(text crashing)
- Welcome back you beautiful people,
we are out here in the middle of flipping nowhere,
nothing around, apart from a tractor.
- Careful Blake, this is my neck of the woods.
We're up in Shropshire, for an epic ride.
To ride some of my most favorite, epic,
most fun trails then to try out some brakes.
- [Blake] I've heard a lot about it Neil.
- [Neil] Well let's do it.
- Right which way? - Up.
- Oh okay.
(energetic rock instrumental)
- [Blake] And with so many brake brands
now having both two and four-pot caliper options
for us riders to choose from, we wanted to find out,
what the difference between them are on the trail.
Are four-pot brakes overkill?
Or are two-pots all you need?
And what exactly is a pot?
- To demonstrate the difference
between the two and four-piston brakes,
Shimano invited us to take them out for a ride.
- Yes Neil, I love it when they invite us.
We get to do some cool stuff.
- And for today's ride, we're riding
two very different bikes.
I'm riding my Nukeproof Mega.
It's got 27.5 wheels, 170mm travel up front,
165 on the rear, a Shimano 1x12 drivetrain,
with Shimano XT brakes with the four-pot calipers,
matched to 180 rotors front and rear.
In the numbers game, I win.
- And I'm riding my Canyon Neuron bike.
This is a 130mm travel front and rear,
29 inch wheel build on this beast,
I've got the Shimano 12-speed on here,
paired with the Shimano XT calipers,
two-pot on this bike, with 180mm rotors front and rear.
It's a full-carbon rig with 29 inch wheels,
this thing is super, super lightweight.
- Well I've got four-pot brakes and more travel.
Bigger is better Blake.
(Blake buzzing lips)
- This thing a climbing machine, super lightweight.
I can get to the top with less energy,
so I can have more energy for the descent.
- Well, I guess we'll find out soon enough.
(ominous acoustic music)
- [Neil] The ride takes us
through the hearts of the Shropshire hills,
an area of outstanding natural beauty.
From the ridge line of The Lawley,
over the Long Mynd and it's wild epic cross-country trails,
to link-up with the woods of Eastridge,
an old mountain bike race venue
with technical downhill tracks,
then onto a steep final surprise,
to make sure we're still concentrating
and the brakes are still working after 45 kilometers,
enjoying the best of British autumnal weather.
- But before we get started,
what exactly are two and four-pot brakes?
Well there's a number of different varieties out there.
But there's two fundamental types.
- Yeah, the first one is a mechanical disc brakes.
So they use brake cables, much like your gear cables,
to pull the pistons and they're generally two-pot.
- Yeah, about two-pots Neil.
- I'll explain that in a second Blake.
Well yeah, the first ones are mechanical,
so they are much simpler and much cheaper
than the second variety, and that is hydraulic disc brakes.
Which uses hydraulic fluid, pushed by your lever,
to activate the pistons
and they can come in two or four pots.
- Just like my motorbike.
- Exactly.
- Or on Jeff the Jeep.
- Exactly
- Getting it.
- Well, hydraulic disc brakes
generally are more powerful and more efficient
than mechanical ones.
So less pull at the lever means more power at the brake.
So more control, more stopping power,
and they come on most mountain bikes nowadays.
- I've got a question.
What is a pot?
A cooking pot Neil?
- No.
- Yogurt pot?
- No.
And it's "yoghurt" not "yogurt".
- Coffee pot, you love coffee.
- No.
- I got one.
Flower pot Neil.
- No.
Pot, Blake, just means means, "piston"
so, two-pot means, two-piston,
four-pot means, four-piston.
- What is piston Neil?
- More pistons equals more power Blake.
You can see on my brakes almost the outline in the caliper
of where the pistons are.
One, two, three, four.
You can sometimes get six-piston brakes,
although they're not so common these days.
Anyway, can we start riding now.
- Please Neil, I'm cold.
Thanks for explaining.
(peaceful acoustic music)
(wind rushing)
(peaceful acoustic music)
(rain splashing)
(bike tires grinding)
(peaceful acoustic music)
(rain splashing)
(brakes squeaking)
- Do you reckon was that Blake?
- Cool, it was good.
- Sort of mellow cross-country trails right here.
- Super chill.
- [Neil] I feel like four-pot is overkill.
Because they are never steep enough
to really drag them and get them that hot.
- And get them that warm.
The single-pot here is perfect you don't need
that much - [Neil] Cross-country tracks.
- [Blake] Exactly. - [Neil] Although,
I do like having a big,
aggressive powerful brake all the time anyway.
- [Blake] Yeah yeah.
- [Neil] All right, let's try to get out of this rain.
- Let's get into some cover Neil.
(energetic drum music)
- [Neil] Four-piston brakes have their roots firmly set
in the gravity side of the sport.
They were developed in downhill,
and are designed to withstand prolonged descending.
Nowadays, they are also used by enduro and trail riders,
who ride more extreme gravity-focused trails,
where light weight is less important than braking power.
Similarly, if you are a heavier rider,
or riding a heavy bike, like an E-bike,
they're a wise choice too.
- [Blake] Traditionally, two-piston brakes
are for lighter cross-country riding,
and racing by riders who don't ride
on extremely steep trails.
Light weight is super important to them,
and although two-piston brakes have plenty of power,
they can start to fade
on longer, steeper, more extreme descents.
(energetic rock music)
(brakes squeaking)
(tires crunching)
(energetic rock music)
- Well, we've got some liquid sunshine now Blake.
- Yeah, Shropshire has delivered Neil, the rain.
- It's raining a bit.
It's crazy, these four-pots are so powerful, wet or dry,
I think now, the only limiting factor
is going to be the grip.
The brakes are just so powerful, what about the two-pot?
- Two-pots perfect, good right now but...
- You haven't got as much grip
as I have. - I haven't got much grip,
I'm running these Continental Cross Kings, Neil,
and they are cross-country tires
- [Neil] They're fast
- And they're very fast rolling on a 29er,
so I think, I wouldn't notice any difference just yet.
- Tell you what, it's good having
my chunky barrel on the front.
Proper digs in, on stuff
when it is going to be a bit slippery.
- Especially when you use that front brake.
Dig that grip in.
(bouncy dance music)
(brakes squeaking)
(bouncy dance music)
- [Blake] As we come into our second season of the day,
yes, the sun is out to come and play.
It's time to shred more.
- What do you reckon Blake?
- It's a bit exposed up here and windy.
- Big old climb to get up to this point.
- Oh mate, yeah.
Really good we were coming from all the way over there.
- You can see, well, well into Wales.
That's Cadair Idris, almost the seaside over there.
So pretty cross-country so far.
- Super XC.
- A few fast angles a bit of goat tracky stuff.
We were riding around probably my favorite trail,
and now we're riding a really steep ridge where,
it's steep, brakes are going to get tested.
(contemplative guitar music)
(energetic electric music)
(rocks crunching)
(energetic electric music)
- [Neil] So why would you go for a four-piston brake
over a two-piston one?
- [Blake] Well the more pistons a brake has,
the more power you'll have on tap.
Good to have for gravity riding
and if you're a heavier rider too.
- [Neil] Bigger brakes will also deal
with the heat build up that occurs
during long sustained braking, like on long descents,
better than their lighter, two-pot equivalent.
- [Blake] So it's a balancing act.
If light weight is more important
than out and out power of less gravity focused riding,
then look at two-pot brakes.
- [Neil] And if braking power for big descents
is more important than saving a few grams,
then go for four-pot brakes.
(energetic electronic music)
- Good day out then Blake?
- Amazing you know?
We had every single flipping season known to mankind:
rain, super windy, and hot.
- Some of my favorite trails but a good variety as well.
We had some mellow for some stuff,
some pretty steep stuff in the end.
- We did yeah.
You know what, these brakes are perfect for
single-track, long-distance, quite mellow, beautiful riding.
When it gets a bit gnarly, the heat is up a little bit
they'll start to. - They will do a bit.
I mean, I like four-pot brakes.
They're big, they're powerful, I like having too much power.
I've also got definitely the tires for the day.
- Yeah, I needed different tires
- Because that's going to help your stopping power.
- It definitely is Neil.
Now would you run a two-pot on your trail bike,
because you know, it could be worth it.
- Yeah on my light-weight cross-country bike,
I've got two-pots and they're great.
And you can always go up on rotor size,
if you wanted more power.
- Yeah, so if you had a two-pot,
you would just make the rotor a little bit bigger.
- Yeah
- Yeah, I think that's good enough.
- Right, if you want to see another video
featuring Shimano, the new XT and yeah
so let's click down there for that one.
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- Thumbs up! - See you!