Poll: How Do You Actually Feel About Cable Routing?
Photo: Merida/PaulBox
After Seb Stott's recent Burning Question article about why so many bike manufacturers are putting cables through their headsets, I've had several brand-side industry folks share their opinions. While some acknowledged that routing cables through the headset could have some small benefits, they all painted a picture of engineers and product managers battling marketing and sales departments about practicality and aesthetics.
Either way, I thought it'd be good to get some feedback from the people who actually, you know, buy the products. I've heard this poll we ran on aesthetics gets referenced by product departments pretty regularly, so who knows, maybe the results of these polls will sway brands one way or the other.
Dangerholm has some of the cleanest builds ever.
What kind of cable routing do you think looks best?
Regardless of performance.
Scott's new Genius has headset cable routing.
What kinds of cable routings are dealbreakers for you?
Check all that apply.
Are minor weight savings and less cable movement compelling reasons for routing through the headset or stem?
Assume the various claims about headset/stem routing are accurate.
Levy showing you how it's done back in 2010.
If you have a bike with through-the-headset cable routing, how reliable has it been?
Please only answer if you've got a bike with through-the-headset cable routing.
To acknowledge my own biases, I'm generally an external cable routing kind of person, but I do love the look of an ultra-clean bike and would absolutely buy the right routed-through-the-headset bike. I feel like once you've accepted an internal cable, it's not the literal end of the world to have it go through the headset.
This poll is all about what you all think, but Levy, Henry, Kaz, and I have got a podcast recording scheduled for tomorrow for us to all argue about this and tell you what we think. Probably in excruciating detail. Sorry in advance.
Author Info:
Must Read This Week
"Puppy-kicking: Shoes, Boots, or Bare Feet?"
Anyone who says barefoot is just an amateur, and is only doing it for the Insta likes, get real and get yourself some good quality leather boots.
Barefoot is the scourge of the traditional puppy kicking movement, and should be banned from international competition….
#Leatherboots4life
That's like kicking a hornet's nest in the USA from what I understand.
There must have been some high level meetings about consumer engagement recently. Polls and articles similar to this, the fuc&kin autoplay nonsense, Outside+ complimentary memberships, there must be a push to drive up numbers and engagement.
No judgment, we all need to get paid.
Couple of suggestions,
1. I appreciate the inclusion of the RSD and Evil bikes in the recent DC field test, to really drive people over the edge, maybe compare all the bikes to the latest Enduro field test winner in the impossible climb, continue to relate everything back to bikes that are not on test.
2. Include a commuter e-bike (cheap and cheerful, with jailbroken 1000watt hub motor) in the efficiency test of all upcoming field tests, do not provide any direct comparison with bikes on test.
3. In the upcoming DH bike field test, only ride blue flow trails, compare how the bikes fare in hike-a-bike situations
4. Have Braydon Bringhurst or Chris Akrigg perform all impossible climbs, then once they’ve gotten to the top on the most inappropriate bikes, have them criticize the viewership about how easy it was
5. Bring back budget vs baller,
6. Stop field test videos halfway through for Outside+ membership drives similar to public TV drives of the 80’s
7. Advertise turning off autoplay on videos for Outside+ members, but don’t detail how to accomplish it, then once it’s been figured out by enough members, reset the memberships
Like, follow, and subscribe for more details
By the way. This is sarcasm for those that think I am actually threatening someone.
- Henry Ford
- Scott
Do we really trust these same designers to do the same thing on a bike that’ll see more abuse, more steering cycles, more corrosion, more dirt, & more crashes!?
IT'S STILL DUMB THOUGH
That's this way, AND the other way!
Recent recalls by BMC, Specialized, Trek, Merida, Cannondale, … tell us the truth. Recalls happen because of safety issues. Every one of these brands (and more) have had recalls due lousy designs running hoses and cables through the stem & headset.
It's evident that Scott is forcing their employees to vote in their favor on these polls. There's no way anybody actually prefers the monstrosity that is headset routing.
The verdict is out, people do want this. As a mechanic I find it frustrating to work on at times, but it's nowhere near as bad as people are making it out to be.
If nobody wants this, why is it selling so well? Because people want it.
Also do Scott do a spark without headset routing at the same spec? People who want a spark might go for that but we don’t know because it’s not available.
From experience I can say that headset routing is reliable enough and generally not even nearly as much of a bother as people think it is. It adds like a total of 30 minutes to the annual amount of time spent on maintaining your bike.
I get it, new = scary, but people really need to stop getting their panties in a bunch over headset routing.
I could MAYBE live with headset bearing routing (but would strongly prefer not to.) But if I have to bleed my brake to change stem or stack height that's 100% a dealbreaker.
Scott posted one of those sped up "dream bike build" videos for their new Genius and about half of it is the dude faffing with cables. F that.
Cables through the headset won't be the death of mountain biking per se, but putting aesthetics way over function, and then using faux engineering speak and marketing jargon to defend it just might.
Whether those small holes around the junction of the head tube result in enough of a stress concentration to cause cracking is a different question.
Raw alloy 4 life
Under the hood of my car is kept super clean looking show quality too, some of us are just into different things. I promise I dont care if you have a rats nest hanging off your handlebars, that ain't me though.
It's not clear to me that this is the only time you need to pull cables. Is this true for all headset routing schemes? What about sending fork out for service (the only way many of us can get seasonal fork service done), swapping travel or airsprings? What about swapping dropper posts or sending droppers out for service? Is there truly no impact for all headset routing schemes to these common maintenance events? As someone who learns everything from the park tool video series, maybe what I need is some detailed mechanic videos that show me how much easier all these things are with headset cable routing. If someone can show me how easy it will be every 6 months to pull my fork on my Focus internal-headset bike, that would go a long way to persuading me. Because I look at it and it looks like I have to drain my brakes every 6 months, which... I'd rather ride a fixie single speed.
But to answer your question: There are two cases in which you will have to open cables.
1. When the upper bearing wears out. You can prevent that by opening up your headset before the first ride (no cables need to be touched for that) and put grease into the headset, the more the better. When your upper bearing is done eventually you switch to a stainless steel one with all the available sealings, which the bike brand originally didn't want to pay for. And if you happen to own an aluminium frame, you could also re-cut your head tube to make sure tolerances are right, just to be safe. If your give your headset some love from time to time and don't directly abuse it with Muc-Off and the high pressure washer, then you should be good for a long time.
2. When you want to tinker with your cockpit (mainly stem. That does not include all bikes, but most of them. They use special headset covers shaped to fit the brands stems. So if you want to swap stems you have to buy a universal headset cover, which is mostly available for a few bucks and probably features more sealings than the original one. To change that you have to open your brake cables once. Then you can use whatever stem you want, just like you are used to. You could also use the opportunity follow through with the things listed in "1." and be good for a long time as well.
What would actually be of great help for consumers is a database of bikes explaining and rating the cable integration (ease of use, level of sealing, looks,...), so people can make educated buying decisions. I've seen quite a lot of different bikes and solutions in the shop and it's nowhere near as bad as the picture is painted online. Maybe somebody (looking at you Pinkbike) wants to carry out some real journalism to educate people and move the industry towards actual change for better products?
The only thing that you need to mess with any lines to do is REPLACE your upper headset bearing. Which is so rare. To clean and regrease your headset you don’t need to disconnect anything.
If that gives you so much trouble that you would complain about it on forums and refuse to buy the bike, and you think this is some horrible thing that is worth this much uproar, maybe you shouldn’t be working on your multi thousand dollar machine that you trust your life with
www.focus-bikes.com/au_en/cis
And I don't believe you. It looks to me like I'm stuck with a proprietary stem, that it's going to limit my ability to use my collection of existing stems to dial in cockpit, that the stem is inherently weaker in its design due to that stem cap, that I'm going to have limited length options AND limited rise options, that it's going to get in the way of installing in-headset tools like the OneUp EDC, that it's going to be in the way every time I pull the fork and put it back in, that I'm even going to be dealing with cable mess when I swap bars.
I think maybe a video series on this would help a lot.
www.slowtwitch.com/Products/Components/Formula_SpeedLock_7861.html
Do you splice this in with a quick connect at the front and rear of the brake line ?
But you know what's working FOR SURE? External routing.
I'm just heading out to a three-day trip of riding and the fact that I can easily work on my bike with a minimal set of standard tools is just too good to give away.
Stop trickling it down to the pleb-priced and race level bikes where we have to work (or enjoy working) on our own stuff. I am sure the market can accommodate both needs.
This is only becoming an issue because the enthusiasts and plebs don't want it, and it's trickling down. We see it for what it is. I don't care if the boomer market e-bikes and halo x/c bikes have it. Keep it upmarket along with all the other bougie stuff. Flight Attendant, 5Dev cranks, all that other stuff that looks good, touts performance gains, but doesn't really move the needle much based on what it costs.
Then I bought a Chromag frame. All external. Building it up was so fast and easy. Like, ready to ride in under half an hour. The cables don’t even look bad.
Now I’m conflicted.
www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002129315804.html
The whole package is difficult to swallow.
I am confused though, does this silly design mean you have to press out the headset CUPS, or just remove the bearing from the cup? The latter is trivial, the former... Seems totally insane. Those really do last the life of the bike.
Managed to put a headset part in upside down, which I only noticed trailside.
Got it all fixed with my multi-tool and some creative ways to hold things.
Silly story, but if it saves my ride once in 5 years, its worth it. Thus, headset cable routing is a no no
You're more interested than the MFGs are. They already have a plan and it involves telling you what you're going to like next year.
PS, its not bearing race problems that make this a catastrophic PITA. Any time any of your cheezeball headset bearings fail, esp the $10 set that come with your scott/bmc/trek/etc....the whole thing comes apart, and ALL the cables and the hydraulic brake lines come out, not just for race issues. If your R brake hose was super close before you took it apart it may need a new hydraulic line as well to trim it and install a new insert and olive, weather your brakes needed it or not.
If you don't care you either don't work on your bike, don't pay for labor or both.
Through the stem requires a brake bleed for a regular setup change most MTBers SHOULD be experimenting with.
Through a headset bearing only means one (hopefully long lasting) service part should be checked and changed at the time of a brake bleed.
WHY are you putting these in the same poll the options have VERY different outcomes
Besides this, the way the routing is done, and if you are a little OCD on your cablelengths and cockpit setup, it adds a whole lot of extra tinkering to the whole for very little gain it seems. Working with even less margins or strange folds - its gets annoying to place things around, cut it at correct length etc. let along getting eye-pleasing curves that roll along the bars. It just fuzzes up a lot of straight forward procedures upto a point you wonder why they invented this whole jigsaw puzzle.
If I would have to explain how to do an easy clean and lube your fork / headset region of your bike looks, it kinda scares the heck of out the everyday Joe.
I'm not talking about your sub 10kg XC machine, where every weightsaving might be worth 10K in the eyes of the customer. No, it's mostly found on 27+kg E-bikes.
If the fancy new thing was proven MORE reliable, then I would be fine with it. But I have my doubts.
Meanwhile we still use derailleurs that hang like 5-6 inches off the ground... Fix the f*ckin drivetrain MTB industry. You woulda thought e-bikers inspired MTB-optimal gearboxes by this point. And if not that at least that radical horizontal derailleur system that kinda sits between the tubing stays.
singletrackworld.com/wp-content/blogs.dir/1/files/2017/12/Spectral-AL-6-Cable-Channel.jpg
As to what I think about it?
In short, Needless Over Complication.
As for the cable holes weaken the frame argument?
Horsehockey!
Scott Spark Shock hatch, Specialized SWAT access holes, etc.
This is a trend that needs to die just like proprietary parts did.
All this barefoot talk is just so much nonsense. How are you going to get any kinda distance like that?
I'm sure there must be specialized puppy kicking kicks that we can import from one of those former Soviet block countries. They've probably been making them by hand for forty generations in secret workshops, refining the finest details in search of ultimate distance.
I'm gonna hit the internet and find out if there's a Kanye collaboration going yet...
This savings equals profit for the manufacturer. This is about money plain and simple.
Full disclosure. I’m not for it.
A: "none"
It wouldn't be a PB poll without some grammatically incorrect answers.
So if that's the case then I feel like it wouldn't be hard at all to learn and do full internal routing with guides. The rear brake would be the only one that would annoy me there.
Through the headset? No thankee. I can think of a couple of other places that routing things might be more fun for some depending on what they're into.
- they're ugly
- they seem less convenient than through-frame routing (with tubing, that is)
If it was clean and simple without interfering with anything during maintenance i would just buy it. Right now though, that's what internal routing provide. The improvement with the headset/etc routing is really minor so it has to have zero drawback.
Also I find internal routing with tubing to be easier than external, dont have to put clips or zip ties or anything - granted that the frame is well made. Many aren't fully using inner tubing for example (eg no routing in the rear triangle).
MTB 1 (dropper)
Gravel/Commuter 1 (front brake thru fork)
Road 0
Dirt 0
BMX 0
I do swap out the dropper for a standard post/saddle for park trips a couple times a year, but hard to do without internal given where the dropper actuator sits.
I already regret the internal brake thru the gravel fork, had to jump through some hoops to face the brake mounts without redoing the bar tape.
I used to have a MTB with internal through the frame, it probably needed the cable housing replaced more often than I was willing to mess with.
If dirt+BMX frames start coming with internal routing I'll know it's time to quit and take up tic-tac-toe as a sport.
The shifter is way cheaper to produce compared to a mechanical one, since its pretty much a chip with 2 buttons in a plastic shell without all the cams and gears of the mechanical one, but yet its sold at a way higher price because of the perceived "high tech" of wireless.
Secondly, if you have a wireless system, it should have more buttons on the shifter and be more programmable in terms of what each button does, especially if if is going to be sold at a higher price.
If the gears can be routed, good, if not, it's alright.
If the rear brake comes routed, good, if not, it's alright.
Seatpost => Hope clamp
If I wanted a "clean" bike, cable routing is not how I'd keep my bike clean.
I'm about to build a new bike, swapping parts, and I will have to cut brake lines which will likely require a new brake line.
This ^ is stoopid!
Now if you're a dentist, then clearly you don't work on your bike and probably care more about appearance, so eff you!
Keep up the good work.
I honestly was starting to think I was 100% alone in this opinion so this was a great set of poles because I know feel vindicated. I don't expect 100% of people to agree with me, hell I was not even under any illusion that the majority of people would agree.... but knowing I'm not alone makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside.
- The giant downtube hole means I don't need to spend any time "fishing" for cables.
- Unlike what some folks claim, I don't need to touch any cables to swap the stem, adjust spacers, adjust the head angle, or drop the fork
- The headset is actually just drop in, so if I need to replace it (haven't yet and unlike some of my other bikes it's a sealed bearing) it's actually easier for me as a home mechanic since I don't need a headset removal tool, at the expense of an extra 20-30 minutes every couple of years.
- At this rate, my brakes are going to need bleeding more often than my head set needs replacing... an enforced bleed every once in a while seems fine
All that said, I would prefer external with a nice cover but I guess I'm confused why the hatred for headset routing isn't equaled by hatred for regular internal routing.
Maybe pb commenters are just skewed towards PNWers who ride exclusively in the rain, go through a headset a month, and ride hardtails because they can't stand to replace another bearing! (That was a joke)
I look forward to the responses.
PS Tube in tube is easier to work on, but definitely is another thing driving the cost of our bikes up.
I am DEFINITELY not EVER subscribing with swamp like content such as this.
Biggest worry about the current systems is the cable hack-sawing through the steer tube. Cable even touching the steer tube is a deal breaker for me. (Though lets be honest, CSUs only last a year max, so maybe this whole thing is moot) I've had cables, heels, etc saw through stuff shockingly fast. Make this a non-issue, and deal with water ingress, then fine, I'll buy whatever works. The top headset bearing removal worries is a red herring, and there's ways around that.
I really like the trend to geo-adjust headsets, which are probably mutually exclusive with headset routed cables. I predict a future where bikes are split between pretty bikes and hard charging bikes.
all other work is done by LBS.
It looks like half of the commenters work on their bikes 24/7, when do u ride? and why do u need to change brakes every other ride so internal routing bothers u?
I ride three to four times a week, other than lubing the chain, airing up tires, and checking suspension pressures, my last maintenance was changing rear brake pads.
I bet you spend more time getting your bike to and from the shop than I spend doing the same maintenance your shop does for you
Dentist?
I like internal routing but only if it’s done right. If it’s not tubed internally, give me external.
Why is this so hard for you people?
There are valid reasons not to want this kind of cable routing, but the example you gave isn’t one of them because the problem you have isn’t the cable routing but really that you have no idea what you’re doing.