cable rub

If the housing touches the frame and there's movement, it will mar the finish and in extreme cases wear through the frame. You can artfully route your housing to minimize this, and use frame protector patches (you can buy them or make your own) where it does contact the frame. I've never seen the magic housing material that leaves no mark, though.

Where ever a cable rubs my frames, I wrap them in electical tape. I wrap about 4-5 times. The tape is soft, therefore will wear instead of the frame.

I have used Lizard skin carbon patches, but have had mixed luck with getting them to stick.

Personally I don't understand not dealing with your own housings and cables, pretty basic stuff and imho best done yourself. I can't imagine my shifter housing hitting my fork, but I don't have your bike; if your shop gave you your bike with it that way and it's not absolutely necessary I'd doubt their ability to do better. A simple way to use something that keeps the housing off the fork is to take two zip ties, one around the fork crown, the other a little loose loop attached to the first to guide the housing and keep it away from the fork crown. There are also little plastic guides you can buy, but the zip ties go around just about any fork crown design and are way cheaper.

Thanks. Normally I'd fix the housing myself, but this is my first go at using hydrolics, and I've never done it before. I know, no time to learn like the present, but since they still are offering free service, I figure why bother myself let the LBS that caused the problem fix it. Only noticed it recently, or it would have gone back sooner. Thanks for your help.

I've found that with shock travel and steering, you just can't expect to completely prevent "all" rubbing -- at least not on all setups. I always try to minimize it as much as possible and re-route or zip tie to prevent really bad spots, but I find that there are spots where the cable will rub a bit no matter what you do. Isn't this just a normal wear and tear situation? I put it in the same category as "rocks" -- i.e. mountain bikes will get scratches and wear over time.

Larry

The best soulution I've found is black felt stick on patches. They're usually used on the underside of drink coasters and other items to prevent scratches on tables and furnature. The key is to cut them to size and stick them around the housing where they rub the frame. This way the cables won't rub through the paint and you won't have fuzzy things stuck to your frame.