How to replace your cables and housing (EASY!) | Syd Fixes Bikes

welcome to the shed i'm sid mackie's on the camera and today we are going to be learning how to change a shifter cable [Music] now we've fully mixed up all the pieces which is exactly what mackie told me not to do for this task you will need a new cable new housing ferrules one cable end cable cutters allen keys a phillips head screwdriver and a crimper tool or needle nose pliers first off i think this is one of the first bike maintenance tasks you should learn to do cables are definitely something that wear out being able to swap your own cables is great there's a pretty high mark on the task at a bike shop and it really isn't that hard shifting does tend to degrade gradually over times you may not realize how hard it is getting until you hop on your friend's bike or on a bike that you haven't ridden as much so it's definitely something to stay on top of because it's just no fun to not be able to push your lever and if it really gets bad you could snap the cable it could be fraying at the end like just want to pay attention to your cables today we are going to be working on mackie's mom's bike this is a giant trance from 2006 and it is still trucking along but very much in need of a new shifter probably two new shifter cables but i think for this video we'll just do the rear we want to shift all the way down here because we're gonna cut the cable so there's gonna be suddenly no cable tension so sweet there we go i think this bike is a rapid rise no it doesn't matter it just means that you shift to the easy to the easiest gear instead of the hardest gear like right now pedal no way okay learn something new every day usually you shift all the way to the bottom of your cassette unless you happen to be working on a 2004 shimano dior rapid rise are they even a thing recently at all no rapid rise derailers stopped being a thing but this one still exists what i was saying is the one apparently there's a couple things that are different between this and a newer bike and one of the more notable things is we're going to have to cut multiple pieces of housing on pretty much all of our bikes it is single piece of housing and it's internally routed this is externally routed i'm also going to need a lot more ferrules than i thought so if you have internal cable routing do not pull it all the way out i will put a link right up here to our tricky cable routing suggestions you want to leave that housing in we'll show you in that video how to measure it and how to push your new housing through assuming you are working on an older bike like this one we're gonna carry ahead and pull everything off you want to keep track of which piece of housing goes where so lay them out in order derailer next one all right great okay so now we've pulled all of our housing out next we've grabbed our screwdriver pretty much most shifters have a screwdriver here why is that no but i'm just saying like why is everything else an allen key it's really just like a plug to keep like dirt and stuff out so we're gonna put this somewhere where we won't lose it here's where the fact that you have a rapid rise derailer so normally you'd shift to the hardest gear in this case you shift to the easiest gear you basically want to shift until there is the least cable tension and then you should be able to see the head of your cable when you're in the correct gear just how she comes voila this is going straight in the trash i don't have anything against older bikes but there's just something about the older the bike is the longer it's been since it's been worked on there's just more things stuck in out that hurt that was probably not the way to do it just things get more stuck you know at this point we are going to cut our housing again if you have internal housing that you left in there you will want to just cut a piece that is way long or just run your hole most people don't buy bulk like this so you probably have like a whole long piece run it through without cutting it then cut it to save yourself the ha the absolute dire struggle that is a bad internal cable routing day there we go so on the old piece of housing you have metal sticking out on the new piece of housing you don't that's one way to tell that your housing is worn out all right we're gonna go ahead and here we go and see the nice thing i don't know if you can see with the camera but when you have it in the proper gear to do this you can see light at the end of the tunnel okay i just have to take my word for it well you also can't get it out unless you're in the right gear so i'm gonna run a nice puppy through this is something that i have a really bad tendency to forget like i think most of my bikes are missing because you just put it down yeah and it seems kind of an essential but then again like you're just creating another hole for bud and water to get into your shifter don't be like me just remember to put your thing back in then we're gonna grab barrel grab our long piece now we've fully mixed up all the pieces which is exactly what mackie told me not to do so make sure you keep your pieces separated and you said no each piece of housing requires two ferals one on either end i like to put them in like this though as opposed to putting them all in before because sometimes if your cable's a little or your housing got a little squished it may not like this might not come out as easily so basically you put the first ferrule on feeding a necklace run the cable into the housing and then put the second ferrule on so what did we have going on here do you remember where this was under over through probably get to pay attention to that this is a sort of thing that you don't see as often especially in mountain bikes these days where there's a section here that does not have cable housing oh you have another feral still in there i know i gotta get the fires out oh this is gonna hurt when it comes down no i did it it was fine are you wondering which piece is which no i'm 100 sure it's this are you am i wrong no you're right stressful for a few minutes there this piece of housing looks good on this side and a little more squished on this side but you put the ferrule on the cable first and then run it through the housing then you can just kind of connect them it's like beating a necklace i feel like that didn't mean much to you but i beaded some necklaces in my day yeah oh yeah okay and again another section without it which you don't see that often because it was a bad idea bad idea then still a bad idea the reason i say that having exposed cable like this is a bad idea is that any bit of cable that is out especially on a mountain bike is going to get mud and dirt on it that is going to eventually end up getting into the housing because that's just how that's just how things go and then your cable will wear out faster and it will not be moving through the housing smoothly and it will just not feel good this is looking all hunky-dory through here we're gonna stick this through and then we're gonna grab our allen key and get rid of that which you could have done earlier whoops that'll all come together when we get tension on the cable there then we loop this puppy through like and you want to be aware as you are releasing the previous one how it was run because you know you could have run it around the other direction but i wasn't paying attention to that but i'm pretty sure it's like this yeah well as you do more derailleurs you get an idea of which way it generally is okay well that'll get us started don't you reckon yeah it's um it's off it's like one gear off whenever you're installing a new cable i recommend just screwing the barrel adjuster all the way in on the shifter and then giving it one full turn out because then you have a little bit of adjustment that way but most likely you'll be tightening it you do the same thing on the one that's down here yeah so screw that one all the way in and then once it's all the way in now give it one full turn looser and why do you do it that way because most likely you're gonna want to tighten it that's why you do it mostly that direction but you may want to loosen it so then you're going to cut the cable this is a specially made set of needle nose pliers that allows you to very easily crimp your cable ends you can do it with normal needle nose pliers too just flatten the hole thing there and then do a couple even tighter ones with the pointy end and then you can flatten the wider part also with the flip starting yeah okay that's not going anywhere do you know why you use cable ends so that doesn't slide out no no no that was a trick question it has nothing to do with sliding out so that you don't like poke yourself in the eye of all of it and it's just so it doesn't fray so we're gonna go ahead and adjust this derailleur properly we do have a video that goes much more in depth on adjusting derailleur on a non-rapid rise trailer i don't think that many people have rapid rises so that might be more helpful and this is how to change your cable and housing in one minute first step shift into your smallest cog unless you have a rapid rise derailleur like this one in which case shift to your biggest cog cut your cable unscrew the screw on the inside of your shifter and push the cable out throw out the old cable leave the housing in if you have internal cable routing and watch our internal cable routing video otherwise keep track of the order of your pieces of housing and cut new pieces to the same sizes run your new cable through the hole in the shifter add the ferrule first and then the housing and then the next feral and proceed as if you were beating a necklace re-run the cable and housing tighten your barrel adjusters all the way in and then loosen one turn when you get to the derailleur run the cable through the lock nut and tighten cut the cable about two centimeters out add your cable end and crimp then adjust your derailleur until it shifts properly [Music] you

Channel: Syd Fixes Bikes

Views: 47,650

Keywords: syd fixes bikes, woman mechanic, bike maintenance, bike maintenance how-to, diy bike maintenance, fix your bike, how to fix your bike, welcome to the shed, learn to fix your bike, wrench on bike, diy bike mechanic, learn to be a bike mechanic, work on your own bike, bike repair, bike maintenance tutorial, female mechanic, replace cables on bike, replace cables and housing, replace mtb cables, new bike cables and housing, replace worn cable, rapid rise derailleur

Id: 4to6142jjJw

Length: 10min 42sec (642 seconds)

Published: Sun Mar 14 2021