akkahagar

I bought a pair of Suntour barcons for my old road bike, a Schwinn Sprint. The bike has stem mounted Suntour shifters, and Suntour derailleurs as of now. The most that I have worked on a bike so far has been changing tubes.

Any advice at all on how to go about mounting the barcons? Any pointers to a guide that someone else has created? What tools would I need? I dont have the cables and the housing as of now, just the ratcheting shifters.

Thanks in advance.

sydney

Lacking a specific question sydney did not feel like writing a book,but is feeling more charitable after a good ride. The book would be very long due to all the possibilities.The short story is that many bikes with stem shifters have no cable stops or cable guides. The best wey to do barends is to have cable stops on the downtube, cable guide at the BB and cable stop on the right rear chainstay. The FD might also need to be ditched depending on how it is rigged.Lacking all the stops and guides, one can try and run casing all the way to the derailers and secure it to the frame with zip ties, but that is kinda the Bubba way.The casing will also need to be cut to length with the correct tool.

akkahagar

Thanks a lot, sydney.

Let me just point out how helpful your post was: I did not even know what a cable stop, a cable guide, etc. was. Since you threw out these words, I am reading up about them and would eventually fix it. For a complete newbie, even having a starting point helps greatly. Thanks a lot.

Sheldon Brown

This is a very worthwhile upgrade.

To install the shifters in the handlebars, you need to disassemble them. There's a funny little locknut that you work with a screwdriver, remove that, then unscrew the screw from the other side, and the lever/ratcheting assembly will slide out from the main body.

The main body has a 6 mm Allen socket that will now be revealed behind where the mechanism came out. Turning this counterclockwise expands the part that clamps inside the end of the handlebar.

This is often confusing because you epect to turn things clockwise to tighten them, but this is backwards. (The threads are normal, but you're looking at the "clock" from behind.)

Another poster mentioned cable housing stops, but that won't be an issue in your case, because your bike already has those for the stem shifters.

The housing from the barcons normally runs straight along the bottom of the handlebar, under the handlebar tape, until the bar bends upward. Then it leaves the bar and curves around inward toward the housing stops on the down tube. The stock housing is liable to be a bit too long, you will probably need to trim it.

i have a detailed article on cable running/preparation, see: https://sheldonbrown.com/cables

I advise using so-called 'index' housing even though these aren't indexed shifters.

See: https://harriscyclery.com/cables.

See also https://sheldonbrown.com/derailer-adjustment

Sheldon "Bark On!" Brown

AD-SLE

Thought this would be a good place to tag on some additional newbie like questions after searching the forum. I have a tandem that has some fouled up early generation STI brifters. Tandem crowd says just get some good old fashioned barcons before spending big bucks on some new brifters. Not sure spending $40 on eBay makes sense but spending $200 on a bike I have never ridden....

So, as I look at ever barcon from early Suntour to current Shimano are all all Shimano switchable to "friction"? Anything I need to look for if I need a tripple and 7 spd? I just need a "starter" set until I decide to go with some nice brifters. On a tandem I may find barcons are what fits the bill anyway.

Thanks!