# DT cable routing with continuous housing - recommendations



## jocko (Apr 29, 2005)

I'd like to route the derailleur cables on an mtb frame down the DT, but use continuous housing. Any suggestions on how to manage the bottom bracket area? Just use a zip tie mount on the bottom of the bb? Or what have others done? Thanks.


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## j-ro (Feb 21, 2009)

I've done a dt routed brake hose and it came off better by going over the bb and along the top of the cs to the brake. I would imagine that doing the same for the rear mech would be kind of cludgy behind the rings and just under the chain.
my guess woud be that a ziptie stop 4-5" above the bb and 3-4" out along the bottom of the chainstay would be fine there. I think when I was playing with the routing for the hose it just didn't want to lay tight against the shell.

jake


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## jeff (Jan 13, 2004)

How about gong internal?


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## MDEnvEngr (Mar 11, 2004)

I'm with Jake. Down the underside of the TT, and then across the top of the BB and out the chainstays. Hose/housing lays nice. The hose/housing can also protect the DT from rocks and such. B


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## j-ro (Feb 21, 2009)

MDEnvEngr said:


> I'm with Jake. Down the underside of the TT, and then across the top of the BB and out the chainstays. Hose/housing lays nice. The hose/housing can also protect the DT from rocks and such. B


That looks fine on the drive side, perfect chainslap protector!

I love how clean that is where they double up underneath on your brazeons.


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## Drew Diller (Jan 4, 2010)

Same vote as the others, that was how I did some routing for a NuVinci hub.


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## coconinocycles (Sep 23, 2006)

I hate zip-ties - it looks 1/2 baked on a custom frame......
go over to the Internal Hub forum, lots of ideas there, if you do a search on Coconino/Rohloff you will come up with one I did in foam green that came out really tight - Steve Garro, Coconino Cycles.


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## coconinocycles (Sep 23, 2006)

Here you go.........
The stop you see is for a BP front derailleur and there are "O's" for a traditional rear derailleur as well - what ever you want and not in your face, as camo as I could make it.
- Steve Garro, Coconino Cycles.


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## bsieb (Aug 23, 2003)

coconinocycles said:


> Here you go.........
> The stop you see is for a BP front derailleur and there are "O's" for a traditional rear derailleur as well - what ever you want and not in your face, as camo as I could make it.
> - Steve Garro, Coconino Cycles.


Beautious! How about brake hose, any alternatives to ziptyes there?


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## coconinocycles (Sep 23, 2006)

bsieb said:


> Beautious! How about brake hose, any alternatives to ziptyes there?


Yeah - bleed your brakes - they come too long anyway & a custom bike deserves it. 
XT's take what - 10-15min to bleed, tops? 
Zipties suck.
ugly, sharp, and they bust. 
A well bled line is sleek and tucked away from damage......
- Steve Garro, Coconino Cycles.


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## MDEnvEngr (Mar 11, 2004)

coconinocycles said:


> I hate zip-ties - it looks 1/2 baked on a custom frame......


Then I'd say 99% of the custom frames out there are half baked. I like your hoop solution and have used it on a couple of frames. But it's a pain for the end user overall. Fine when internal conduit is used on the frame, because the user is already committed to threading their hose/housing anyway.

The normal hose/housing guides you see are terrible...the slot for the zip tie is impossible to get coated and there the rust starts. The bent-up-flat ones that hold the hose without a zip tie are worse looking than the zip tie...but they do solve the rust issue and get rid of the dreaded zip tie.

I have bent spokes and wires and washers and tubes and all sorts of things to make hose/housing guides...most ended up in the trash can. The perfect guide needs to be clean, easy to use, easily produced, light, stainless, and cheap. It needs to hold the hose sightly off the tube. It must allow full coating/painting. When someone comes up with one, they'll go like hotcakes!

B


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## Walt (Jan 23, 2004)

*Check out bikelugs.com*

Kirk's are made from stainless steel sheet cut/pressed to hold a hose/housing and a ziptie (or safety wire, or whatever). They weigh 1 gram each. Not super cheap at $1/guide, but IMO they are the best thing out there.

BikeLugs.com

I find anything that has to be threaded through too annoying to deal with on my own personal bikes - and I'm always swapping components around. So zipties (or safety wire) are what I generally do.

-Walt



MDEnvEngr said:


> I have bent spokes and wires and washers and tubes and all sorts of things to make hose/housing guides...most ended up in the trash can. The perfect guide needs to be clean, easy to use, easily produced, light, stainless, and cheap. It needs to hold the hose sightly off the tube. It must allow full coating/painting. When someone comes up with one, they'll go like hotcakes!
> 
> B


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## jocko (Apr 29, 2005)

Wow - a lot of passion around the poor ziptie! I like the option of being able to easily swap parts, but agree it's not the most aesthetically pleasing.

Steve - for the front, you stopped the housing before the BB. Any thoughts on ways to run housing under BB and then stop somewhere before front mech? Or does your example prove to be best solution?

Thanks gang.


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## coconinocycles (Sep 23, 2006)

MDEnvEngr said:


> Then I'd say 99% of the custom frames out there are half baked.
> B


Fair Enough.
- Steve Garro, Coconino Cycles.


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## Raumfahrer Rolf (Apr 18, 2007)

Has anyone designed the cable routing on a bike around Ragley's cable guides (single or triple)? They seem like a pretty "clean" way to manage full length housing. But, as a non-builder, I have no idea how easy they are to build with.


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## Walt (Jan 23, 2004)

*I think...*

I think you'd just use blind water bottle bosses and bolt the guides on. IMO, not any cleaner looking than zipties, but not difficult to build with either. I could see those being a nice solution in some cases. Great find!

-Walt



Raumfahrer Rolf said:


> Has anyone designed the cable routing on a bike around Ragley's cable guides (single or triple)? They seem like a pretty "clean" way to manage full length housing. But, as a non-builder, I have no idea how easy they are to build with.


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## DWF (Jan 12, 2004)

DT routing is the only way to go, imo. It's the cleanest and requires the least maintenance if done right. But I don't run full housing. I put the stops on the DT then use a guide under the BB like you'd do on a road bike. Stop on the chainstay. The important thing is to have all the cable ends pointing down and no bends downward in the housing so gravity keeps the water/crap out & if it does get in, it can drain. Don't have any good pics of it, but you can get the idea here:


ELROYs_nancy by Anvil Bikes, on Flickr


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## shandcycles (Jan 15, 2008)

Raumfahrer Rolf said:


> Has anyone designed the cable routing on a bike around Ragley's cable guides (single or triple)? They seem like a pretty "clean" way to manage full length housing. But, as a non-builder, I have no idea how easy they are to build with.


I've used those quite a lot. No recent pics show them very well but this frame from a couple of years ago used them.

This was an S&S Rohloff bike so they're pretty handy as the cable and cable box can be removed for packing without screwing up the cable tension.


mór dearg by shandcycles, on Flickr


mór dearg by shandcycles, on Flickr

there's a bunch more pics on the Flickr site


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## customfab (Jun 8, 2008)

Running housing on top of the chain stay to the RD just seams like a horrible idea. With the chain smashing the crap out of it, it won't last long. Of course if your going to cover it with one of those big ugly neoprene chain stay protectors it won't matter.


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## shiggy (Dec 19, 1998)

Raumfahrer Rolf said:


> Has anyone designed the cable routing on a bike around Ragley's cable guides (single or triple)? They seem like a pretty "clean" way to manage full length housing. But, as a non-builder, I have no idea how easy they are to build with.


I have used plastic "P" clips bolted to a bottle braze on for housing guides. Can stack Several clips on one bolt. I have three under the TT.


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## MDEnvEngr (Mar 11, 2004)

customfab said:


> Running housing on top of the chain stay to the RD just seams like a horrible idea. With the chain smashing the crap out of it, it won't last long. Of course if your going to cover it with one of those big ugly neoprene chain stay protectors it won't matter.


:thumbsup:

I'm only getting 2 years on the housing before I have to replace it, but I don't ride that much: I'm at only 151 rides so far this year. To me the housing is a consumable...if I can make it do double duty as a chainstay protector I'm going to. Why do the opposite and make the chainstay protect the housing?

Cheers! B


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## rocwandrer (Oct 19, 2008)

jocko said:


> Wow - a lot of passion around the poor ziptie! I like the option of being able to easily swap parts, but agree it's not the most aesthetically pleasing.
> 
> Steve - for the front, you stopped the housing before the BB. Any thoughts on ways to run housing under BB and then stop somewhere before front mech? Or does your example prove to be best solution?
> 
> Thanks gang.


If I understand the question correctly, that is a bad idea, IMO. Better to either top pull a top tube run full housing, or run bare housing to the head tube end of the downtube and then bare cable to the derailleur. If you run full housing to a stop on the bottom of the seat tube, you'll have created a local low point for crap to collect inside the housing.


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## customfab (Jun 8, 2008)

MDEnvEngr said:


> :thumbsup:
> 
> I'm only getting 2 years on the housing before I have to replace it, but I don't ride that much: I'm at only 151 rides so far this year. To me the housing is a consumable...if I can make it do double duty as a chainstay protector I'm going to. Why do the opposite and make the chainstay protect the housing?
> 
> Cheers! B


Because even with new housing your one long rock garden away from failure.


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## Meriwether (Jul 26, 2007)

I know I'm not saying anything really new here, but I tend to agree with Steve that zip-ties are ugly, sharp, break, and aren't the most suave solution on a custom bike...but there really aren't many options out there unless you make your own or use the hoops. 
The "hydro" ones that someone brought up are pretty cool IMO especially for forks, but they are sharp if you happen to catch your skin on one and they bend and rust. It seems like they could be redesigned making them rounder/cleaner/better (I think).

The Pacenti stainless ones are not too bad in cost if you include the Paragon zip-tie ones in your search (!!). I like to use the Pacenti's too since they are pretty adaptable to any use and any diameter tube. But...they're zip tie.

The hoops are nice, but you better make damned sure you once you bleed your brakes you're DONE with futzing with your cables and don't swap stuff between bikes at all. I had the hoops on a previous bike and I hated them for the rear derailleur since I couldn't clean the cable as easily. But for an internal hub or running full housing to the derailleurs they're the bomb since the cables rarely need to be serviced.

I think we should collectively come up with a new design and ask PMW or Pacenti to make it happen...! Anyone...?


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## Cracked Headtube (Apr 16, 2006)

I use the Surly guides a lot. I like their surface area. But I got a bunch of the Pacenti guides on sale a while back so I'm burning through those for the time being. I just did my first downtube routed full brake housing and ran 3 pacenti guides along the underside of the downtube, brazed on, and two on the top of the chainstay. The hose goes on top of the BB shell. I played around with mock-up routing ideas, and this way seemed to be the most straight forward. 
SHIGGY: Where did you find those black guides? I haven't looked extensively, but while browsing I could only find white. I saw Rick Hunter using those a few years ago, and like the idea. 

Specialized uses some alloy bolt-on guides on some full-sussers, and it was very easy to over haul that bike and replace housing as needed. I'm pretty sure they were cast (not machined) aluminum bits. Perhaps I'll call 'Big S' tomorrow and inquire on replacements.....


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## shiggy (Dec 19, 1998)

Cracked Headtube said:


> I use the Surly guides a lot. I like their surface area. But I got a bunch of the Pacenti guides on sale a while back so I'm burning through those for the time being. I just did my first downtube routed full brake housing and ran 3 pacenti guides along the underside of the downtube, brazed on, and two on the top of the chainstay. The hose goes on top of the BB shell. I played around with mock-up routing ideas, and this way seemed to be the most straight forward.
> SHIGGY: Where did you find those black guides? I haven't looked extensively, but while browsing I could only find white. I saw Rick Hunter using those a few years ago, and like the idea.
> 
> Specialized uses some alloy bolt-on guides on some full-sussers, and it was very easy to over haul that bike and replace housing as needed. I'm pretty sure they were cast (not machined) aluminum bits. Perhaps I'll call 'Big S' tomorrow and inquire on replacements.....


Black P-clips use to be everywhere. Not so much now, at least in the smallest size needed for housing guides.


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## jocko (Apr 29, 2005)

I just noticed that in the description of the Surly Krampus, the following is highlighted for the front dereg:

"Note that there is no housing stop for a front derailleur, as it was designed to run a high direct mount standard front derailleur. This type of derailleur will allow the most clearance at the tire."

Do any of you have experience with these new front derailleurs? Sounds like housing stop is included in derailleur (like rear). Do they work with both top and bottom routing?


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