gauvins

@chrisx, in another thread, suggested using cable splitters to facilitate the process of packing a bike as small as possible. These are usually installed on S&S frames.

My use case would be different - I am considering cable splitters so i could fully remove my handlebars (no more risk of kinking a cable, more flexibility is packing, and, why not, the ability to swap butterfly and drop down on a whim)..

Three questions. 1. Blurbs suggest that splitters are easy to split. True or they tend to jam or require lots of strength in your fingers? 2. Where should they be located? 3. Any downside such as being a weak spot, or increasing friction?

spinnaker

Excellent idea. I would be interested also. I.E. what are the downsides if any?

DanBell

When in use, I don't even notice they are there. I did find that mine had gotten a bit stuck when I finally tried to separate them. Luckily I was carrying the right size wrench as well as a small Leatherman, so using the two together I got them to unscrew. After that I kept the threads greased up and checked regularly that I could turn them by hand. Due to natural tension on the cables they can be a little tough to get back together, but once you get a turn or two on the threads it goes on smoothly. The ones I had came with a little rubber gasket on each section, I assume to make it easier to grip them to separate by hand, and also to protect your frame from the separators vibrating against it while riding. Most of these dried out and died on me pretty quickly though. Not a big issue, but I'd prefer if there were a hardier solution to this concern.

Aubergine 

Tourist in MSN

I have splitters on my Ritchey Break Away frame, three of them. Easy to undo, but I have not had mine get stuck like DanBell noted, although have only owned that bike for a bit under a year. I have not tried yet to replace a cable, that might be the true test of complexity.

Many newer bikes are running full length outer housing on the rear brake cable, I suspect because some people instead run a hydraulic hose. Thus the frame lacks the cable stops for housing, thus no exposed inner cable along the top tube or downtube. You pretty much need outer housing cable stops on the frame so that you can put teh splitters on the bare cable between the stops on the frame.

My S&S bike does not use splitters, all brakes and gear cables are full length outer housing. That bike was designed to be used off road, I suspect they used full length outer housing to keep dirt and grime out of the cable housings. I suspect that was the reason because on a different bike, it was getting very hard to shift so one day I tried to figure out why and I found a lot of dust had caked inside of some of the cable housings from the dust. That bike had seen a lot of off road and trail riding and each time I shifted, some bare cable was pulled into outer housing, along with any dust on the cable.

Several years ago I saw a warning on another forum to check your splitters on occasion. Someone had the splitter on a brake disconnect and he lost half of his braking with no warning.

79pmooney

I do something similar on my Cycle Oregon fix gear, I run two very different "cockpits". A standard width regular road bar and lever and a very wide and deep pista bar with V-brake levers. I coupled the road setup to sidepull brakes and the pista/V-brake lever/climbing setup to dual pivots. The swap was very fast. Loosen stem, disconnect rear brake cable at brake, take off both brakes and lift the cockpit off (quill stem). 2 minutes? (I've always run full length rear housing. Better matched rear braking power to front. Also makes pulling it through TT braze-ones really easy.)

I also used to tour using DT shifters. Never did a long tour but did three 8 day, 800 mile tours with one night in a motel. It was quite doable. So I see no reason why one couldn't do both. Run DT shifters and keep the full brake cable/housing runs as one unit. Keeping the front permanently hooked up makes the re-install very simple. That brake matters. You can be hasty with there and not really get the cable length right and it is no big deal unless a big descent is in your day plan.

Ben

gauvins

I hear you and found similar arguments elsewhere, but I don't understand -- can't you fit the splitter anywhere? I mean, cut a length of housing to run from your shifter to, say, six inches; put a ferrule and screw the male end of the terminal; run another length of housing to the next braze on, ferrule and drop the (second) cable in the female part of the terminal. Screw and ride? Or even install the splitter flush with the shifter. What am I missing?

Tandem Tom

We have them on our Co-Motion tandem and I have them on my Surly LHT. The idea of using them for swapping out handle bats had merit. One thing to be aware of is the length of the ""remaining portion" of cable will most likely not be the correct length when you do the swap.

Tourist in MSN

The inner cable is in tension, the outer cable is in compression. On a bike where you see exposed inner cable, the downtube or other tube with two cable stops is serving the role of compression, thus a section of housing is not needed there. I clearly am having difficulty putting this into words that are clear and unambiguous.

The Raleigh Grand Prix which licensed with Ritchey to use the Break Away system in the photo. Cable splitter under the word Prix. And cable stop just to the right for the outer housing to butt against. My point is a lot of new bikes do not have the cable stops that the outer housing butts against for the rear brake cable because they are designed so that you can attach a continuous hose or a full length outer housing instead. My Lynskey Backroad is built that way, rear brake uses full length outer housing.



But in this photo of my Lynskey, there are no cable stops for my rear brake cable. (Photo is immediately after I built up the bike, the ugly bread loaf twisty and zip ties, etc., were replaced with better looking cable attachment hardware.)

If you cut the outer housing and put a ferrule on it, what is the ferrule going to push against? This photo also shows that if you have a cable adjuster, putting in a splitter won't solve what you want to do, the inner cable can't be removed from the bike without disassembly of the splitter.

djb

this is whats fun with this forum, I just learned about cable splitters. Looked them up and found this company that has a good diagram.

As mentioned, I could see that diff bar types could, and probably would have different housing lengths that could get messy with diff handlebar types, as you would clearly have to use a safe "long enough" setup for one bar, but that might be waaay too long for the other bar type and get in the way, stick out too much and get snagged on things etc.

pretty neat idea though to be able to switch bar...is it worth the hassles? Who knows, but good thinking outside the box there gauvins.

fietsbob

I created a 2 piece handlebar and a wide open face stem , to make my last bike box pack easier...
+ made the handle bars wider ...

Then, I bought a Bike Friday (But haven't toured with it, yet , ) thousands do,with theirs..

They also offer a split handlebar, using an inner liner tube and an outer tube,
that a standard stem can grip to hold the 2 halves together .....

and is 3 layers strong in the center..





....

gauvins

Dawned on me why splitters must be fitted between cable holders (i.e. where the cable is naked) and there is enough wiggle room for the splitter to move back and forth.

I somehow had the wrong mental image where the cable was sliding inside the splitter...

So - ok. I see where I could fit them (my frame has slotted holders) except for the front brake (V). I read somewhere about putting it between the brake's upper jaws. Does it make sense?

fietsbob

Seems like an unnecessary bother..

just leave the cable attached or loosen the clamping bolt, leave the noodle on the cable..

Tourist in MSN

I assume you mean a V brake. You probably could but if the brake pads wear to the point that your splitter is pushing against the noodle under full braking, that could be a limiting factor for braking force.

Somewhere I have a splitter because when I bought my S&S bike frame, they gave me one splitter. I could not figure out where to use it, eventually gave up and put the splitter somewhere. Later I realized it must be to put inside the V brake, but now I have no idea which box in storage would have that splitter in it.

If I installed a splitter there, I would probably carry a few spare washers in my bag of spares in case I needed to move my pads closer to the rim, I would be looking for some thin washers to use as shims.

ADDENDUM ADDED LATER

This is probably the splitter I have somewhere, they list it as extra short for putting inside a V brake.
https://www.sjscycles.co.uk/cables/j...e-short-black/

spinnaker

Thanks for finding this. I was wondering on how these attached. Looks to me like you need to buy two cables each for shifter and brakes? Is there one type of splitter for brakes and another for shift cables?

And where do they do? Do you split a housing? My housing goes all the way to the frame so not sure how that would work.


What about the folks that spit their frames with S&S couplers. Do you have a set of these at the handlebars and another set on the frame for the split?

DanBell

My cables are exposed running along the downtube. Two for the Rohloff and one for the rear brake. The cable splitters are in the middle(ish) of the cable section along the downtube. Easy to access there for my purposes (splitting the frame in half for packing).

raybo

I have an S&S coupled bike. It has 3 cable splitters. One on each (naked) cable that crosses the couplers. One is on the rear brake cable, which goes along the top tube. One each on the front and read derailleur cables, both of which are located on the down tube part of the bike.

Spinnaker is correct that the cable splitters require two cables to make a single connection. The diagram shows how they work.

I have to remove the handlebars of my bike in order to get it into its box. To do this, I have to disconnect all three cable splitters, disengage the front brake cable, and then remove the brake arm that synches the brake cable. I can then remove the handlebars with cables sticking out everywhere (I commonly close the case on one or more of these wild wires) and the brake arm hanging down. Not all that much bother, given I have to get the bike into its much smaller box. I wrote an article about my experience with an S&S coupled bike that has more detail, if you are interested.

As someone mentioned above and I want to reiterate, disconnecting the cable splitters is easy: simply unscrew them (I keep mine greased). Reconnecting them, however, is a PITA. The cables are taut when the splitters are connected. The length of thread on my splitters is maybe 3/8ths of an inch. When reconnecting them, I have to insert the threads of one end into the other end while, at the same time, pulling the end of the cables together with enough force to get them within 3/8ths of an inch on one another. This isn't easy and often requires a bit of cursing. The cables don't stretch. It requires brute force with a bit of subtle hand twisting to get the threads set. Once the threads have "gripped", the rest is easy.

chrisx

You need

Cable housing stops to use cable spliters, as mentioned above. The wire moves back and forth inside the housing, not with the housing. Most bike have stops as part of the frame for derailleurs.
I like these spliters better ,
https://www.ticycles.com/store-all/d...able-splitters




DA VINCI CABLE SPLITTERS

get the tsa net and 4 S&S // HARD CASE // 10" COMPRESSION MEMBER

while you are at it.

I use white grease on my splitters, same grease I put on my couplers and use to lubricate my cables. They are located half way between the crank and fork, along the down tube, not next to each other.

Good luck getting the cables to match up for 2 sets of bars. Inline cable adjusters could help,
https://www.universalcycles.com/shop...?category=1613Velo Orange Metallic Braid Derailleur Cable Kit




Metallic braided cable is more compression resistant and tougher than plastic-coated cable.
https://www.universalcycles.com/shopping/product_details.php?id=56044&category=7
would this help?

I might get DI2. 1 chain ring, and an electric derailleur, or Di2 11 speed hub. Might work out.

Only problem to report.
I did not remove the rear bb7 or split the brake cable. While packed in the case, the brake cable housing developed a kink. I had to replace it. I may have left the bike in the hard case all winter, and rode the Fargo around instead.

All the times I was not lazy, and did remove the brakes from the frame, and roll them up next to the bars, all was fine.

I clean the grease oh so carefully from each part, and regrease each part when I put the bike back together.
Lazy, caused the one problem I had in the hard case.

spinnaker

Still not grasping this Maybe I need to read your article. But it is late now and I am off to bed.


But maybe I am gasping this now. You can completely remove the handlebars but you need to undo the front brake cable where it connects to the actual brake? I would then imagine because you split the cable the shifter cable, it is now loose enough to extract the housings from the frame bosses (or whatever they are called).

Tourist in MSN

I included the photo I had above in post 9 here in this post again for reference. It is not an S&S coupled bike, it is a Raleigh Grand Prix, they licensed with Ritchey to make a frame with the Ritchey Break Away system, you can see the Ritchey logo in one of the seatpost clamps. In the Ritchey there are two seatpost clamps, one clamps the seattube to the seatpost, the other clamp clamps the toptube to the seatpost. Thus, the seatpost is functioning as the coupler that holds the two frame halves together. The cable splitter is used to speed up disassembly of the frame.

If you look at the photo, the splitter is below the word Prix on the frame. It simply is a way to temporarily "cut" the inner cable in a way that it can be re-attached later. They only work where you have inner cable exposed like in the photo.

And if you note the cable stop in that photo that the housing is butted up against, there is a slot in that cable stop so that you can release the inner cable from the frame completely.

Only one splitter per cable needed if both cable stops are slotted. As noted above by Raybo, yes, you need two cables, one for each half of the splitter. I think there are at least three different manufacturers, some I believe use a different splitter for shifter versus brake cable due to different cable diameters. The splitter in the photo is a Ritchey splitter.


Yes, there is no splitter on the front brake. If you had a V brake, as noted above in post 14 you could put a short splitter in between the V brake arms. My bike with splitters has a sidepull brake, easier to remove the brake from the fork crown since it is only one bolt, thus no adjustment is required later when you re-attach the brake. If you had a canti brake with a yoke that you can slip off of the straddle cable, no splitter would be needed. Or, with a V brake you could remove one brake arm from the front fork, leaving the cable on that brake arm. (But if you were switching handlebars, you of course would not want part of the brake to remain on the cable.)

I only re-attached my splitters twice, I do not remember any difficulty or how I did it. I think on the shifters that I put the gear into the gear that that had the most cable slack and by hand moved the derailleur wtih one hand to give me a bit more slack in the cable to slip the outer housing into a cable stop with the other hand. In the rear brake, I think I lossened the release at the brake lever to get more cable slack, then re-attached the splitter, then by hand squeezed the brake arms while putting the cable back into the stop.




They were not designed so you could switch handlebars, they were simply a way to expedite disassembling the frame for transport and rapid reassembly.

But, if you wanted to have more than one set of bars that you frequently swapped, that would work to. But it would require buying several splitters, several extra cables, and as noted by someone above maybe some in-line cable adjusters. And of course the time to install all of that.

And as noted above, would not work if you had a full length outer housing on the rear brake, but in that case it would work on the shifters.

Tourist in MSN

One more note - I always see the shifter splitters close to the bottom bracket. On a bike with fenders, you get a lot of tire spray down there, I would instead be inclined to put the splitters up closer to the headtube where you would get less tire spray on a bike with fenders. (Most of my bikes have fenders.) That way the splitters would stay cleaner. I think they put the splitters down low for aesthetics to make it less obvious that there are splitters on the bike.

pdlamb

Like raybo and DanBell, the splitters on my bike are on the cables going down the downtube (derailers), and the brake cable is on the bare cable along the top tube. I usually grease the splitters every time I assemble the bike.

After 10 years, I've had to replace one splitter which cracked (probably because TSA closed the case on the splitter!). I've had trouble reassembling them one other time (TSA closed the case on the cable) and kinked the cable. The secret to reassembling the splitters is simply to make sure the shifters are all the way to the small gear, and if you've got some rubber gloves you can put the chain on a larger gear if necessary. Likewise for the brake, flip the brake lever and the brake to open fully; you'll get plenty of cable slack to screw the splitter in.

fietsbob

Bruce Gordon Offered them as a bar switching convenience at one time..

JohnJ80

I do this and it works super well. Otherwise, I had to remove the cable from the brake. After a couple of trips, the cable gets munged up. The biggest problem is that it takes a lot longer to adjust brakes than using the cable splitter. V-brakes can be pretty finicky to adjust (at least mine are). I'd estimate that adding these little splitters probably cut the hassle factor and the time to reassemble the bike in half.

This would be the biggest problem in what the OP proposes. Getting the cable lengths exactly right. Without that, it doesn't really make a lot of sense. In point of fact, I'd bet this is going to be pretty hard to get right. If it's a v-brake on the front, then I believe you'd also have to have the cable, cable housing and noodle be attached to each set of bars.

It's the other way around - see above. In my case, the fork comes off the bike and goes into the case and I do leave the noodle attached. Just didn't work well to take the cable off and re-attach in terms of time and hassle. So I'd say that for taking a bike apart for transport, it's really nice. For changing handlebars, I don't think this is going to the limiting factor. It's going to be getting the precise cable length set up right.

You have to carefully fit it in there. If you favor the end where the cable terminates, it's pretty unlikely you'll have a problem. I got it to work just fine but it definitely is a case of "measure twice, cut once." Your idea of adding a washer to accommodate brake wear is a good one and gives you a little more margin in the positioning of the splitter.

gauvins

May be naive, but I don't see this as a major factor. Shifters and brake levers have adjusters that give a few mm of leeway. Not in the cards for this season. Maybe next year. Will eventually report.