This Space for Rent

kludge or clever hack?

Bosses for Paul Racer brakes

I’m building a frame that’s going to be fitted with Paul Racer brakes, but the ones I was given to put on the machine were ones with a backplate for mounting to the brake bridge and/or fork crown. Well, the offending frame is going to have a brake bridge and fork crown, but the holes drilled in those are dedicated to holding the fender in place (rear wheel) and rack in place (front wheel), so I needed to do some tweaking to make things fit.

So, for the front wheel I took a pair of U-brake bosses, and for the rear wheel I took a pair of 13mm offset canti bosses, then chopped the actual bosses off so I was left with the bases & a bit of threaded hole. So I can take the existing brake mounts (which are a pair of unthreaded bosses that are loaded by a bolt and the Paul Racer spring boss), unscrew them from the backplate, and bolt them into these bases. It’s about $7 of bosses, which if it works is a good solution that keeps the brakes in a state where they can be removed and reassembled in the original form if the rider decides they want to use Dia-Compe, MAFAC, or even V- or cantilever brakes instead.