, so I thought maybe some flexing was causing vibration and squealing. Anyway, I swapped them out for the stock wheels on my commuter bike. Problem solved immediately. Plus the upgrade wheels don't squeal at all now they're fitted on my commuter bike. No brake rub either. Go figure!

Thanks for this, I'll read that thread. Most of the disc braked bikes in my club squeal in the wet - or they did in Feb 2020... Apart from one guy whose brakes never have. Happens to me on different wheels too, although none of mine is above cheap level.

The only benefit is not needing a bell on a shared use path.

I've got both SRAM and Shimano disc brake bikes and they only squeal when it is pouring down.
They do make a racket then but I'd rather have the sound then having to worry about stopping.

I only know one guy whose brakes don't squeel in the wet, he weighs 67kg, runs 140mm rotors on a CX bike, and runs a very small frame size. To my mind that equates to smaller, more compact frame, stiffer rotors and less stopping power required in the first place, perhaps prevents the resonance and squealing that I experienced in the past (85kg, large frame, 160mm rotors) and my riding buddies also experience (at least one is significantly lighter than me, but still runs a larger frame and 160mm rotors.

I understand the stopping power vs. squeal point of view, but I've never worried about stopping power of my rim brakes, good aluminium rims and decent pads seem to do the trick.

Anyway, this debate exists ad nauseam elsewhere, I just object to the idea that rim brakes are 'obsolete'. I think they very much still have a place.

Jason Rourke has been building for Longstaff for a number of years and took over the name a couple of years back - you won't look back if you are after an Audax - I have an older Reynolds 853 model - one of the last George built.