John Jorgensen wrote:
> Regarding factory brake cable drilling on GB stems.
>
> My father's 1964 Carlton Catalina came that way factory
> drilled. Made the front brake much less "spongy" than the
> typical bracket mounted off the steerer.
I liked the factory drilling I saw on a number of those, but mine wasn't
drilled - so I drilled it myself, you can see the results here:
http://tinyurl.com/
Forgive me, I did it when I was about 20 years old (about 30 years ago). Still have that stem on a daily rider. It was already old when I drilled it, I am not small, and I used it for a fair bit of rough stuff, so I believe I have shown that you don't have to worry about the strength of the drilled stems. (As always, ymmv.)
My home job came out very close to how the factory jobs look, except with an aluminum adjusting barrel instead of the proper steel one. In the picture, the knurled "locknut" is threaded up out if the way, to show the milled flat in the stem - in use, the locknut is threaded all the way down against this step.
Mark Bulgier
Seattle WA USA