Mechanical brake cable in a hydraulic guide hole

[Borbus]

My frame has cable holds for hydraulic brakes which are about 8mm, but I have mechanical brakes, standard 5mm cables. There are no stops in the hydraulic holes, they are just guides for the hose.

My LBS did it before by running the outer cable the whole length, like the hydraulic one would, and putting some rubber spacer around the cables and pushing them in bigger holes. This solution works, but it looks a bit ugly (the rubber spacers stick out the top a bit) and obviously the full length outer has more resistance.

Is there any better way to do this? Are there hydraulic->mechanical adapters for frames? Or maybe some other hack I can do to improve it? Even just a neater way to hold the full length cable would be an improvement.

 

[subaqua]

i would be wondering why the bike doesn't have hydraulic brakes if thats what the frame has been designed for

 

[Borbus]

It's a rebuilt bike from a salvaged frame. I didn't want to shell out the extra for hydraulic brakes at the time.

 

[rusty bearing]

The extra resistance would be negligible and you could argue that the inner being less exposed to the elements and crud might work normally for longer.
Keep the full length outer and find an aesthetically pleasing way of securing it would be my advice.

 

[Andy_R]

The extra resistance would be negligible and you could argue that the inner being less exposed to the elements and crud might work normally for longer.
Keep the full length outer and find an aesthetically pleasing way of securing it would be my advice.

+1

IIRC you get more resistance with sections of outer housing instead of a full length run because of the build up of crud at each cut end over time. If you're using cable discs you may also want to think about using compressionless outer housing.

 

[simon.r]

Agree with using a full length outer. I can't see the problem with running the 5mm cable through the 8mm hole?

 

[Borbus]

I think I was expecting it to have as little resistance as the front brake, which is probably silly considering the two right angles the cable travels around.

Ok, thanks for the replies, I'll see if I can think of a better way to hold it in the guides. They're not actually holes, by the way, I don't know if there is a word for it, but they are basically slightly more than semi-circles with a gap in the top for pushing the cable in to.