Why isn't he Prime Minister???
Edit.. CBA
If he doesn't like holes maybe the old curmudgeon should cut back on the bottle/bag/whatever bosses?
What are you doing to your rear brake that needs anything to be done to the hose once it’s in the frame? And whining about having to take the lever off to feed it through, still going to have to do that to shorten it anyway if attached to the outside
It doesn’t really bother me much either way; can’t see the advantage of it, but equally i fitted the brakes to my last mountain bike five years ago and haven’t touched them since.
Yep. I find it suprising how little questioning there is over metal frames that are full of holes and welded-in cable guides just for the asethetics of hiding a cable. Add ugly to reduce ugly? Add material or weakness too bc the compromised tubes have to be thicker-walled to pass tests.
I reckon threading the cables and hoses took 50% of the build time on my new Orange frame, and it came with guide tubes installed. Getting the grommets in was an absolute pig too.
If they are intelligently designed with a big port a the bottom bracket and external along the chain stays, it's not so bad, (2 of my bikes have this) but all small holes can get in the sea.
My most recent build had external cable routing. Still had to thread the hose through the shock mount linkage near the bottom bracket. Didn't really matter as the brake was supplied rear to cut and bleed
My least favourite thing is threading a brake house through a chainstay to create less than 6 inches of invisible hose.
There's just zero benefit to anyone or anything and it's a totally unnecessary PITA.
Just put the bloody guides on the outside.
Cotic, in front brake internal routing shocker!
First world problem that’s a one off or at worst a very occasional activity. Hardly a major factor in frame purchase decisions.
Completely agree with him.
Of course it does create work for shops, which depending on your POV, is either a good or a bad thing.
as someone with opposable thumbs who doesn’t tend to use the trained shop monkeys, I just find internal routing an annoyance.
Know someone with a VERY expensive enduro frame - when trying to replace his gear cable, the housing got stuck. Couldn't get it out no matter what he tried. Jammed in the frame forever is seems.
So he cut as much off as he could (with limited access), and ended up getting a wireless derailleur/shifter just so he could keep riding.
Is it a conspiracy to force wireless shifting onto the masses? To collect shifting & riding data in order to meticulously plan future obsolescence? To be able to track riders, and remotely throttle them if they stray too far off-piste?
No. It's just a sh*t idea that most of us willingly supported, because we kept buying bikes. We're the guilty ones. 😂
Whilst I don't necessarily disagree, the last cotic I had had around 7-8 holes for the cable guides, bottle bosses and more bosses underneath the downtube, so not sure the holes in tubes argument holds up. I also found it a little irritating that the guides never tightened against the cable so the rear brake hose would always be slightly curved away from the downtube.
I recently bought a £15 cable routing kit from amazon and it has made the occasional ballache of cable routing a much simpler task.
For me it is all about the maintenance. If you can't do a once a year or so job (like servicing a headset) without disconnecting hydraulics and rethreading cables then you've gone too far.
Likewise if you must internalise then have the good grace to provide guide tubes.
I reckon threading the cables and hoses took 50% of the build time on my new Orange frame
You got off lightly - getting the seatpost cable round the BB is particularly enjoyable eh?
I'm a firm advocate of external cabling, but have somehow ended up with internal on all my MTBs - basically because the prices were too good to ignore.
It's just an unnecessary PITA, in my view.
I reckon threading the cables and hoses took 50% of the build time on my new Orange frame
You got off lightly - getting the seatpost cable round the BB is particularly enjoyable eh?
I'm a firm advocate of external cabling, but have somehow ended up with internal on all my MTBs - basically because the prices were too good to ignore.
It's just an unnecessary PITA, in my view.
Surly get my vote all routing external, full length cable outers zip ties.
The problem is allowing product designers to exist. They only care about the look of something and not how it works or how much fafage it causes.
Cotic in seat stay internal routing shocker!!
I know its not a brake but still unnecessary IMO.
Yeah, threading the dropper cable around the bottom bracket is fun on an Orange! Looks better on some frames though.
I have a couple of internal routed frame and one external. Meh, can't say I spend much time worrying about it. Saying that, Transition are in my good book for making internal routing a painless experience.
Transition are in my good book for making internal routing a painless experience.
Just came back in to edit my post above to say this, but you've beaten me to it. Built my son a Transition Sentinal earlier this year and the gears internal routing was the easiest I've ever done. The rear brake stays on the outside but routed along a recessed channel. Bloody Brilliant!
Dropper cable on the Cotic above was also a bit of a pain in the arse to route as the pivot bolt gets in the way. Something the Transition was also better at as the main pivot bolt is not through the seat tube.
An engineer with strong opinions? Colour me surprised. I don't care either way if I'm honest, dropper posts with internal routing is about the biggest issue for me I guess as it's always seems awkward. Brakes need installing and the hoses shortening regardless of internal or external routing, and doesn't make any different to routine maintenance that I can see really as that involves mostly either at the lever of the calliper anyway. Holes in frames is a pretty weak argument given water bottle mounts are a thing...
But here we are talking about Cotic, so I guess that viral ad idea worked.
I was pleasantly surprised how easy the internal routing was on my Scandal when I built it up two years ago, thanks to the well thought out ports. I'd rather have external routing though; now I'm about to strip it down, I'm leaving the brake hose in situ, disconnecting the lever and caliper to fit them onto a Sonder Frontier frame. It'd be much easier if it was just cutting a few zipties and lifting the entire brake off in a oner like the good old days.
Threading a hose with a banjo fitting is going to be more difficult on the Frontier because the plated port and the hose-size hole are effectively the wrong way round. Looks tidy, potentially a pain in the arse.
What are you doing to your rear brake that needs anything to be done to the hose once it’s in the frame? And whining about having to take the lever off to feed it through, still going to have to do that to shorten it anyway if attached to the outside
+1
And even if you fit new brakes it's an easy job to swap, just poke a bit of wire down the end of the old and new hose and push/pull the new hose through.
How much weaker is a hole in the frame Vs a welded on guide?
Like a lot of people who are neither mechanically challenged or magazine reviewers searching for things to talk about, I don't really care. Some bikes do external cabling neatly, some don't. Some do internal cabling in a messy way! I'd actually quite like
It's a bit like when someone decided that full outers were a thing we must have on hardtails. Why? Just spec a decent sealed ferrule on the rear loop and not have the friction of a meter of cable. CX bikes manage it just fine. I'll begrudgingly accept they make some sense on FS bikes where you end up needing loops of outer to get round the pivots.
The problem is allowing product designers to exist. They only care about the look of something and not how it works or how much fafage it causes.
No, I think this one is consumer driven, remember when "we" all collectively refused to buy externally routed dropper posts and started doing DIY drilling of seatubes just to avoid that loop of cable to the seat collar? This is the end result of that.
i like that he sticks to his guns but i'm actually selling my Solaris Max specifically because of the sh!itty plastic p-clip solution to the cable routing on the downtube. Cables never stay straighten, gets little bits of sponge stuck in when washing the bike and I nearly always scuff a knuckle on the clips when working on the bike because they are sharp AF.
I completely understand why they have done it but it's just not for a picky bugger like me.
I can see where he's coming from and it's not really much different to the arguments that have been doing the rounds in roadietrackworld for years since internal routing seems to be the standard there now whereas MTB still seems to be trying to decide what to do.
I can only imagine that evolving further now that wireless groupsets are much more common - you could conceivably create a wireless only frame with no gear cable routing or ports at all, leaving only the brake hoses (and possibly dropper cable although you can get those wireless as well) to sort out.
The problem is allowing product designers to exist. They only care about the look of something and not how it works or how much fafage it causes.
Take a look at the work of good product or industrial designers?
Holes in frames is a pretty weak argument given water bottle mounts are a thing...
It depends where they are. If you want a cable to go into a 6mm hole the upper edge of the down tube halfway along it, that's easy enough. If you want a larger modular bolt-in port about 75mm from the head tube that's a bit different.
because of the sh!itty plastic p-clip solution to the cable routing on the downtube. Cables never stay straighten,
Have you tried those Alu cable clips that come in 2 halves? They will tension and grip a cable, esp if you pop a bit of heat shrink or rubberwrap on the cable outer. Can look pretty neat.
No, I think this one is consumer driven, remember when "we" all collectively refused to buy externally routed dropper posts and started doing DIY drilling of seatubes just to avoid that loop of cable to the seat collar? This is the end result of that.
Hmmmm, I really Don't think this is "consumer driven", it's very much been manufacturer driven and all because the big boys who sell lots of carbon road bikes were able to push the "aero benefits" of hidden cables to dentists and stock brokers. That in turn reduced the CoGs for moulding a frame (you no longer had to put cable stops and mounts on the exterior just a couple of in-moulded holes). and so they turned their attention to everything else, including MTBs and Gravel bikes.
It's been made the de-facto "standard" by the like of SBC/Trek/Giant/etc mostly for their own cost reduction needs.
First they told us we wanted hidden cables (including for droppers) with the advertorials they pay for in the mags and websites, then they sold us the products to match the marketing.
I've actually got an externally routed dropper, works just fine and I didn't have to drill holes or faff about routing cables through an otherwise good frame.
The art of marketing is convincing people to want something they never previously want or need, and making them believe they asked it...
I have a internal headset routed road bike, an internal routed MTB (but external on the seatstays), and a fully external MTB,
The headset routing is a pain, it will be a priority on my next road bike to avoid that.
The internal routed MTB is fine, I can't see what the fuss is here. Not had any issues replacing shifter and brake cables. In fact I prefer it to the external routing. It sounds like there must be internal routing bikes with much more daft designs.
All the internal cables on my Aether 9c rattle inside their housings, the external ones on my Moxie do not. I can't say that building up one bike was appreciably harder than the other. I cut to size and bled the rear brake line on both. But a noise you have no way of curing really doesn't feel like progress.
Yeah, I don't think the dropper anecdote is the driver at all. For a start I don't think people stopped buying external droppers for the reason you say, because it was only once companies offered stealth routing that people could drill their frames to adapt. Stealth dropper routing is the one internal cable i'm OK with as it makes better sense than the previous routing, and it's usually only partially internal, and fairly discreet and on a stout bit of tubing anyway. Either way, dropper isn't to blame for the rest of the cables moving inside. Agree with Cy and jameso, it's a crap 'solution' and not comparable to compromises associated with bolt on mounts, in terms of tubing strength and profiles etc.
Internal routing all comes undone with servicing and just simple parts changes, and it increases waste of hoses and cables if you end up needing to trim stuff for new connections etc. Even (and especially for me) fork internal routing is a bad idea, especially on drop bar bikes with hydro discs. Makes changing a brake or headset bearing unnecessarily difficult. I'm also happy with the utilitarian look of external cabling too, especially if done nicely.
As a serial tinkerer & frame swapper I like full external. For example I can go from having a built-up fully rigid bikepacking bike to a fully built-up hardcore hardtail in about half an hour (Headset and fork stay in each frame when I take one apart, everything else swaps across). I don't even have to undo the cable from the rear derailleur I can just swap drivetrain and brakes over without disconnecting a thing and it's very satisfying!
My road bike is internal through frame though (not headset) and I have no issue with that, it just gets ridden and I've never had a need to remove or replace anything that goes through the frame in 3 years so far.
Right. Its Friday. We are all friends here. I simply cannot help myself.
Firstly, I've been a MTB'er for 25-30 years. Its not my first rodeo.
I have worked as a professional bike mechanic.
I love Cotics, I've owned a few and I will quite possibly own another one day.
I like Cy, I have chatted to him previously at events and I massively respect him and the company he has built.
But...
Internal cables. He's right.
No, he isnt, he is opinionated (which is of course fine, lord knows I am opinionated if anything!).
"Urgh, internal cables suck blah blah" is simply another of the bandwagons to jump on. Wheel sizes. Hub standards. Disc brakes. Suspension. e-bikes. We have been there over and over, it was forever thus and it always will be.
Internal cables doesnt work for a man building short production runs of steel, tubular bikes, designed to appeal to a certain narrow band of the market.
I own multiple bikes with internal cable routing, of various designs.
I have never found that the internal routing of cables limits my ability to maintain my bike.
I have never had a cable wear through a headset bearing. (I have had multiple externally routed cables wear through steel frames, mind!)
There are multiple benefits to internal cable routing, some of which I very much enjoy. Especially so if you are a large manufacturer with the ability or desire to design and built an entire 'system', not just the frame.
( I know your going to ask so heres one - race plates. Which of those bikes below do you think it will be easier to get a race plate on the front of, nice and neatly, without getting tangled up...
And guess what, thats more important to me than having 900 rivnuts screwed into the side of my mountainbike so I can go 'bikepacking' or whatever nonsense we are calling it now, something I have no plans to ever do. I do, however, put plates on my bikes every so often. More often than i change headset bearings for sure, sounds like some of you need to learn how to clean your bikes.... 😉
Can't somone make a steel frame one day without adding all that extra shit to it...? )
Internal cable routing doesnt work for Cy and his tubular steel frames, thats fine. But simply calling it out as rubbish, and 'my way is the only way' is really, really poor form in my opinion, he's better than that.
For a bit of fun, lets directly quote him from the clip...
Perforating a frame with holes, isnt very sensible, in my point, in my view
Here we go the. Lets focus on holes perforated through the frame, in order to manage the cables (so ignoring bottle bosses, which I think is fair).
My beloved Scott Scale. Which has, shock horror, full scale cable tourism.
I have highlighted all the holes on this bike, used to manage the cables.
There is 1.
Next, the Cotic Bfe, A frame I really like and a version of which I have owned in the past.
7 holes, for cable management. Or if we like, 700% more perforations through frame tubes, than the Scott with the evil cable routing.
As an aside, I dropped my forks yesterday and changed my headset angle on the Scott. I used a T25 Torx and thats it. I didnt even put the bike in the stand. If I wanted to smash out the pressed in headset cups on a Cotic, I would need rather more tooling that that.
'Internal cable routing is bad' is simply not factual, or objective, and especially not when presented in this way.
It is entirely subjective.
Much like the fact that this, looks shit.
Whereas this, is ace (and god forbid, theres even an extra lockout cable in there! and its still neater and tidier!)
An engineer with strong opinions? Colour me surprised....
But here we are talking about Cotic, so I guess that viral ad idea worked.
Exactly. I'm almost annoyed at myself as a fellow Engineer, for rising to it, but like I said, its Friday, lets go for it 😉
It might not work for you, because maybe your a luddite, scared of change, or you build frames out of steel tubes (which I love!), you are shit at maintaining your bike, or many other reason, all of which are fine and your allowed to be all of those things. However simply saying its wrong because subjectively you dont like it,... well that, actually, is whats wrong.
Enjoy your bikes everyone 😀
I agree with that there @snotrag chap up there, internal routing is far better than the old semi-exposed external stuff.
For starters is just looks better, nothing for random things to snag on and collect stuff. In my experience there's less maintenance cable wise to worry about, and that includes running 4 CX race bikes with internal routing - which is miles better as there's less to collect mud on the frame - always a bonus.
If you can't figure out how to swap cables easily on an internally routed frame, then you're doing your LBS a favor and keeping them in business, its pretty dam simple, even more so with an internal routing kit.
While you're about, how's the Tracloc lever for the dropper post / lockout duties on the Scale?
I agree with him. Internal cable routing is just more faff and makes simple tasks take so much longer. I remember my old Raleigh Grifter; that had an internally routed rear brake cable. The 9 year old me was reduced to tears trying to thread a new cable through. I accept that technique and mechanically experience were somewhat lacking at that stage, and nobody had ever taught me anything about bikes, but herein lies an issue: bikes ought to be simple mechanical devices that are easy to maintain. The simpler they are, the easier it is to keep them well maintained, and the safer all bikes would be. My philosophy is that a bicycle should be simple enough for a 9-year old to fix with basic tools. The vast majority of bicycle owners do not have sufficient knowledge to fix their own bikes. This leads to high costs for having bikes fixed professionally, which leads to lots of very poorly maintained and unsafe bikes out there.
It might not work for you, because maybe your a luddite, scared of change, or you build frames out of steel tubes (which I love!), you are shit at maintaining your bike, or many other reason, all of which are fine and your allowed to be all of those things. However simply saying its wrong because subjectively you dont like it,... well that, actually, is whats wrong.
Having a go at people because they lack the skills and knowledge to fix something that's been made unnecessary complicated for reasons of profit, is somewhat unfair. What if we all had simpler and easier to maintain items? Would probably lead to a lot less waste.
But the question I really have, is: where on earth did he get that helmet peak from? An F1 car? It's ridiculous!
Internal routing is a pain, but I can live with it.
Headset routing is another league of faff. I have it on my Canyon Stive ON, never again. I took the fork off to pack the bike up for a holiday, and OMG, the faff of getting the headset and cables back in with everything aligned correctly. All the cables try and spring into the wrong place, or the wrong side of the fork, the protective foam things start getting caught and sliding too far down the cables when you push the fork in. And that was without disconnecting anything.
The worst part is, the bike is super ugly anyway, It's not dangerholmes project or anything.
It's just penny pinching.
I've never actually had fully internal, just a semi internal bit for the dropper on my old Vitus Sommet which was an absolute pig for getting it in and through to the exit hole. That's put me off full internal routing, it's an unnecessary faff. Shame about the Vitus as the rest of the (external) cable routing on it was some of the nicest I've used with the bolt on x-shaped things - wish more bikes that those. Much nicer than the normal zip ties or those reusable plastic clips.
All depends doesn't it. Both my Rocky Mountain and my Fuels are effortless and fully routed top to bottom, fitting a new brake line is quicker than it would be if i had to fit 3 cable ties and hold cable in place or use 4 little clips/brackets. Just push and it pops out the correct hole....
Swapped the rear brake on my bike the other day, just before a ride. Allen keys only. 5 mins, job done. Getting the calliper aligned took most of that time. I’ll work out what’s up with the brake I took off when the rain returns…
I think what you need to do is just do less maintenance on your bike (or buy a bike that requires less maintenance) then it doesn't become a problem where your cables go.
HTH
Headset routing is another league of faff.
Got be able to sell the “advantages” of wireless gears. Look at all the faff avoided for an extra £500 ticket price on your bike! Still doesn’t solve all the problems created by routing a brake hose through the headset though.
I think what you need to do is just do less maintenance on your bike (or buy a bike that requires less maintenance) then it doesn't become a problem where your cables go.
My brakeless fixed gear being the logical extreme. Won't catch me worrying about cables, gears or brakes. I am however very reliant on my chain...
No, he isnt, he is opinionated (which is of course fine, lord knows I am opinionated if anything!).
Absolutely that, and of course if he wasn't so opinionated he may well never have bothered to make frames that he thinks (and so many agree) are what the world needs. He's on a bit of a rant but let the baby have his bottle. He's earnt it.
For a bit of fun, lets directly quote him from the clip...
Perforating a frame with holes, isnt very sensible, in my point, in my view
This is actually where I have a problem (all relative to the real problems in my life of course).
Internal cable routing hardly perforates a frames with holes, and has been pointed out, touring frames and more recently bike packing frames have always been similarly 'perforated' with holes as mount points for various racks, guards, bottle cages, bags, etc.
He's an engineer with a deserved reputation but is making an implication that cable routing holes make a frame unsafe. I don't believe there's any evidence to support such a view. Could be marked up as bad marketing in my opinion.
No, he isnt, he is opinionated (which is of course fine, lord knows I am opinionated if anything!).
Absolutely that, and of course if he wasn't so opinionated he may well never have bothered to make frames that he thinks (and so many agree) are what the world needs. He's on a bit of a rant but let the baby have his bottle. He's earnt it.
For a bit of fun, lets directly quote him from the clip...
Perforating a frame with holes, isnt very sensible, in my point, in my view
This is actually where I have a problem (all relative to the real problems in my life of course).
Internal cable routing hardly perforates a frame with holes, and has been pointed out, touring frames and more recently bike packing frames have always been similarly 'perforated' with holes as mount points for various racks, guards, bottle cages, bags, etc.
He's an engineer with a deserved reputation but is making an implication that cable routing holes make a frame unsafe. I don't believe there's any evidence to support such a view. Could be marked up as bad marketing in my opinion.
FWIW I really don't care either way. Internal routing looks neater, is a bit more of a faff, but I really wouldn't chose a frame based on how the cables were routed. The Deviate hidden top tube route is quite neat but those allen bolt thingumies can also be a bit of a faff to fit.
love internal routing. bike looks cleaner and nicer and betterer. it's a bit of faff but arent all good things?
internal or externa doesn't put me off either way tho. headset routing does/
Just push and it pops out the correct hole....
this matches my experience. I don't think either of my internally routed bikes has made any maintenance task any harder or longer. There are certainly more annoying things on bikes - SRAM cranks, removing pedals, taking saddles off to re-pressurise droppers etc, none of which require cable-faff.
There are certainly more annoying things on bikes -........removing pedals....
Double what....?
I also like Cy, but have to say it’s a non issue on a well built internally routed frame. On my Stumpjumper you just push the cable in and it comes out of the right place.
To be fair, I’m not sure he even believes it, it’s just a video designed to generate discussion and an image of no-fuss Cotic bikes. How can he when they put some many holes in their frames as mentioned several times above? Like their advertising obsession about how much better steel is than all other materials - but then using alloy for the swingarms on all their full sussers. I’d consider a Cotic full suss if they switched to full steel but otherwise they don’t stand out enough for me - if part of the bike is alloy, the rest of may as well be alloy (with all its strengths and weaknesses)
yeah ive got bikes with a bit of internal routing, but not full
its a bit fiddly but not that bad, ive got no problem with it either way
and i actually disagree with snotrag, i think the integrated bar stem and cables looks way worse!,
i really like the Deviate idea up there and i like the downtube guides integrated into my bottle bosses on my kona, a very tidy way of doing things and doesnt need extra holes in the frame
i think i prefer neat external engineering solutions like that
what i do think is stilly is that internal routing adds extra complexity cost and weight, for a debatable aesthetic gain
I've forgotten - are disk brakes still on the wrong side of the forks?
I've forgotten - are disk brakes still on the wrong side of the forks?
That was only on the early generation Roadrat wasn't it?
It was a workaround for the potential issue of QR wheels with disc brakes. Normal dropout alignment does pose a small risk that if you don't do the QR up tight enough, the wheel can be ejected. Reversing it all had the opposite effect, applying the brake pulled the wheel further up into the dropout.
It's all irrelevant now that thru-axles are a thing.
If you can't figure out how to swap cables easily on an internally routed frame, then you're doing your LBS a favor and keeping them in business, its pretty dam simple, even more so with an internal routing kit.
Well that's fine with your experience of internal routing. However my experience when I worked as a bike mechanic was often very different. Frames where you had a 1.5mm hole to get the cable into the top tube and another 1.5mm hole to get it out again were my favourites. Frames which had been sawed through from the inside because the cable had slipped out of the internal guide were also not uncommon.
To change a gear cable on my ebike involves removing the motor. I know what I'm doing with this but it's hardly "pretty dam simple".
Done well, internal routing is no drama, but it's so often done very badly.
If you can't figure out how to swap cables easily on an internally routed frame, then you're doing your LBS a favor and keeping them in business, its pretty dam simple, even more so with an internal routing kit.
Well that's fine with your experience of internal routing. However my experience when I worked as a bike mechanic was often very different. Frames where you had a 1.5mm hole to get the cable into the top tube and another 1.5mm hole to get it out again were my favourites. Frames which had been sawed through from the inside because the cable had slipped out of the internal guide were also not uncommon.
To change a gear cable on my ebike involves removing the motor. I know what I'm doing with this but it's hardly "pretty dam simple".
Done well, internal routing is no drama, but it's so often done very badly.
Isn't that a historical thing though now, so the internal routing on bikes from the last year or two is 10000 times nicer than some from 3-5 years before that.
Having a go at people because they lack the skills and knowledge to fix something that's been made unnecessary complicated for reasons of profit, is somewhat unfair. What if we all had simpler and easier to maintain items? Would probably lead to a lot less waste.
My internally routed Spur was easier to cable than my externally routed Pace. If the bike has been designed well there's no reason for it to be more complicated.
Perhaps that's the actual argument to have, badly executed cable routing vs good, internal or external?
Someone mentioned earlier about it maybe leading to manufactures not even giving a cable option, wireless only. Haven't specialised done that already?
He's an engineer with a deserved reputation but is making an implication that cable routing holes make a frame unsafe. I don't believe there's any evidence to support such a view.
My LBS has experience of poorly designed titanium Kinesis frames where the port at the top of the down tube cracked due to poor design and engineering. One of the reasons that I went with an Orro frame a couple of years back.
It's a bit like when someone decided that full outers were a thing we must have on hardtails. Why?
Probably because they rode regularly in the Peak District where grit solution finds its way into every cable end.
I can't say I'm particularly animated about internal cable routing. It's easier to build up a bike without it for sure, but the cheapo amazon routing kits work well and make the whole thing reasonably tolerable ime. It's not a hill I'd particularly choose to die on. Cables and hoses routed through headsets on the other hand, just seem nuts to me.
Also not a fan of electronic shifting, anything that needs a battery and motor seems ripe for failure.
My philosophy is that a bicycle should be simple enough for a 9-year old to fix with basic tools.
That sort of thing might have flown in Victorian times - small children up chimneys and that sort of thing - but is illegal these days. If, as it seems, you are employing small children as bike mechanics, you are almost certainly breaking the law.
Sorry if I've got the wrong end of the stick here 🙄
My internally routed Spur was easier to cable than my externally routed Pace.
Externally routed brake hose though. 👍🏼
True but the gear cable and dropper were easier!
Isn't that a historical thing though now, so the internal routing on bikes from the last year or two is 10000 times nicer than some from 3-5 years before that.
Nope, not on my new Orange. Tiny holes at the top of the downtube, tiny holes at the bottom and then the same again into and out of the chainstays. No internal piping. If it hadn't had the plastic pull through guides installed, I'd have been resorting to vacuuming bits of string through the frame. There's also absolutely zero chance of getting any foam in there to stop the cables rattling the inside of the frame.
It does ride lovely though.
That’s because orange have poorly executed their solution
an implication that cable routing holes make a frame unsafe. I don't believe there's any evidence to support such a view.
I haven't watched the whole clip but I doubt that's the point made. It's true that adding cable ports (or M5 threaded bosses, but to a lesser extent ime) in many places on the frame needs additional wall thickness to pass the safety tests w/o cracking. Cable ports tend to be placed in areas where stress from fork leverage or pedalling load is high hence why there are examples of bikes cracking around those fittings, whether they passed testing or not (since there's safety regs to meet, test passes is highly likely on anything you buy from a reputable brand).
I was a bike mechanic 15 year ago when I first encountered an Orange with internal routing. One tiny hole at each end of a tube and nothing to stop the cable from rattling around inside. Crappy little grommets which were a nightmare to fit and wouldn't stay in place.
Routing tools didn't exist at the time we came up with all sorts of methods to speed up the process. It was a giant waste of time.
I'm surprised and disappointed to hear they haven't improved things in all this time.
I'm surprised and disappointed to hear they haven't improved things in all this time.
The Stage Evo I bought last year wasn't 'that' bad. The internal routing is of the most basic hole each end type and the dropper routing had me stopping to wonder if that really was correct (took some deft finger in the bottom bracket work) but the holes are pretty big so I was able to slide some anti rattle foam over each cable/hose and the rubber grommets went into place with the help of some silicon lube and a massage.
This reminds me of the 70s debate: brazed on bosses or srcew on clips that avoided heating the tubes. Silver soldering was one answer till steels that stayed strong after brazing arrived. My beloved Vitus 5/10 DB eventually cracked at a tiny braze on tab near the end of a butt.
My philosophy is that a bicycle should be simple enough for a 9-year old to fix with basic tools.
That sort of thing might have flown in Victorian times - small children up chimneys and that sort of thing - but is illegal these days. If, as it seems, you are employing small children as bike mechanics, you are almost certainly breaking the law.
Sorry if I've got the wrong end of the stick here 🙄
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I wasn't calling for a return to the times of child labour. Although...
Bikes should be easy to repair and maintain with basic tools. All bikes. And components should be easily swappable over bikes. When I first got into MTBs, way back in the late 80s, most components fit most bikes, regardless of use type. You could fit the same parts to a racer, an MTB, a shopper or even a kid's bike. Who doesn't like a racer with chopper handlebars (one kid locally fitted drop bars to hisChopper; I think this became the prototype for those time trial bikes with the smaller front wheel). But us kids could tinker and mess about with our own bikes with basic tools we'd borrowed or nicked. Quite telling that most young people these days aren't so great with mechanical devices. Someone mentioned bike shops benefitting form people not being able to service their own bikes; for sure, but an increasing problem for many bike shops is the proprietary nature of bike systems; special tools needed for various cranks, BBs, etc. One local shop I chat to told me of a time when a customer had brought in a high end Campagnolo equipped racer, to have a new cassette and chain fitted. They didn't have the Campagnolo specific chain tool, so he went elsewhere. So they bought one, expecting other customers to need the same, only for it to be used a grand total of once. A £120 tool.
It all went wrong when marketing decided there weren't enough 'standards', and set about inventing new ones. Eventually we'll get to a point where bikes are like cars and you have to take them to specific brand workshops. Kerching.
As a Shimano stockist about 30 years back they wouldn't warranty the chain or any stuff that got mangled if it broke if you hadn't bought the HG chain tool - only about 25 quid IIRC.
It's far better now that QuickLinks are pretty much everywhere.
