intron

Hi Guys,

Anyone know where to find this thing? Or does anyone have one in their parts bin? i am pretty sure it is used as a quick release / caliper adjuster. Mine is pretty toasted. It comes on a rear brake off a Miyata mixte. Please help.

The caliper reads: 0585M also N500 (maybe model #)?

here are pics of the part:

cyclotoine

I might have it but something look funny or maybe different about your caliper... It looks like there is a barrel adjuster on the lower part of yours?

Rabid Koala

It is on a Mixte, the cable feeds from below.

intron

Cyclotoine,

on the caliper there are two adjusters , a conventional one that the cable runs to, and then the one in the second pic. the one in the second pic is the busted one, and i think it is used as a quick release because when i unscrew it, the caliper opens up enough to pull the wheel off. let me know if you have one.

Cheers

cyclotoine

AHH.. now I see. The only mixte I ever worked on had a center pull caliper mounted on the.... middle stays I guess you would call them.... and had a clever bridge in the main part of the frame which had a barrel adjuster fitted into it. Anyway, I will check the diacomp calipers I have when I get home. The quick release is different but may still work.

Oh: and is that a miyata 90? There is one always parked in a bike rack near my builing at school in the same colour.

intron

its a Miyata 100

serial # NS06087

anyone know what the lineup was for Miyata mixtes?

TimJ

How could that be a quick release? It doesn't have anything to do with the cable.

My completely uninformed guess would be it's some sort of tensioner designed to keep the sidepull brake centered. I would also guess it lets the caliper open up a little because you're adjusting the brake cable with that tensioner, uh, tensioning, so you release it and the caliper opens up where it would be according to just the cable adjustment.

I could be completely and utterly wrong though.

cyclotoine

oh! dang I didn't even notice that that was the piece from the center bolt. I thought it was a barrel adjuster in picture 2. Yes of course this is a centering mechanism. I definately don't have one of those.

intron

thanks for looking cyclotoine.

So anyone else have any info?

Antipodes

That part is (if you mean the one connected to the caliper mounting bolt), like others said, a centering device. I have seen them on a lot of old roadies. If my memory serves me correctly, they appeared on a few different makes of sidepulls, not just the ones made by Dia Compe. Maybe a call to an older, well-established bike shop is in order???

intron

TimJ, you are 100% correct, upon futher inspection i have reached the same conclusion, the part i need is a centering device.


Leigh, i went to a few shops today, and nobody had the part.

oh well, the search continues.

p.s. i don't really need the part to make it all work. i am just trying to keep it as original as possible. i know YOU have all felt the same way about one of your bikes.

Cheers

rancho66 

I thought I would add to this old post as after searching the Forum and Internet this was the closest match to the Centering Adjuster on my brakes I could find info on. Here is a picture of the Centering Adjuster on my N500 Dia Compe brake (84 Norco Monterey). Just in case anyone in future searches want to see what they look like.

wrk101

I have found other odd dia compe parts on loosescrews.com. But I don't remember that one.

rancho66 

I picked up 20 or so road bikes this last summer for my new winter hobby, but this is the first time I have seen this type of an adjuster. They center the brakes quite well, but IMO not really needed...probably the reason they are not to common.

bigbossman 

Yeah - I wouldn't sweat it. Just toss it out and center your brake the regular way.

stronglight

The other actual barrel adjuster and cable quick-release mechanism which rancho66 shared in this photo is also an interesting piece from the annals of brake design history:



I have a similar one on some old Weinmann 605 calipers from around 1980. You immediately notice that they mount the reverse of most other cam-style q/r levers as found on early Campagnolo or Dura-Ace, etc., and of course on any modern calipers - all of which locate their q/r device on the lower arms.

This device raises and lowers a D-shaped outer steel sleeve into which the barrel adjuster threads. Basically, this was like the optional q/r mechanisms found on the frame mounted hangers for earlier center-pull calipers, and those were later just moved onto the side-pull arms. They actually do work just fine, although they look excessively bulky when compared to other designs with their very small levers and far more compact eccentric cams.

Here is a pair of the Weinmann q/r levers shown in closed (Left) and released (Right) positions. They did not last for long on the more costly models. By the very early 1980s Weinmann's "Carrera" calipers had already adopted the more conventional q/r lever style. But they could be easily added to the more basic older style calipers which had trickled down to become quite common on lower range bikes during the 1980s.