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V-Brake ®
A Shimano trademark for a direct-pull cantilever brake, which does not use a separate transverse cable. A V-Brake has two tall arms, one of which has a housing stop and the other an anchor bolt. The exposed part of the cable runs horizontally from one arm to the other.
V-Brakes and other direct-pull cantilevers have more mechanical advantage than other brakes, so they require special hand levers with less-than-average mechanical advantage to keep the overall mechanical advantage in a useful range.
Some V-Brakes also incorporate a parallelogram linkage which maintains the shoe at the correct angle as it approaches the rim. This feature also allows the motion of the shoe to be more nearly horizontal than with conventional cantilevers.
"V-Brake" is a Shimano trademark.
