Originally Posted by
etherhuffer
It has been so long since I last did this I forgot how this works. Doing low profile cantilevers and Shimano used a special straddle cable. A and B length? In lieu of a simple straddle, it has a button that the main cable feeds through and goes to one side. The other side of the button is a cable to the opposite arm. That way if your main cable breaks it does not let the straddle wire hit your tire and send you over the bars. As I remember the front and back are different. Any info would be helpful
In Shimano’s long history of bad ideas, the “special straddle cable” is probably top of the pile and largely responsible for the near demise of cantilever brakes. It’s a bad solution in search of a nonexistent problem. I’ve never had a brake cable break nor have I ever heard of anyone who has. A true straddle cable is so much better than the stupid Shimano “special” cable. If nothing else, it has an infinite amount of adjustment which makes dialing in a cantilever easier. You don’t have to depend on what some engineer (probably long dead) decided was the best length of straddle cable nearly 40 years ago.