I'm not exactly new to this, but I thought I'd put a call out to other wound-up users for their opinions, experiences, and help.

I have an earlier (5 years old or more) wound up cross fork with a one inch steel steerer. Because the fork has so little brake clearance, I've had to chop off the backs of the brake pads so that they can open past the fork for wheel changes. (Using new Cane Creek cantis.) I actually had to remove a significant amount of the pads in order for this to work. Without cutting the pads I don't think you could even get a 23mm road tire out of there without deflating it.

Problem: insane fork chatter. As soon as I touch the brakes, the fork is shaking back and forth like a wet noodle. Can't even use the front brakes. I'm to the point of getting rid of the frame so that I can get one that uses a good, 'modern,' 1 1/8" fork.

Has anybody else had this experience with the wound-ups? Do we think that it is aggravated by the heavily trimmed brake pads? Are there particular brakes that are better for this fork (have more forward placement of the pads, requiring less trimming.) I'm really looking for someone to say, "I use the earlier wound up and have no chatter issues, I suggest this brake and pad configuration."

For those that will ask, yes, the headset is tight, and yes, the brake pads are visibly toed such that the trailing edge strikes first. I do have another cross bike with Paul brakes that work seamlessly, so I feel as if there's a good possibility that it's a product of the equipment and not my ability to adjust it. The Pauls and my Avids don't seem to offer any more forward offset of the pads, so I don't even know if changing brakes would help. If the chatter is a product of the fork, and you happen to have a good fork with one inch steerer around that you'd like to sell...

Go find a crown mounted hanger like that on Konas or Redlines. Your local shop should be able to order one from SBS for a few bucks. It will completely eliminate the chatter. The chatter is caused by the flex in the steerer tube. If you move the cable stop to the crown, all the breaking forces are transferred to the burliest part of the fork.

Thanks, that's actually very logical. As the fork flexes backwards the brake cable gets pulled tighter, and as it flexes fowards the cable would get looser - probably plenty enough to set up a harmonic in the fork caused by the variable braking action, especially with the way these brakes are set up (straddle carrier set low for high gain.)

Anybody else have feelings on this? I've seen pictures around of people using these forks with a standard cable carrier...
Do you have to cut your pads with this fork? Do you have chatter issues?

Do you speak from experience with this particular fork Unoveloce?

Regarding that fork. I had the best luck running Kool Stop Supra 2 pads turned around backward and in the salmon compound. Depending on the brakes I had on the bike at the time, I still had to trim the pads. There was definite trimming if I didn't turn them around. I lucked into finding the fix when I switched headsets and stems and misplaced the headset mounted hanger upon the rebuild. I just dug into my old parts and found the hanger that had been on my old Kona Jake the Snake, and problem solved. I have also used the Tektro copy of the old Cannondale Force 40 leverage enhancement thingy and even the mini v brakes. The only downsides to the lower mount cable hangers are it can be hard to get your straddle cable high enough if you run Empella or Pauls older Mafac style brakes. The mini-Vs work really well, but don't offer a ton of pad clearance on the rim. Most people wind up using an inline barrel adjuster.

This bike happens to have top-mount brake levers, so an inline adjuster it does have. I'll have to see if I can borrow a set of v-brakes from someone to test out the solution. A few years ago I could have listed for you the companies that make mini-v brakes. I suppose I'll have to go on a witchhunt now.

Thanks.

and Campy are making the mini-V brakes. There is a huge thread over at the weight weenies site about them. Campy does two versions for their flat bar road group.

Either the V brake or the crown mounted cable hanger will fix the chatter. More experience speaking. Interesting correspondence with the folks at Campy - They say none of their stuff is tested and qualified for cyclocross, so even if I think it works they say don't use it. They also recommend against using the mini-Vs with a road lever. Hasn't stopped me from running Campy.

Ron

Gosh guys, you've got me staring at this bike with the lust I had when compiling and building it up as a dream bike again. I never would have thought that a flexy fork would have self induced brake chatter due to "self modulation" effects.

So it seems tektro no longer makes their mini-v, but do you think this one would get me the same place as the campy? http://aebike.com/page.cfm?PageID=30&action=details&sku=BR9520 Then maybe if campy lust gets me I'd upgrade down the road?

So if brake chatter goes away, is the wound up an okay riding fork? On the road? In the woods?

If I couldn't or can't get this worked out, frame/fork was going to be sold (curtlo custom in baby blue) and replaced with a generic aluminum racer style rig (felt, trek, redline, specialized, etc.) with some fork like a Ouzo, Winwood, or the like. I'm racing a pretty kitted out Felt with a deep quiver of wheels, but this is a gift bike for a certain lady...

Unoveloce's chater-fix works. I know because his latest install was on my bike. Before the crown-mount, the chatter was so bad that I couldn't touch the brakes going downhill around a corner even on pavement, for fear that the front end would start hopping toward the guardrail. Very VERY scary.

I'd say that moving the mount position down has eliminated 90% of all of the chatter. I'm 6'1" and looking down on 200 pounds, so that tiny steer tube has got a lot of heft to slow down. I run Neuvation M28 Aero wheels. The chatter is still there from time to time, but keeping the pads (reversed so I can get the damn wheel out) cleaned and sanded, and toed in helps a lot.

I was really thinking of getting rid of the bike until this came along, so I'm a happy dude.

I'll try to get a pic up this weekend if I remember, so you can see the fix.

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