Well done you!I've ridden to work for the first time on my new (second hand) bike -13km. Didn't manage to finish on way home though, tired legs and uphill most of the way .
Just kidding, thats not possible.Finally i learned how to get my cross rim brakes to stop howling.
Cross rim? I had screeching from my V brakes and it turned out to be a couple of things, first one side was making contact when the other wasn't, and the second was that lubrication got on my rims when I did my gears, it turns out that this is a bad thing. Sheldon Brown provided the solution.
I toe in my V brake pads (on the hybrid) using the same piece of cardboard as my road brake blocks- No squealing, that's with standard Clarkes brake pads about 3 1/2- 4 inch longYes. In truth the reason cross bike v brakes screech is that on a cross bike you get up to much faster speeds, and with softer pads (which are better for the rim) pressing hard they vibrate at a high frequency which emits loud noise. Also, it should be noted that towing-in or out hurts the performance and is difficult to do with the longer pads: with a strong brake is really not possible, so unlike road bike brakes you can't just tow them in/out. Cleaning the rim doesn't help that much, and if i roughen up the pad surfaces i can lose a good amount of milage so other than harder pads-which work great for low speeds off road but heat up and damage the rim at higher speeds- there is no solution.
.........Took me about 5 hours with loads of breaks to watch utube vids on how to do it.
Bin there