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Brakes - looking for an upgrade to my Juicy 3s

heavy_ratheavy_rat Posts: 264
edited January 2012 in MTB buying advice
Sick of the fiddling all of the time with my current Juicy 3s. Too much faffing when changing pads and rotors. Bleeding them is a pain in the censored too.

So what would be a suitable upgrade? Elixirs? Shimano?

Grateful for your thoughts

Posts

  • oodboooodboo Posts: 2,171
    What's your budget?

    SLX are supposed to be pretty good. I've just ordered some XT brakes from Rose bikes. Merlin have some good offers as well. If you don't want shimano then Formula brakes seem to be popular.
    I love horses, best of all the animals. I love horses, they're my friends.

    Strava
  • heavy_ratheavy_rat Posts: 264
    Didnt want to spend more than 150 for both front and rear. Just looking on Rose Bikes at the SLX and they're the wrong way round, ie Front brake is a left hand lever
  • oodboooodboo Posts: 2,171
    Just swap the hoses over, simples.
    I love horses, best of all the animals. I love horses, they're my friends.

    Strava
  • DavsyDavsy Posts: 17
    Singletrack rated both Elixir 7s and XTs highly recently.

    Haven't tried either but I'm a bit sick of juicy 3s too. They said XTs were very powerful, so great for scrubbing speed if you were an all out speed kind of rider but they liked elixirs for power (albeit less than XTs) and feel/modulation.

    Think I'm wavering on the side of Elixirs from what I read...
  • AnonymousAnonymous Posts: 79,667
    Anything in the Elixir range, inc X'whatever', will generally be a decent upgrade from any Juicy.

    Juicys are a pain. The Elixir stuff are generally fine. Pads are so much easier to change and the brakes self adjust properly. They are Avid though so bleeding is going to be the same deal, nasty DOT5.1 fluid etc.

    However you really shouldn't need to be bleeding at all. Problem with Juicys is they're so spongy, inconsistent and a pain to adjust it makes you think they need bleeding when they really don't (and bleeding them makes them worse sometimes). Not that bleeding any other brake is much different.

    Avid/SRAM vs Shimano stuff. Just what brand you prefer really or what works out the best deal. Only thing is Avid come complete kits with rotors, adapters and all the bolts necessary, whereas Shimano might not. The latter is handy if you don't want to be changing everything to replace one bit.

    Oh and Avid levers work either way round usually, and they have matchmaker thingies on some of the higher models that clip to compatible gear levers and such which is a bit neater. Swapping hoses means a bleed probably.
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