Generic/ no name cable housing any "good"?

[Veloo]

Have you/ do you/ would you use generic, no name housing?

Looking for free/ cheap housing for when I work on my friends' bikes which are mostly on the Alvio/Altus/ Tourney end of the spectrum so $5/ cable and $3-4 per foot for housing eats into the budget pretty fast when their budget hovers around $100.

I've always stuck to the name brands for my bikes so don't know if generic housing will come back to bite me in the arse.

[glepore]

For those kind of bikes, sure, use it all the time.

[mstateglfr]

I use Sunlite brake housing on all my road bikes- I guess it's technically branded, but it's about as universal/generic and inexpensive as it gets when bought in bulk on amazon/ebay.
It's lined, it lasts, and I have never disliked the brake feel of any of the bikes. That's basically my requirement list for beake housing.


...shift housing is Jagwire that's purchased in bulk. It's really inexpensive in bulk.

[mtbmoose]

Yep, I buy the Jagwire 4mm housing with L3 liner in a 50m box for about $100. And buy the Jagwire shifter cables in the bulk box as well as the cable crimps and end caps. Very economical that way. I probably work on a couple dozen friends’ bikes every year. Nothing like throwing on new cables and housings to freshen up a bike.

[tellyho]

Clark is a good mid-price option

[dddd]

Generic housing may be fine, heck, I even use shop-discard housing all the time on low-level rebuilds after running a bent piece of cable through it (using aerosol sliding-door lube and compressed air to clean it out).

But generic or re-purposed housing isn't pre-lubricated like the premium housing is (with an optimal silicone/ptfe light-viscosity lubricant).

So, for such housing not sporting the premium pre-lube treatment, I apply a film of SRAM or Shimano cable-specific grease to the inner wire, which is super-slick and (because it's silicone-based) won't evaporate, oxidize or permeate any polymer liners.

Those are my secrets for turning out well-tuned bikes for myself, my friends and the college-town re-sellers.

[Veloo]

Where do you get the bulk Jagwire housing from?
Quick FX calculation equates $100 to about $1 CAD per foot.

Originally Posted by mtbmoose

Yep, I buy the Jagwire 4mm housing with L3 liner in a 50m box for about $100. And buy the Jagwire shifter cables in the bulk box as well as the cable crimps and end caps. Very economical that way. I probably work on a couple dozen friends’ bikes every year. Nothing like throwing on new cables and housings to freshen up a bike.