Uh... ok?
I'm not a professional. I've just been riding for transportation since the 1970's, build my own bikes etc. etc. You learn stuff over time. Wasn't saying anything against you or your bike. Its just that cabled brakes require adjustment. For some people thats an issue. We've seen it become a much bigger one recently thanks to the Rad lawsuit. A LOT of people are now riders for whom the need for mechanical brake adjustments are too much to wrap their heads around... let alone deal with.
Twelve-year-old Molly Steinsapir crashed onto the pavement from a Rad Power e-bike and never woke up. With a poorly regulated e-bike industry, who is responsible when a child dies?
www.bicycling.com
I've never needed to clean brake pads. If you like doing it, I guess thats great.
I agree. The problem, I think, started with Lectric's choice of pads, which seem heavy on the metal side of things. They're pretty noisy and wear fast. The mechanical brakes must be adjusted precisely on the 3.0. First you must align the calipers over the rotors for even pad application and without the calipers interfering with the wheel spokes. Then you must make sure the cable is set properly. If you have too much slack in the cable, you won't get enough braking before the pads are fully engaged and the handles run out of room and bottom out. Too little cable slack and the calipers run out of room before the pads are fully engaged. And on top of all that, you have the stationary piston on the wheel side that must be set accordingly and moved in towards the rotor as the pads wear down. There's a set screw you must loosen first, accessible from the top. To do these things, you'll need two different size hex wrenches - 5mm and 2mm and you have to pay attention to proper torque settings (in the manual), so there's that tool as well.
But wait, there's more. You must also first ensure your rear wheel is set properly in the forks to allow the pads to set down far enough over the rotor to fully engage or you will certainly form override lips on the pads which will also render your brakes useless at some point. And doing so might not eliminate the pad lips forming. But there are special parts (unique washers and brackets) you can buy to adjust the pads up and down precisely, but that information has been posted here already. You need some mechanical ability and acquired knowledge to do all of these things correctly. Otherwise you can run out of brakes and that's never a good thing. Sadly, these mechanical skills are no longer the norm. I know lots of people who can play video games quiet well, but cannot change a flat tire.
True story - I helped a guy plug a tire on his car the other day who had stuck duct tape over the nail hole, expecting it to get him to a repair facility. He was clueless. It's sad we haven't passed basic mechanical skills on from generation to generation. But the one salvation is likely the plethora of online videos showing these skills, so you can indeed still learn these things from others. I suggest you do.
In the meantime, you might be able to request new pads from Lectric. They sent me a free set for each of my two 3.0 bikes. They look identical to the ones I recently bought on Amazon (4 sets for $10 and change). These pads have a more uniform metal bit matrix and are quiet compared to the original pads. They seem to brake and wear better, but I'm still looking forward to the hydraulic system upgrade to eliminate most of the above maintenance protocol.
