This was the last detail that needed to be sorted for the PVD Millennium Falcon build. I had left the rear brake adapter to the end of the project as I figured that I had something to work. I hadn’t . Little details escape.
This happened as my memory of using a FM160 to PM180 was left from the era of the 2018 PVD Warbird. That was prior to the release of FM32 (Shimano) or FM30.5 (SRAM) specification, when I was wildcatting my own FM40 spec. It’s a big difference and now, using FM32, there were no adapters available that would work.
To get up and running with the Millennium Falcon, I made a quick prototype adapter on the manual mill. That served me very well during my road trip to Colorado and even a downhill day at Keystone. The problem, it was ugly as sin.
Good news though, before I left on my trip, I added some adapters to an order at a CNC shop that I already had going for some tooling parts. While I was away, the parts were cut, anodized, and in the mail. They arrived just after I got back. Poetry!
This is not my first foray into brake caliper adapters, I had done a few for the Sidewinder system, PVD Sidewinder to 180mm post mount adapter. Those were very cool and had a ‘moto GP’ look to them. I wanted these to take a similar form but the shape evolved very differently. Still cool.
What’s really nice about working with both the prototype and the CNC versions of this adapter is how easy setup of the caliper is. The footprint is awesome and allows for a precise and rigid mount. It takes so little time and effort to get set up and rolling.
Now, hopefully we can see the 4-pot flat mount calipers that I’ve been waiting for someone to produce.
