I only noticed it now but I see that the front brakes are behind the forks, in the fashion of the Nomad. The current Raven has the brakes in front of the forks. Could anyone explain the pros and cons of being in front or behind ?
When I got my Raven Sport Tour this niggled me a bit, because it was different from what I was used to.
I soon forgot about this difference. Once I got the brakes set up with in-line adjusters (necessary on my set-up with NOS XTR parallelogram V-brakes and Tektro drop-bar levers) I stopped thinking about the brakes. They just work.
I haven't noticed any real difference between XTR V-brakes behind the forks and the Deore LX V-brakes in front of the forks on my "utility" Raven Tour. I do notice a difference in feel and response between my "utility" Raven Tour and my "touring" Raven Tour, the latter has Deore XT V-brakes, CSS rims and the special brake pads for CSS.
One disadvantage of the Raven Sport Tour front brake position is that it would be very difficult to fit cantilever brakes. Which I prefer over V-brakes, but probably mainly because I have used cantis for 42 years and V-brakes for only 7 years.