Are All Cable Housings The Same?

[Peter P.]

I recently worked on a friend's Trek touring bike. His bike and mine share one thing in common; they both have 9 speed Shimano bar end shifters.

One thing I noticed; his shifters have a remarkably lighter shift feel versus mine, particularly in the rear derailleur, so much that I'm jealous!

I know my cables aren't binding because it shifts fine in both directions; it's just that there's clearly more force needed to move the derailleur to the larger cogs whereas his is light as a feather.

The only differences I can tell are: he's running a Shimano Deore LX rear derailleur and I'm using a Shimano Ultegra short cage, and he's got the original OEM 4mm black housings on his bike; I'm running 5mm housings that I think are Jagwire. In fact, I just noticed I've got the same 4mm housings on the STI shifters on my road bike with Ultegra and it too, has a light shift action. His cables even exit from under the bar tape at about the same point on the handlebar curve, which I presume eliminates that as a cause.

Since both bikes' derailleurs use a parallelogram coil spring I figure that's not the cause; must be the housings.

So is it? Has anyone experienced better/worse performance with certain brand cable housings? Vain me; I'd like to keep my housings white, regardless of brand so keep that in mind!

[Dave B]

When it came to mtbs I always ran shimano and used the XTR cable kits. Shimano puts their grease in the housing and coated the cables with something. Was some of the smoothest stuff out there. For road and cross I tried most things and ended up liking the Gore systems. It kept stuff sealed so it shifted nicely...longer. That was key, the longevity I found personally.

Ymmv of course.

[jds108]

Any little bend/kink along the way can add resistance. One place that I don't see mentioned very often is the bend in the handlebar right behind the shifter (assuming the cables are under the tape)

Many newer handlebars have a very tight bend there (from the flats to the drops), particularly the carbon bars that are molded rather than formed from a bent tube.

I don't have a good solution to this one, but that's what's causing some friction with my brake levers on a couple of bikes.

[Chance]

I know my cables aren't binding because it shifts fine in both directions; it's just that there's clearly more force needed to move the derailleur to the larger cogs whereas his is light as a feather.


In my experience cables can sometimes get gummed up with age. Not certain if it’s caused by dirt, humidity, or lubrication drying out over time but simply switching out cables and housings with identical model can improve operation. Since deterioration occurs over a long time it’s hard to notice the gradual change. Then if we switch to another brand it suddenly seems they have the best stuff on the market. That may be the case, but sometimes it may just be that the new stuff is new and not much more.

[UberBike]

Some housing is smoother and some have smoother action due to grease and some cables themselves are more slick.
But with your setups being similar I would check the housing ends and make sure the ends are not crimped before they enter the ferrules.
Poke a awl or pen or something into the housing end to make sure its round and wide open and make sure the cables and shifters are clean.

If it is time for a maintenance change the gore low friction housing ( the ones with the small tubing that goes though the housing ) is nice and the tube protects any normally exposed cable runs from mud/ect.
Preferred builds when we're not concerned about price I go with the gore housing and yokozuna cables.

[carpediemracing]

First make sure that your shifter isn't just tightened more.

A low buck way of decreasing cable resistance is to use a thinner cable. I think the thin ones are 1.1 mm and the regulars are 1.2 mm. Some housings only take 1.1 mm.

Another is lube. I personally find White Lightning lube (the wax stuff) to be very effective for cable housing. The wax gets in and doesn't go anywhere. A teammate/friend uses it in high level classic car restorations for various cable actuated things (latches, throttle, James Bond type air flow reducers, etc). I've tried everything over the years, from thicker oils, grease, "ceramic" lube, thin oils, and nothing works like WL in cables.

A good housing helps, one that is cut properly (so the ends aren't crushed together).

Finally the less compression the better. I found that going from stock Campy housing to the Nokons make the resistance so low I thought I didn't have a cable hooked up to the rear derailleur. A new Nokon install, with a new 1.1 mm gear cable, with White Lightning, makes the shifter feel like it's electronic. I can't speak for other housings since I haven't felt the need to try them.

A plus for Nokon - you can "uncut" housing, i.e. you can add segments if you're moving the cables to another bike etc. It's also very easy to exactly match cable lengths - just count segments. If you like fine tuning your housing length you can add/subtract one segment at a time.

(Front derailleurs have a much more powerful spring so it doesn't feel quite as light.)

[Mikej]

The liner inside of the housings will wear through at the bends (any bend in a cable is where the majority of friction will occur) leaving the wire braiding exposed and in direct contact with the cable. This will allow free movement of the cable, but it will have an increased friction over the plastic lining. I buy XTR cables in 10 packs and shimano housing in the 30 ft roll for my MTB and change 2x per year, but campy oem sets for road last quite a bit longer since alot less shifting happens under heavy tension on a road vs mtb. From my experience it is not really the gunk as much as it is the worn liner. Change yur cables, or lessen the tension if yur cheep, also, dont use oil or grease, high end stuff comes with lube already installed.