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Another cable compression solution.

Posted: Sun May 25, 2014 5:09 pm
by TheBrownDog
Here's my solution to some cable compression dramas I had a few months ago. I use a Wildcat bar harness and love its versatility - good bit of design and production. But Ive always been worried about it crushing the brake cables and after a fast and bumpy two days in the Peaks District I was riding down my driveway, gave the brakes a squeeze and the rear brake cable popped out of the reservoir. I was pretty keen to sort it out.

I saw the recent thread using handlebar clamps but Id always be worried they might fail under prolonged stress, so I bought an alloy accessory bar form SJS Cycles. This weighs around 110g and usually attaches to your steerer above your stem to carry your handlebar furnishings. I put it under the stem and inverted it to clear the bars and give room for the cables.

I finally gave it a proper thrashing yesterday - 25 miles of miserable muddy Chilterns bridleways loaded with a 13L Alpkit drybar with my bedroll stuffed inside it and it works like a bought one. Very stable - even more stable than hanging it from the bars though I'm not sure why - and the cables are free and clear to do their thing. As a bonus the bag is lower so has less effect on handling and no longer gets in the way of my lights. So Im well chuffed.

You need at least 27mm of vacant steerer space to fit one and if you have small frame or use a large drybag you might find front wheel clearance an issue. It fits very well on my large 26er Inbred.

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Re: Another cable compression solution.

Posted: Sun May 25, 2014 6:09 pm
by SteveM
great idea, sjs cycles are a real resource for this kind of stuff

Re: Another cable compression solution.

Posted: Mon May 26, 2014 9:27 am
by Hoojum
Ingenious solution TheBrownDog.

Re: Another cable compression solution.

Posted: Mon May 26, 2014 2:51 pm
by Farawayvisions
Now that I've changed handlebars to On one Marys, I've found that there is a bit of pressure on my cables when the wildcat is fitted. The accessory bar is a good idea, but with my small bike, I don't have clearance to mount the bicycle any lower. I'll have to watch out for another gizmo.

Re: Another cable compression solution.

Posted: Mon May 26, 2014 4:55 pm
by Hoojum
Farawayvisions, how about this simple but effective method using plumbing pipe or something similar. It's worked for me and kept my dry bag rock solid and away from cables for many a trip. Your man from Alpkit seems to think its a winner too.https://www.alpkit.com/develop/wrt-follow-up

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Nathan

Re: Another cable compression solution.

Posted: Mon May 26, 2014 5:20 pm
by Farawayvisions
Nathan
That looks like a low cost solution. The wilcat harness is slightly different but it looks like it might be a winner for me. Must go look in the local skip for a discarded length next weekend, Cheers! I'll check back in again with a pic. :-bd
Meraid

Re: Another cable compression solution.

Posted: Mon May 26, 2014 8:07 pm
by Ray Young
Hoojum, that is brilliant, light, simple, cheap and I'm guessing very effective. Well done that man :-bd .

Re: Another cable compression solution.

Posted: Tue May 27, 2014 7:26 pm
by numplumz
Now that is inspired, hats off that man :-bd

Re: Another cable compression solution.

Posted: Tue May 27, 2014 7:30 pm
by durhambiker
Good thinking. Had brake hose issues over the weekend after strapping my drybag to the bars, and realised the front hose was rubbing on the tyre. Noticed a few miles before it rubbed all the way through...

Re: Another cable compression solution.

Posted: Sat Nov 29, 2014 6:57 pm
by Farawayvisions
I've tried Hoojum's pipe idea on the Wildcat harness. It's not working for me as I need to keep the bag pretty high on the bars to get clearance on the wheel and the webbing only passes once through the pipe meaning that there is no stability of the pipe. Here's a few pics of a rough attempt so you can see what I mean. I'd be delighted to hear if there are any more ideas please.
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Re: Another cable compression solution.

Posted: Sat Nov 29, 2014 7:55 pm
by Dave42w
Been looking for options on bikes without enough headset spacer height for the St John Street Cycles accessory bar.

The Nitto Lamp holder 23 looks the best: http://sprockets.uk.com/nitto-lamp-holder-2/ but at nearly £60 not exactly cheap.

I suspect a number of handlebar accessory mounts might be made to work for some bike/load combinations

eg 2 of these? http://practicalcycles.com/products/241 ... ories.aspx

or this if you can get it to the UK http://www.avt.bike/WebStore/merchant.m ... Mount-Wide

Two of these might not be strong enough. But if you joined them with a tube maybe for a lightish bag? http://www.sjscycles.co.uk/tate-labs-ba ... prod33702/

Maybe even bar ends in the middle of the handlebar pointing downwards to stop the bag hitting the stem?

Re: Another cable compression solution.

Posted: Sat Nov 29, 2014 8:00 pm
by Dave42w
Or how about this http://www.velovitality.co.uk/collectio ... less-stems

mount it on the bottom of the faceplate to push the bag forward?

Re: Another cable compression solution.

Posted: Sat Nov 29, 2014 8:03 pm
by jameso
Friend of mine uses barends just as you describe there. Worked fine on 2 big rides we've done together, he's happy with it.

Re: Another cable compression solution.

Posted: Sat Nov 29, 2014 8:06 pm
by jameso
Farawayvisions, that rear bake hose kink at the lever entry point may be worth checking over..

Re: Another cable compression solution.

Posted: Sat Nov 29, 2014 8:41 pm
by Farawayvisions
Dave, thanks a million for going the extra mile here. I really appreciate it. An extra bar with clamps might just be the business. I have a nice piece of carbon tubing I can use if I can get a couple of clamps to fit. :smile:

Jameso
I will be checking all my cables (I mean hoses) in the next few days. Thanks for spotting. The front brake kink is even worse. Of course a Jones Bar would do everything I want, but santa will probably be unable to locate me. :wink:

Re: Another cable compression solution.

Posted: Sat Nov 29, 2014 8:52 pm
by Ray Young
Farawayvisions wrote:I will be checking all my cables in the next few days. Thanks for spotting. The front brake kink is even worse. Of course a Jones Bar would do everything I want, but santa will probably be unable to locate me. :wink:
Meraid, if you end up needing to have your cables replaced then getting longer ones fitted may solve the problem of them getting kinked.

Re: Another cable compression solution.

Posted: Sat Nov 29, 2014 9:09 pm
by Farawayvisions
Ray,
You are absolutely right. That is indeed the correct fix. Hopefully, I won't need to, I've enough to get ready at this stage, It's fun to come up with solutions though. :-)

Re: Another cable compression solution.

Posted: Sat Nov 29, 2014 9:29 pm
by fatbikephil
I space mine out at the fork end using an ortelib light bar you get with their bar bags - also keeps the straps away from the lower headset cup on unicrown forks.

Re: Another cable compression solution.

Posted: Sun Nov 30, 2014 11:56 am
by MidgeMagnet
I use hoojums idea with slighty longer conduit. Seems to work well for me with no harness so its a good cheap solution.

Couple of pics...
http://instagram.com/p/riBAUiubl3/

http://instagram.com/p/qH1pJWubqD/

Re: Another cable compression solution.

Posted: Sat Dec 06, 2014 7:41 pm
by Farawayvisions
With five days to go until the ride in Morocco, I've opted for new brake hoses. Jameso suggested in an earlier post that I might have a kink in the hose, it turned out that I did so the rear hose was reused and cut then refitted to the front and a new one fitted to the back. Looks like it will be great. Next job for the new year is replacing the gear cables.

Here's the new arrangement.
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Re: Another cable compression solution.

Posted: Mon Jan 06, 2020 11:30 pm
by stevewaters
Thanks for your ideas on here. I have used the accessory bar from SJS Cycles to mount my Wildcat Lion harness. - I am delighted with the results - It doesn't squash the cables and it leaves all the hand placements available. I had 2 x 25mm spacers and just swapped out the bottom spacer for the accessory bar - see attached pic :smile:

Re: Another cable compression solution.

Posted: Tue Jan 07, 2020 12:18 am
by restlessshawn
Wow thread resurrection, bit confused by the problem though as it’s possible to set the wildcat lion up to leave a cable gap :wink:

Re: Another cable compression solution.

Posted: Tue Jan 07, 2020 12:33 am
by stevewaters
Yes - Searching back and finding that old thread helped me devise a solution so I was just adding to it in the hope it might help others.
A cable sawed a hole in my (carbon) head tube last year - probably my incompetence in setting up the Lion. Also, after getting quite severe numb hands and losing opposable grip after last years HT550 I have installed stub bars which the harness was fouling. - Each to their own ! :-bd

Re: Another cable compression solution.

Posted: Thu Jan 09, 2020 2:31 pm
by belugabob
restlessshawn wrote: Tue Jan 07, 2020 12:18 am Wow thread resurrection, bit confused by the problem though as it’s possible to set the wildcat lion up to leave a cable gap :wink:
Not necessarily - it depends on the brake levers, hose exit angles and headtube size.
Wildcat harness fits fine to my Merlin Malt, with no hose issues. My Trek marlin 29er, however, just won't work (but may, with the help of one of those SJS extenders.

I'm also considering the SJS extender, to enable use of the harness on my road bike - but it's probably not a good idea, with a carbon steerer, as the bung doesn't go down far enough to provide support from crushing

Re: Another cable compression solution.

Posted: Tue Jan 14, 2020 1:16 pm
by belugabob
stevewaters wrote: Mon Jan 06, 2020 11:30 pm Thanks for your ideas on here. I have used the accessory bar from SJS Cycles to mount my Wildcat Lion harness. - I am delighted with the results - It doesn't squash the cables and it leaves all the hand placements available. I had 2 x 25mm spacers and just swapped out the bottom spacer for the accessory bar - see attached pic :smile:
Any chance of a picture from the side, to get a better idea of cable/strap/accessory bar angles, please?