Dura ace 9000 cable life?

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wojchiech
Posts: 405
Joined: Thu Feb 24, 2011 6:33 pm
Location: bay area, california

by wojchiech

Does anyone know if nosed ferules make a difference? I recently replaced my housing from the DA9000 housing included with the shifters to Alligator ilinks, and used some leftover teflon liner as extended nosed ferules. I tried to make them at least twice as long as the Shimano ones just to see if they protect the cables better. If anyone has done something similar let us know, otherwise I'll report back in the next 3-4000 kms
:beerchug:

ProEvoSLTeamHighMod
Posts: 65
Joined: Wed Feb 19, 2014 6:13 am

by ProEvoSLTeamHighMod

drbellows wrote:DA9001 shifters didn't solve the problem. After 2 snapped cables, Shimano replaced my DA9000 rear shifter with a DA9001. 1500 miles later, guess what happened. Now they are only offering to replace the inner cable under warranty. Shimano also said by phone that they recommend changing the Dura Ace cables and chain every 2500 miles. They said these are precision components that require a high level of maintenance to maintain precision function. That recommendation can't be found on their web site, nor can any mention of the 9001 series shifter. I guess it's a secret. They've passed the onus onto their customers and, I suppose, they hope the number of snapped cables will go down once cyclists start switching them out more often. Problem is, the driver is shift frequency, not mileage. I suppose if you ride your magnificent DA equipped bike as a single speed your rear shift cable will never break. Corporate malfeasance at its worst.


I agree with most of this...
I have installed a set of ST-9001 on a customer's bike with some success - from 3 months/cable to now 6 months and no sign of wear. On the other hand, his second bike, with ST-9000 is still at best 3 months per cable. The second bike does receive about 50% more ride time, but we're well past that differential in cable life now.

However, when I called Shimano asking for the same exchange (1st bike initially had ST-9000), they gave me this exact same BS about their discovery that, in fact, the cables were to blame, so they had slightly modified them to make them wear longer...
Which is interesting, given that there in fact WAS a revision released, and in my experience it was helpful... This REEKS of the same type of refusal to acknowledge flaws that initially plagued the 9000 cassettes as well.

It's completely ridiculous that A. they expect consumers, let alone legitimate mechanics to believe that the cables are to blame for cables breaking... that's a logical fallacy. They released a revision to the shifters, which at least in my experience has made some difference (I also have seen perhaps 10% of 6800 shifters breaking cables as compared to 9000), and suggests the presence of a flaw, however minimal the difference ends up being... and B. that they are offering to WARRANTY CABLES?!?!?!?!? - and when they sent me a warranty set, they wanted the old ones back?! WHAT?!

The cable life is crap. I encourage everyone to inspect frequently - very frequently. Also, to use the nosed ferrules, not that this prevents them from breaking at the head, but it does reduce the system drag, which contributes...
I have also noticed that cable life is actually better with the proper dura-ace cables, I've gotten better life with them vs standard jagwire slick stainless, even controlling for same rider / riding habits.

And, this veers into off-topic, but I would like to point out that when a systemic issue happens with a certain other company's products, they issue recalls. And while the internet then proceeds to beat them down for doing so, shimano is quietly "warrantying" items, then refusing to warranty them, then blaming the customers for a product flaw... Which receives no merciless internet ranting (outside of my own!)

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GT8
Posts: 63
Joined: Sun Aug 28, 2011 3:58 pm

by GT8

Changed out my rear cable today just as a precaution (fitted exactly 1 year ago yesterday) - 9001 shifters.
On good/race bike so only ridden March to September, probably around 1500miles on it, put some grease under the flap as well.
Was still shifting fine and looks ok - the polymer coating is fraying/wearing but the metal cable seems fine.
Just didn't want this post niggling on my mind during the coming race season!

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Wingnut
Posts: 2196
Joined: Sat Jun 23, 2007 12:41 am

by Wingnut

Bigger Gear wrote:I don't think Campy shifters and cables are immune either. I've not been on any of the 11 spd Campy stuff but I used Campy Record 10 shifters for about 7 years (at least 3 different pair). Eventually the cables will fray in the shifter with Campy too. The nice thing was that the broken strands would actually poke out the little slit on the bottom of the brake hood and one would get poked by them and know it was definitely time to change the inner cable :)


I've never...ever, snapped a cable while using Campagnolo...and still rare to hear of one snapping due to regular use with Campy.

Bigger Gear
Posts: 560
Joined: Fri Mar 27, 2009 6:58 pm
Location: Wet coast, Canada

by Bigger Gear

Just an update to this thread:

My stress-test of Yokozuna shift cables/housing on my winter bike finally hit its endpoint with the rear inner cable failing at the shifter (Ultegra 6700) after 18000 km! I realize it is kind of foolish to run cables for so long but the shifting was still pretty good right up until failure. Once they got to a certain age I decided to run them until failure just to see how long they would last. There were a lot of rainy rides and probably 100 bike washes done with these cables. I'm definitely putting another set of Yokozuna shift cables on and I would recommend them to any Shimano user who is unhappy with the performance and life of the Shimano PTFE or Polymer cables.

wojchiech
Posts: 405
Joined: Thu Feb 24, 2011 6:33 pm
Location: bay area, california

by wojchiech

I think I may have found a possible solution. Please take it with a grain of salt as this is just my single personal experience.

My trick: using a piece of alligator mini i-link liner as an extended nosed ferrule that goes through the shifter almost all the way to the cable head. I was already using ilinks so the idea popped into my head to try this on a whim and see if it made a difference in cable life. I also tried nokon liner and regular 1.5mm ilink liner but both were too large to fit through the shifter.

Compared to bare cable there is much less friction when shifting. After about 6 months and just over 5000 km there is no noticeable wear on the liner piece or the original shimano polymer cable that came with my shifters (9001, btw). There is a bit of a bend in the cable where it feeds through the shifter but that happens with almost any cable and shifter.

If anyone gives my trick a try please let me know if it makes a difference. :beerchug:

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