The weight thing makes sense, as does the slots and friction of unlined housing. But here's a few other reasons I can think of. 1)Fashion- if it was done on fancier frames eventually it would get done on cheaper ones, and become expected. 2)Cheaper to make. less housing used, over thousands of bikes at $x per foot. Not such a big deal for a small builder, but for Raleigh? Also it's cheaper to install than clips (The good ones, not the plastic like Huffy used) and uses one less braze on than guides for a full run. 3) Actually marginally safer. I had a cable break at the brake lever, and was able to stop by pulling on the exposed cable. Sure, I know now that front's work better, but at the time, I didn't, and the little used front brake probably wasn't working anyway. I was a kid, and may have moved the pads to the back till I could get new ones.(not poor, just cheap and 14)
Steve Birmingham Lowell, Ma USA
Date: Wed, 2 May 2007 03:06:42 -0700 (PDT) From: Thomas Adams <thomasthomasa@yahoo.com> To: Stronglight49@aol.com, classicrendezvous@bikelist.org Subject: Re: [CR] Brake cable routing logic?
Dear Bob:
One foot of cable housing = 20 grams, so split cable housings lighten up Old Paint. Given what a weight weenie will pay for a component that's 20 grams lighter than the competition, I'm surprised anyone uses full length housings. Plus if the housing stops are slotted to allow temporarily unshipping the housing, then it's easy to perform the annual cable relubrication, certainly more necessary in the days before lined housings and non-stainless cables. Of course most old frames I've owned with split housing stops don't have slots, so that wasn't much of a vintage advantage. And, as you point out, older unlined cable could significantly increase friction so shorter housing lengths may have reduced total friction. Just some speculations on why.
Tom Adams, Shrewsbury NJ
Stronglight49@aol.com wrote: Well, just call me stupid, but I fail to understand the reasoning behind splitting up the brake cable housings beneath the top tubes on everything from Raleighs to Paramounts, and most every British touring frame. Even the best contrived set-up with a guide loop followed by a housing stop always seems to create additional cable drag where the bare cables struggle to exit the brazed-on stops.
On my other bikes, with housing guides for continuous runs of brake housings, either brazed or clipped onto the top tube, the braking action is consistently smooth, smooth, smooth - regardless of whether the brakes are Campy, Weinmann or Mafac. With the divided stops, it is always scrape, scrape, scrape as the cables fight their way through the additional metal obstacles. Regardless of how carefully aligned the housings may be, they never seem to remain perfectly fixed to always allow the cables to pass cleanly through the stops.
Was this design to avoid lengthy travel of gritty galvanized old cables through coarse unlined housings? This no longer seems an issue today with slick lined housing and silky smooth stainless steel or even teflon coated cables.
Perhaps I have just missed the point entirely because I just don't get it. Can someone please educate me?
Thanks!
Bob Hanson, Albuquerque, NM, USA