Shimano BR-M375 vs Zoom DB680: Long-Term Commuter Review

After 10 years and over 15,000 km of commuting in all weather conditions, I’ve tested both the Shimano BR-M375 and the Zoom DB680.

One of them nearly left me without brakes on a downhill. The other has been running for 6 years without a single cable failure.

If you're considering mechanical disc brakes for commuting, here’s what actually matters.

Why I chose mechanical and not hydraulic?

The bike came with integrated brakes / shifters. I wanted to update from V Brakes for a very simple reason and is not the lack of power. I ride my bike in all seasons and in all kinds of weather. In the rain rim brakes eat aluminum rims like cake. Fed up by this I decided to switch to disc brakes.

Because I didn't want to change the shifters on the bike (they are combo unit brake - shifter)  instead of getting hydraulic I went the other route and go mechanical brakes. I didn't purchased the Avid BB7 as it was not easy to get at a decent price. It was more expensive than hydraulic systems, and I felt it was not worth it. I could just get for the same money new hydraulic brakes + shifters.

My first contact with mechanical disc brakes was in 2016 when I installed the Shimano Altus BR M375. After 4 years and 8.400 km I switched to the Zoom DB680 in 2020.

In total I  ran the two systems for 10 years and 15.400 km. Because of this I feel I have enough experience to say the good and the bad. Shimano was on the bike for 4 years and 8.400 km while the Zoom DB680 is still on the bike after 6 years and 7.300 km and counting.

My experience with Shimano M375 caliper after 4 years and 8400 km

Shimano BR M375 like most mechanical brakes on the market has only one moving piston and a fixed one. To compensate for pad wear you can move inward the fixed caliper. But when the pads are worn in this is not enough, as the distance between the moving piston and the rotor is high, and you have a lot of travel without engagement. The second option is to reposition the caliper and do the adjustment from the fixed piston. I had to do a lot of readjustments and sometimes it was not enough. So to limit the number of times I had to move the caliper I shortened the travel of the piston (clamping the cable higher). But this caused another very annoying issue, cable snaps. Because the construction of the caliper and the way the position the cable gets when the pads are worn causes the cable to bend repeatedly and finally it snaps. Clamping the cable higher exacerbated this issue. I had enough of this cable snaps as I was changing one almost every month and at some point while descending a hill I felt the cable snapping and the travel of the lever extending as more and more strains would snap. I managed to stop but the entire back brake had only 2 strands left.

Even though the brakes are robust and powerful the disadvantages were too big for me.

I researched dual piston mechanical calipers. At that time locally there were not many options, at least not my budget, so I bought the Zoom DB680 dual caliper from Aliexpress. 

Zoom DB 680 after 6 years on the bike and over 7.000 km

I was always very hesitant about Chinese brakes and I did a bit of research before buying them. My biggest concern was the reliability of the system as it is extremely important to have a reliable braking system. 

One thing that speaks for itself, the brakes are durable and reliable. Even though I had doubts at the beginning about this topic, longevity and reliability.

My first experience with them was mounting on the bike. This was not an experience without issues. I had to file one of the calipers clamping holes as it wasn't aligning properly with the disc. Not a good start. Also there was not that much material that could be removed, so I filed carefully.

But after installed they worked really good. Comparing the braking with the Shimano caliper the action is very different.

First, they have a lighter action, you don't have to exercise as much force in the brake lever.

Second the braking is not as powerful as the Shimano, but plenty enough. And the delivery of the brake force is much more linear and forgiving. Even if you grab a lot of front brake it won't throw you off the bike, they have a progressive feel. For extreme stuff probably they are not a good option, but for most people and especially for commuting I think this is a very good thing.

For example with the Shimano I had to pay attention to my braking so I would not lock the back wheel. With the Zoom DB 680 is much harder to do it. If you grab a lot of brake you can feel how it increases progressively the braking force and when you are at that point you can back off just a little tiny bit. Many would say that this is a weak brake, and they would be right, but I think it is absolutely genius. Of course the experience might vary, I am a heavy rider 90kg + bike + occasional baggage well over 100 kg total mass.

Since switching to the Zoom I never had a cable snap on me again.

Dual piston mechanical brake are better than single piston ones. Adjusting the brakes is much more easy to do. You will need  an allen key, I would prefer to be able to do this without tools but for the price you can't ask for everything. Being able to adjust the pads without a key would be awesome, even on the side of the road... (but on the other hand the BR M375 uses an allen key as well). 

Both pads can be adjusted independently so once you put the caliper on position you never have to readjust it. Both pads move in grabbing the rotor the same time, making the pad wear more equal. But I found that sometimes after adjusting the pads they would back off a tiny bit giving more travel in the lever. To address this I took them out of the caliper and placed thread locker on the threads. This solved the problem but it was not easy getting them back in position.

The brakes have barrel adjuster, combined with the adjuster from the shifter you can run the brakes quite a lot before needing to adjust the pads.

Another plus is that the caliper uses the Shimano pad, which is very popular and easy to replace. 

Final verdict on Zoom DB680 caliper

If for some reason you don't want to have hydraulic brakes, and you mainly use your bike for commute or for casual riding, then yes. It is a perfect brake for this kind of riding. 

It works, it is progressive (i consider this a huge benefit, to grab a lot of front brake and fly over the bar), reliable I had it for 6 years and over 7000 km and it is very affordable. Back in 2020 I payed for a set of calipers 23€ or 26$. Of course the prices increased but they are reasonable. At the time of writing this post I could find on Aliexpress 2 calipers + 2 rotors price including shipping 39€ or 45.5$. It uses the Shimano bs01 pad which is easy to replace.

Quick comparison table

	Shimano BR-M375	Zoom DB680
Piston action	Single	Dual
Power	High	Moderate
Modulation	Aggressive	Progressive
Maintenance	High	Low
Cable issues	Yes	No
Best for	Easy XC	Commuting/Recreational

 

Service your pedals in under 5 minutes guide

Most basic flat pedals are treated as disposable. When they start feeling gritty, they usually end up in the trash because servicing them is a nightmare. I’ve managed to get 12,000 km out of a cheap pair of Wellgo platforms over 8 years of all-season commuting and light XC riding. Even though I am not a light rider and ride in a hilly city they still spin smooth and work great.

Here is how you can prolong the life of almost any ball-bearing pedal for under 1 €/$.

Regular maintenance of pedals is a good way to increase their life. With ball bearings (nut and cone) regular maintenance can be very easy or complicated, depending how the system was designed.

But even with a proprietary system that doesn't put emphasis in easy serviceability you can still use this hack with no problem.

Not all nut and cone pedals are easy to work on. I have a pair of Wellgo flat pedals, one of their basic models. I serviced them 2 or 3 times until now and is was no walk in the park. The problem comes from the fact that the cone is recedes in the pedal body. And when you try to tighten the locking nut you have no way of holding the cone fixed in place. This style of pedals is not found just in cheap Wellgo pedals but can be found in Shimano, DMR and other lesser known brands. These type of pedals are viewed by some as disposable as they need propriety tools that are not cheap to be serviced.

There is no one tool to rule them all. For example Shimano uses 7 or 8 mm locking nut and 10 or 11 mm for the cone. For this you need the tool PD-63 that is a set of combined tubular keys with thin walls that allows to grip the cone and tighten the locking nut for a precise adjustment.

Wellgo in the pedal I have uses 9 and 13 mm lock-nut and cone. A system similar to DMR pedals. DMR makes a tool which is called DMR pedal tool V2 which works the same way as the Shimano. But DMR pedal tool V2 has a reasonable price.

It is not impossible to open the pedals and service them without the tools but it won't be a fun experience. Some people use a flat head screwdriver, but I found it cumbersome and not very reliable. It takes multiple tries to set it just right. You have to insert the screwdriver in such a way that yo block the cone from turning when you tighten the nut. It is not that easy, and in the end I ditched the screwdriver and over tighten the pedal then backed up the cone and it seamed to work better.

The result is that most people will not service their pedals and just throw them away when it's time and buy a new pair.

Of course there are other manufacturers of pedals manufacturers that have solved this issue without the need for a proprietary tool. The axel of the pedal is slotted and than a regular set of tubular keys will work just fine for tuning the cone and tightening the lock nut. Pedal manufacturers like HT, VP, Union/Marwi have serviceable ball bearing pedals. This system is much more easier to work on but still takes time to do it.

Coming back to my pedals and the difficulty of servicing them. 

The Wellgo pair that I am servicing is a cheap platform that I bought in 2018, and now in 2026 they have close to 12.000 km. I am a heavier rider, I ride in a hilly city, most of the km are commute. I am an all season bike commuter so the pedals don't have the easiest life.

I could buy the DMR pedal tool V2 and probably in the future I will as Wellgo uses the same size as DMR for the bolts, but I got intrigued by servicing the pedal without opening it. I am fascinated with DMR V8 classic pedals with grease port and by the design of the Shimano SPD pedals and GR500. These systems rely on new grease flushing the old dirty grease from the bearing. Even though Shimano and DMR took different paths the principle is the same.

How to clean dirty grease from any ball bearing pedal in less then 5 minutes without taking the pedal apart?

You do not need a grease port on the pedal, and you don't need to take the pedals off the bike. 

 

What do you need:

    Grease NLGI 2 general purpose is fine,

    10 ml syringe

    knife

    a pick or a screwdriver 

    paper towels and a trashcan nearby

Step by step - flushing the pedals

 

Step 1 - Preparation

Cut off the front part of the syringe, leaving behind a straight tube and the plunger. The diameter of the 10 ml syringe should fit in the pedal snugly.

Remove the dust cap from the pedal using a screwdriver or a pick 

You can see the old grease (motorex 2000), looks really good, but the this end, usually is pretty clean. The other end of the axle is where the dirt gets in, you will see in the flushed grease.

 

Step 2 - Flush the old grease out

Fill the syringe with new clean grease. I just dipped it in the container and sucked in the grease. Really easy and fast.

You need to apply a little bit of pressure so that the grease doesn't just exist around the syringe body and travels through the entire axle to the other end.

While I am flushing the pedal I rotate it in order to make sure that the new grease is going through all the bearings.

You will see the old dirty grease getting out on the opposite end. The grease coming out of my pedals looked like black sludge, not even close color compared with the neon green Motorex I put in 2 seasons ago.

The crank side of the pedal is where most of the dirt gets in, and by doing this purge you push the dirt out the same way it got in.

 

Step 3 - Clean the pedals and ride

Keep some paper towels and a trash can near by though.

When the grease coming out is clean the service is complete. Just clean the excess and you can jump to the other pedal.

 

Until now I used Motorex 2000 as it is a very good, sticky and water resistant grease, but for this method I switched to a cheaper alternative, a lithium calcium NLGI 2 grease from the local hardware store.

It is better to have clean and fresh grease in the bearings, although cheap, all the time than premium grease that has turned into grinding paste because you never change it.

One thing to take into account, not all greases are compatible so it is best to flush the pedals completely for the first time you do this. Next times you can just do a top up.

I bought the grease for 3€ / 3.5$ 400 ml, 2 syringes (10 ml) for 0.2€ / 0.23$ (you only need one, but I got a spare just in case).

  

One pedal needed 5 or 6 flushes of grease until the grease that was getting out on the opposite side was clean, while the other pedal only took 3 flushes. In total i used ~65 grams of grease from the tube which corresponds to ~70 ml according to Chat GPT.

So the 3 € / 3.5$ pack of grease should be enough to flush the pedals around 5-6 times. Which equates to 5 minutes of service and a cost of around 0.55€ / 0.64$ / service.

 

Let me know if you found this helpful. 

Review of the Garmin Forerunner 255

I have the watch for at least six months now. Even though it was year with less physical activities due to moving here renovation I had plenty of time to test the watch in different conditions. 

I use it mainly for recording runs and for cycling with the occasional strength training. 

Compared to cheaper and simpler fitness trackers it offers quite a bit of benefits that might make you get the proper sports watch. 

He does all the basics like monitor heart rate, step counter, not compared to a fitness tracker it has the GPS integrated so you don't have carry your phone with you and it has NFC as well. On top of this Garmin ofers a set of very useful features for people who like adventures and sports. 

If you're a hiker or you enjoy being in the nature on food on bicycle you have the three sensors barometer, sprinkler and compass. It is very nice because the watch can alert you know if a storm is coming. You can also watch what happened with the atmospheric pressure in the last hours so you can see if it's going up or down which may indicate rain. The compass is nice to have on your hand it can be useful in all kinds of situations even sitting environments where you are looking on your phone for directions. You can orient yourself very easily with a quick glass and the compass and seen in which direction you have to start walking.

For the sports enthusiasts you have access to: training plans, suggestions of activities, exercise load, progress, recovery. Also we can connect to Strava through the Connect app and send the starred segments to your phone.

I especially enjoy this features that monitor my activity load and how much should I train to improve my fitness or to keep it the current level.

The watch also displays the VO2 level, but will do so only for running. For cycling you need to purchase a power meter to be able to give you VO2 max. 

How to Maximize Battery Life on your Garmin Watch

 If you want the best batter life from your Garmin watch either for long activities away from civilization or you just don't want to charge your Garmin too often there are a few steps you can take to have a longer use time between charges.

How to get better battery life from Garmin watches? 

My Garmin Forerunner 255 has a great battery life, over 1 week usually with a single charge, and several activities per day. But I do adopt some of the following tips.

Backlight

Depending on the type of display you have this will offer different benefits in term of battery saving. Garmin 255 with a color MIP display is not that affected as an AMOLED but still you can see the benefits. 

In System / Display  there are 3 settings that you can take advantage off.

    During activity, General use and During sleep.

You can set the backlight brightness from 10% to 100%.
Timeout, again depending on the display different values will be available. The MIP display has the option of 4 sec, 8 sec, 15 sec, 30, sec, 1 min, no timeout. The standard 8 seconds seems to be enough during activity and during general use I am fine with 4 sec.
Gestures allows you to set up automatic lighting of the display at any hour or only after sunset.
During sleep I have gestures disabled as I do not want my watch to illuminate my sleep. I will press the light button if I need it.

Watch face

MIP displays (memory in picture) retain the information in each pixel, and update individual pixels as needed. So if you use a simple watch face with not much changing data you will have the best out of the display. My current watch face only displays the day and date, time (no seconds) steps and barometric pressure.

Also having less information on the display means that less sensors are used all the time and this will consume less energy.

You can choose any watch face from the connect app, but the standard watch faces on the watch will probably offer the best optimization regarding battery.

Sensors

 Pulse Ox takes quite some power out of the watch, so having it on all day all night will drain the battery much quicker. You can set it to record the oxygen blood saturation all day, during the day, during the night, or on request. On request is the best if you want best battery life out of your watch. And I don't find very useful to have it running all day an night. Especially if you are not training at 5000 meter altitude

Connectivity

If you are in a pinch you can stop the Bluetooth on the watch, I get around 2 extra days just by not having my watch connected to the phone all the time. If you don't care for getting notifications then you can keep it off for the most part of the day. Don't worry, your activities are safe, and will get synchronized with your phone once you activate the Bluetooth.

Battery saver

 The Battery save profile is a quick and fast way to gain extra days of battery if you are in a pinch. The Battery Saver will stop the Heart Rate Sensor, Pulse Ox, and body battery. Along with it will stop the Bluetooth and will change the watch face to a simple one.

Satellites

Garmin Forerunner 255 has a few options for which satellites it uses when it tracks activities. As standard Auto is selected, but you can change it in Settings / Satellites.

Off if you don't want tracking and you really want to conserve the battery.
GPS only which offers good battery life, with ok accuracy
All Systems uses all available satellites which offers better accuracy, with decent battery life
All + Multi Band is the best for accuracy, but not as good for battery life
Ultra Trac, best battery but not very good accuracy

Power modes on some Garmin watch models

Some Garmin watches will have Settings / Power modes which is an easy way to change between power saving settings with a single click. Unfortunately it is not available on the Garmin Forerunner 255

Pause/Resume later activity 

Last tip is for long activities that stretch over hours and you take a brake. Let's say you go riding your bike and stop for a coffee and donuts. You can pause the activity, but the watch will continue to be connected to the satellites and all the sensors. So for better battery life it is better to select Pause / resume later. The activity will be saved and will resume when you start it again (it doesn't create 2 different activities)