Bob Freitas wrote:
Anyone ever seen or done this before? BOB FREITAS cloudy MILL VALLEY,CA USA
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What a lovely Jack Taylor, creme de la creme for its era! That's the good news. There's more: the Shimano E disk brake, when set up properly, was a good brake. We used one on a Schwinn Town & Country tandem, and one on a T&C triplet. In back. One great advantage of a real disk brake is that nothing has to be disconnected to drop the wheel to change tires. The operating cable and the reaction assembly both stay with the bike.
Still, I just won't even ride seriously on a tandem or triplet with a dished front wheel. The lateral forces on front wheels of these bikes are really seriously large. On "normal" descents, the "pinger" for our old-style odometer would miss strokes, because the spokes deflected so much (OK, I'll come clean: it had a track hub with narrow flanges pressed into front wheel duty). One day, riding with another couple who were riding a borrowed triplet with a Phil front hub, they taco-ed the front wheel. Trying to start, they got up a bit of speed, and suddenly turned the front wheel. It stopped, the bike kept going, and the wheel was an unfortunate victim of momentum.
BTW, Jeff Archer at First Flight Cycles had a large supply of the "E" brakes and hubs, and it's not a bad way to go for mocking folks with modern disk brake set-ups.
One more note: the first time I saw a disk brake on a tandem, it was a prototype Bill Boston, at TOSROV in 1975 or 1976.
harvey "no connection to buyer, seller, or Shimano" sachs mcLean va