XTR Race brakes powerful enough

In all honesty unless you want to loose some weight I'd stick with what you have tbh the deores are fantastic brakes and I can hardly the difference between a friends deores and my xt m785's.

Bigger discs?

Power is not everything.

Tally Ho wrote:

I can lock the front wheel on the flat with one finger at maximum effort, but with many of the steep downhills here I find I need to use 2 fingers most of the time as the hills are really steep and some of my riding includes single track pavement with occasional 25-30 degree hills. And hurtling those at speed requires some stopping power and is best accomplished with 2 fingered braking on the deore's. Hence the desire for a little more power and then see a cheap XTR 985 deal. And I'm also just found this which is a bit confusing as it says that the XTR race is more powerful than the deore in testing (110NM XTR Race to 104Nm Deore) http://www.bikeradar.com/mtb/fitness/ar ... kes-24345/

Different tests produce different results I read a test that put the Deore 596 very nearly at the top for power and the XTR985 race a fair bit down. It doesnt alter the fact that the Deore 596 is one of the most powerful non Downhill racing brakes out there.

What size front disc have you got the jump from a 160mm to a 180mm is I believe about 10 to 15% extra power with a bit of loss of modulation. The jump from 180 to 203 is again about 10 to 15% extra power but when you get to 203 you run into problems with scraping noises as 203 discs are never as true as smaller ones, plus you do lose quite a lot of modulation and feel it becomes more abrupt.

I ride in the Pennines and the Lakes a lot and there are some pretty damn steep rocky downhills but I have never even come close to needing 2 fingers to stop using my XT brakes and I am a fat knacker who likes to let rip downhill.

Tally Ho wrote:

I'm running on 160'mm front and rear so I could try 180mm on the front and see how that works. Still a shocker though that the XTR race is less powerful than the deore.

No its not a shocker the XTR is XC racing kit and designed for light weight as its No1 priority power is a secondary priority. Unless your a top level XC racer XTR is a waste of money and most people would be better off using XT, SLX or Deore and spending the money saved on something important like Beer. Get yourself a bigger disc and an adapter and a new set of pads. Fit them and bed the pads in properly. Should cost you no more than about £40 for the lot if you shop around. 160mm discs are not for use in big hills unless your a featherweight.

If you have that sort of money to blow on top of the range brakes - get Formula The Ones - ludicrously powerful and with a XC* weight.

However, like others have said I'm surprised by your apparent lack of stopping power

For brake squeal - if your happy your new pads are properly bedded in (remember not to touch the pad surface with your fingers - sorry if I'm stating the obvious), you could always give the rotors a clean with some good disc rotor cleaner (a degreaser essentially) incase you have some polished in contaminants like oils or simple skin oil (i.e. finger print smudges). This may improve performance if they are contaminated.

A well set up disc brake normally has a reasonably solid and definate 'bite' when it engages with the disc - if your brakes feel spongy or the bite is indistinct - a rebleed may be in order and again may solve your problem (and certainly be cheaper than 300-400 pounds of new brakes)

Tom Barton wrote:

If you have that sort of money to blow on top of the range brakes - get Formula The Ones - ludicrously powerful

Don't do that. Great brakes but poor poor pad clearance. Go for any version of the Shimano servo wave brakes. You cannot go wrong.