V-Brake Replaceable Pad Pins

After replacing the front wheel bearings, I replaced both pairs of brake pads. The rear brakes use holders with slide-in pads, but I’ve never been happy with the dinky little pins that retain the pads, so this time I’m using ordinary cotter pins:

V-brake pads - cotter pin retainer
V-brake pads – cotter pin retainer

The rear brake pads on a diamond-frame bike sit nearly horizontally on the seat stays, with the pin head pointed upward. On Tour Easy recumbents, the pads stand almost vertically on the chain stays, with the pins sideways:

Tour Easy rear brakes
Tour Easy rear brakes

That photo dates to 2010, when those brakes were new. Nary a pin has worked loose yet and I don’t expect they ever will, but …

If the pins rust before the pads wear out, I’ll go back to those little bitty OEM stainless pins.

4 thoughts on “V-Brake Replaceable Pad Pins

  1. If the pins rust

    Available at your favorite hardware store (and even Home Depot, in the odd-ball hardware drawers): stainless steel cotter pins for the win! [grin]

    1. Oh, no no no, you misunderstand! That would require buying stuff. This way, my pile o’ stuff goes down

      1. OK, that makes sense. Sounds like the stash-o-cedar I was “given” (long story) and a patio table project that will use as much as possible. The offcuts make nice kindling, too.

        1. This house has a two-door cedar closet lined with gorgeous tongue-and-groove planks. Alas, after half a century, most of the cedar smell is gone, but the basement had a few dozen surplus planks (*) that smell wonderful when cut.

          (*)The guy died some years before we bought the place, but I feel a definite kinship…

Comments are closed.