Much as I appreciate the simplicity and feeling of being connected to your bike when riding fixed, I'm nothing like as confident riding fixed in heavy traffic in town as I am with a freewheel and would still feel distinctly uncomfortable riding with just the one brake. I'm not suggesting for a moment that everyone else should have two brakes fitted, just saying that's what I need to feel comfortable riding in traffic, so I'd definitely think twice about riding SS with just the one brake, I guess it's a question of what your comfortable with and whether you want to run the risk of what happens if the one brake fails.
Maybe I'm being a bit cavalier but I can't see why, if you're careful, you'd neccessarily need to respray a frame just because you've drilled the rear brake stay. As I understand it sometimes manufacturers simply fit a standard brake bridge that they fill, making it even easier to drill, this obviously won't be the case if they've used a piece of tubing, but this shouldn't be that bigger deal to drill through. If you're reasonably carefull I'd have thought you could drill a clean hole without making a cosmetic mess of your frame and if you're (sensibly) worried about exposed metal corroding couldn't you cover it with a little clear laquer, you're not after all going to produce acres of exposed metal. I say all of the above with the clear provisio that I've never actually done this so am not claiming to know this from experience and will happily be corrected by someone who knows better.
Much as I appreciate the simplicity and feeling of being connected to your bike when riding fixed, I'm nothing like as confident riding fixed in heavy traffic in town as I am with a freewheel and would still feel distinctly uncomfortable riding with just the one brake. I'm not suggesting for a moment that everyone else should have two brakes fitted, just saying that's what I need to feel comfortable riding in traffic, so I'd definitely think twice about riding SS with just the one brake, I guess it's a question of what your comfortable with and whether you want to run the risk of what happens if the one brake fails.
Maybe I'm being a bit cavalier but I can't see why, if you're careful, you'd neccessarily need to respray a frame just because you've drilled the rear brake stay. As I understand it sometimes manufacturers simply fit a standard brake bridge that they fill, making it even easier to drill, this obviously won't be the case if they've used a piece of tubing, but this shouldn't be that bigger deal to drill through. If you're reasonably carefull I'd have thought you could drill a clean hole without making a cosmetic mess of your frame and if you're (sensibly) worried about exposed metal corroding couldn't you cover it with a little clear laquer, you're not after all going to produce acres of exposed metal. I say all of the above with the clear provisio that I've never actually done this so am not claiming to know this from experience and will happily be corrected by someone who knows better.