Hi Matthew, My only recommendation is to avoid the brake calipers completely ... I'm sure that will make a much cleaner job of it! :)
I know ... he meant to say brake LEVERS, but I just couldn't resist.
The basic skinny that I have learned from the list is that when wrapped from the top down to the bottom, it will be cleaner since the end of the tape can be pushed into the end of the bar before the plug goes in to hold it in place, but that means that there will be a reverse "shingle" effect, which could result in the top edges of each pass rolling down under hand pressure during use. This leads to the method of starting at the bar end and wrapping up to the reveal near the stem clamp, which makes a true "shingle" effect, but then requires that the wrap be finished with some sort of tape there. Some people find this very unsightly, others do not mind it, while yet others do not care one way or the other.
I've begun using any old (old) tape, wrapped one way or the other as a base layer, and then using adhesive backed cloth hockey tape twice or more times to get a nice tight finished look. It is very thin, but it is much easier to wrap without loose parts at the tricky curves, since it stretches well. I can do multiple wraps with this "top coat", until I feel I've completely covered the underlying layers and secured the look I'm after. I notice that the rolls of hockey tape seem to go on and on forever. A downfall here is that the color options are limited, but then that is also true for tape actually sold for handlebars. My final coat is done top down, since it is so tight and sticky that rolling down is not an option. If you try this, be sure to use cloth hockey tape, but not FRICTION tape, which will be tacky on the outside ... collecting dirt and giving off adhesive to your gloves and hands. Yuck.
There are other factors, like wrapping in a direction that induces tightening of the bands under hand load, instead of loosening them, and how to go about passing the brake lever area. Some people like to wrap the bars with only the band clamp in place, and then install the lever body (main base) over the finish tape. Others, like myself, prefer to have the complete lever installed first, roll back the bottoms of the hoods, and wrap on top of the bare lever body, then rolling the hoods back down over the wrap.
It helps to use a small strip of finish wrap coming from under one side of each hood, under the bar and up under same hood on the other side, prior to the finish wrap, so that the tiny exposed triangle shape in that area will not be visible ... it just blends in.
There are thousands more idiosyncrasies regarding the art of bar wrapping, and probably hundreds of them can be found in the archives ... perhaps by using the search phrase exactly as follows, within but not including the parenthesis: ("wrap" and "how"). Be sure to include the quotation marks and the "and", because this tells the system to search for postings with both of the two words, but in no particular order. Bob Hovey posted that trick, and I have been using it ever since :)
The archives search page is here:
http://search.bikelist.org/
Ciao, Mark Agree Southfield MI USA ~ ~ ~
Date: Thu, 25 May 2006 21:20:18 -0400 From: "devotion finesse" <devotion_finesse@hotmail.com> To: classicrendezvous@bikelist.org Subject: [CR]On wrapping one's bars...
So now I am about to REALLY reveal myself as a "newbie"...Please bear with
me.
I am now in the process of assembling the 74 Raleigh International that I
have been gathering parts for (with much appreciated help from CR
listmembers!) and this, being my very first road bike, has brought me to an
obstacle:
I have never applied tape to a set of road drops. Sure, I have put a little
Tressoplast cloth tape on the flats of many track bars. No science there.
But multiple bends and brake calipers present a couple of new challenges.
I am hoping that some of you might have some pointers to help me get moving
in the right direction.
The International is the bronze/orange/rust color and I intend to use white
Velox tape, shellaced to match.
I have looked at every road bike locked up on the street. I have scoured
the pages of classic rendezvous looking for detail shots of bars, etc. It
seems that wrapping methods are consistently inconsistent. Is there a
"correct" way to go about doing this? Do I start at the stem and wind my
way toward the bar ends? The other way entirely? Do I wind around the bars
toward the front or rear? Any tricks for cleanly dealing with brake
calipers?
Any tips are greatly appreciated.
Thanks,
Matthew "the twenty-something who is about to take off his training wheels"
Bowne
Brooklyn, New York