Prepping a bike for my son for campus use at a major college (~55,000 enrollment). The bike will be parked on campus, outdoors. Thinking of switching out the working brake and derailleur cables for stainless to keep the cables from rusting. Was wondering if stainless eventually rusts? Bike will be used ~3-4 miles per day.

As the chromium in alloy is "used up" (not really what happens), stainless will, indeed, begin to rust. It takes a good measure of time to happen, and that's not to say that it isn't a good thing to use, just that it isn't a panacea.

Maybe he'll wind up changing the cables every couple of years, rather than every year. It's hard to say, as it is super dependant on local conditions. A bike with stainless cables may go years without rust forming in the desert, or months next to the sea, if stored outside.

Some grades of stainless will rust. I won't pretend to know much about metallurgy. It won't rust severely ever or lose measurable strength.

I have a teflon coated stainless steel rear der. cable on my beater bike that lives outside locked to a pole in the elements.

No rust yet, its only been a year though.

Gets ridden to the grocery store a few times a week.

Do it. I will not state it as being fact but stainless will eventually rust. I'll base that 'claim' on the fact that it comes in various grades...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SAE_steel_grades

You will probably end up buying 302 or 304 but they will not state it is anything beyond 'stainless'. The other one of note is 316, aka Marine Grade, which has better corrosion resistance in Salt Environments... when the Gritters get out on the roads. 302/304 is going to be twice the price of normal/galvanised so you might have to budget for four less tins of beer, four cables, on one weekend.

You can get nuts/bolts and other stuff that is Marine Grade/316 which is more or less twice the price of 302/304. Again the difference is beer money.

I have not as yet used such stuff for long enough to see it rust but I have some faith and there is a feel good thing about it. I also know that a Manufactured Down to Cost BSO bleeds rust from all of its orifices after experiencing its first rain shower or two days of humidity above 70%.

Just Do It.

Oh and keep the exposed stuff clean. Wipe with thin oil. Same applies to inside cable outers with the caveat that the liners might be sensitive to the sort of lubrication you use.

some, as others say, have a % of iron, though largely nickel copper chromium... there is no 1 stainless steel .

main prep for a campus bike is Locks, and knowing how to use them , and an un attractive bike, given campus is a big mecca for bike thieves.

I not sure I'd call anything available at this market level to be "rust proof". Stuff marketed as stainless should take longer to corrode than other alloys, but it will likely eventually happen. I would regard it as "rust resistant", to choose one of the two terms you suggested in the original post.

Yeah... Definitely some of that. Perhaps there is a market for simulated pre-rusted and frayed stainless steel cables.

I thought stainless steel didn't rust until someone showed me the inside of a commercial ice-maker.
The entire cabinet was stainless steel, but the combination of heat from the compressor, and condensation from the chiller coil made it an ideal environment to rust even stainless steel.

That said, I've never seen rust on shifter/brake cables.

Yes, it will be a beater bike, but it will be mechanically sound--new pads, cables/housing, new grease, etc... and locked.

Planning to add hose clamps to the wheel quick release(s), not much but maybe enough for the thieves to go to the next bike.

I'll go with stainless, hopefully one of the LBS carries stainless.

Why not just replace the skewers with security skewers. Certainly less janky.

My advice. Don't give him a bike that you're not prepared to lose. A campus that big? It'll likely get stolen.

If you want the best chance of keeping the bike around, buy him a good lock and a way to mount it to his bike securely when he's riding it so it's hard to forget it.

Stainless does eventually corrode, but more importantly is the that housings themselves rust because they are NOT stainless. I'm unsure how I feel about stainless cables. For me, I replace most of my cables yearly, so I can use the cheapest of the cheap and never worry about it. Sure, I could go longer, but it's all of a few dollars every year to replace cables and housing. That is worth it to me since it does such a good job at ensuring good shifting. I see bikes come in all the time with stainless cables but with housing that is beat to crap, and we still have to replace both the cable AND housing because the housing rust made the stainless cable "fuzzy" and not move smoothly in new housing.

A better way to put it is that stainless steels will rust in some environments.

Um...no. The chromium won't be "used up". Even if it did oxidized completely, chromium oxides are green not red like rust. It's the iron that oxidizes and forms rust.

The differences in the two scenarios above is chloride ions (from salt) and water. You could expose the stainless to salt in the desert but there isn't enough water in the air for the salt to absorb it and start plucking iron atoms out of the steel. In an ocean environment, there is plenty of both. If you were to put the bike in a humid environment without much salt exposure, it would last a long time as well.

It may. But another thing to consider is the inside of the cable housing. Higher quality cable housing is lined with a plastic liner so that it doesn't rust as well. A stainless cable with unlined housing won't stand up to the elements as well.

Yup. That helps as well. A teflon coated inner cable with a plastic lined housing will resist corrosion the best...even with salt exposure.

Just lube the cables on a semi regular basis.

I'm not sure I've found stainless brake cable housings. So... the cables may not rust, but the housings may rust if they are steel lined.

Probably somebody has made rust-proof housings that cost 10x the standard cost.

Lined brake and Lined Derailleur housing (different) may be of some help.

Of course, rust in the housings is usually only a big problem in a few conditions such as mixte bikes with a housing that makes a loop downward that could pool water. Or, of course, housing with damaged covering.

I did buy some Chinese imported "stainless" derailleur cables that turned out to be galvanized

There may be MTB cable kits that reduce water and mud penetration into the cable housings.

Keep this in mind as well. My son went to Michigan State, a large school. At the end of every semester they had well over 100 abandoned bikes that they auctioned off. A good source for a replacement beater if his does get stolen.

cables will probably break before rusting out.

Galvanic Corrosion is your real concern. Is the metal on the deraileur bolt the same ion? Brakes? Levers? Housing? If not, moisture and salt (from the sea or de icer) will allow electrons to swap back and forth. This is galvanic corrosion in a nutshell.

I'd use all the same metal before mixing in a higher level or you'll be setting up for a sacrificial annode.

In other words, get standard stuff and lube it once in awhile.

I've had good results from the Stainless Cables off ebay. Like these Same for gear inners.
The "Jagwire" "complete" cable kits are good too, but don't come with gear inners. Better to get some decent ferrules too. JAGWIRE Cycling Bicycle Housing Cable Brake Shifter Kit Road/Mountain Bike BMX

From working at an LBS that primarily services the college student bikes.

I'll tell you that rusting cables is likely the least of your concerns.
I only ever see it become a problem on ladies frames with full length curvy housings.
If it's a men's frame with straight cable runs and housings with breaks in them, water tends to drip out before rust forms.

no, your bigger concern is running out of air in the tires.
College students Do Not inflate their tires. Get the fattest tires possible so they'll be tolerant of running for months at a time at 30psi and falling.
Don't even bother trying to tell him that he needs to re-inflate weekly, it won't happen.

after that, the next most frequent problem is taco-ed wheels. Since bike traffic on college campuses mostly involves crashing into other bikes and inexperienced car drivers.

followed by brake pads wearing out (which may be a factor in the above crashing issues)
far too often I'll tell a student they need new pads only to get the response: "it's OK, I'll just use the other one till it breaks"
you'd think that hub brakes (drum brake, coaster, disk) might be a good solution to this; but it's not because that only increases the cost of replacing the wheel when it *does* get taco-ed.

He knows to keep the tires inflated, apparently there are stations across campus just for that.
Brake pads will be new. He has had two crashes with other cyclist, the second one did taco his wheel a bit. He kept riding it that way until he brought it home so that I could fix it. He almost ran over the campus mascot (a dog) his very first week of class. That bike is not really usable at this point so I'm fixing up another beater bike.

When you change the brake cables put some grease on your fingers and work it into the cable for the whole length. Make sure you get full coverage.

Also, use an old roller chain to prevent someone from stealing the seat. Wrap it around the seat stay and at least one seat rail.


I had a seat stolen. It wasn't a great seat, however, riding home without a seat was a pain, and then going out to pay for another seat an additional pain. I kept a shopping bag over my seat when I was commuting to the station. This served two purposes, 1, you couldn't see that it was a reasonably good seat 2. it kept rain, bird poop and debris off the seat. When I returned I removed the bag and rode home. I always thought that one of those all plastic BMX seats might be a solution, but I would have had to go out and buy one, so I just protected the one that I had.


By the way, I saw someone on the forum put a Huffy decal on their bike. Don't know if that helps, but it could be a deterrent.

This!!

Call the local campus police department. They'll tell you when the bike auction is.

(Mine is coming up in a few weeks. Great place to get bikes super super cheap (a few dollars-100 bucks)) Don't bother trying to go there to look for a road bike, they always command a premium. Your best bet is to find a beat up (but nice) old mountain bike. Bring it home, give it a tune up, and it'll be better than 95% of the bikes on campus. Actually, that's a bit of an exaggeration. Lots of kids ride brand spankin new mountain bikes worth thousands of dollars. (And they leave them out in the rain!) I shudder when I see a rocky mountain sitting in the rain locked to a rack.

There are many stainless steels. They are formulated/discovered to have resistance to various corrosive agents I think it is a big help to keep in mind that these steels "stain less" and that they are not "without stain". The right ss for the applications can serve very well for long periods of time.

I don't know what ss is used for bike cables and I would guess the various manufacturers use different ones. But a bike parked it the rain is not a severe environment. Even the lesser stainless's should do just fine. Maybe bleed a little rust after a year or more but unless cosmetics matter, not a big deal.

I still would occasionally lube the cable entrances and exits with grease or oil just like I would if they were not stainless.

Bigger issue for you/your son - with ss cable, it isn't obvious when the wire is getting tired so it is easy to use the cable too long and break one.

Ben

His freshman year I took his beater bike and went to lock it up on the bike rack while the boy and MOM checked in at his dorm. Took a look at the various bikes out there. One was a brand new(not a nick on it) Red Specialized Sirrus hybrid. It had a cable lock running through both wheels and then the cable lock was draped OVER the bike rack, not through it. Anyone could have just picked it up and walked off with it! I always wondered how long it lasted.