... would it be a good shifter cable replacement??

Let's discuss!!!

its gotta be a big-ass guitar

or a really small bike

 

Guitars...

... would it be a good shifter cable replacement??

Let's discuss!!!

have a standard 25-ish scale... basses are 34" or thereabouts. Why spend fat cash on a guitar string when cables are like $3.

 

Besides the fact that they are not long enough.....

.........the alloys used in guitar strings isn't conducive to outdoor exposure to the elements. You would have severe corrosion problems very quickly! My sets last about four to five hours before they are turning black with corrosion. I can't imagine getting them wet, or exposing them to humidity, snow, mud, or any such thing would be much different.

 

make sure you use flatwounds...less friction in the housings

 

You guys are right...

I don't know what in the hell I was thinking of when I posted this stoopid question....

Zanetti makes a good point and maybe that's what I should've asked.

Why bike cables aren't flatwounds or have a construction (not equal) but similar to guitar strings? Flatwounds have very small friction. I dare to say much less than normal cables.

Now if we would find a practical use for vacuum tubes on bikes

Cheers all you bike/guitar junkies out there!

 

... would it be a good shifter cable replacement??

Let's discuss!!!

i like the xtr cables a lot. in hawaii we actually run a little bit different setup. instead of have a rear derailleur setup with 3 seperate housing pieces, we do the usual front piece and just have one long one from the top of the seat stay and all the way to the rear derailluer and just zip tie it to the seat stay. with the xtr cable it seems to shift awesome, especially since out conditions suck out here. try the xtr's they are pretty sweet.

 

You guys are right...

I don't know what in the hell I was thinking of when I posted this stoopid question....

Zanetti makes a good point and maybe that's what I should've asked.

Why bike cables aren't flatwounds or have a construction (not equal) but similar to guitar strings? Flatwounds have very small friction. I dare to say much less than normal cables.

Now if we would find a practical use for vacuum tubes on bikes

Cheers all you bike/guitar junkies out there!

a shifter cable is equivalent to about a 50g string which are wound around about a 17g center. I doubt it would be reliable and I suppose that it might stretch too much under shifting tensions.

 

well i know it doesn't work the other way, i have tried to use a cable as a string in a pinch..................sustain was slightly lacking.

 

well i know it doesn't work the other way, i have tried to use a cable as a string in a pinch..................sustain was slightly lacking.

WTF is a pinch, and how do you play one?

 

WTF is a pinch, and how do you play one?

He meant he was in a hurry and no guitar strings were available.

But in guitar playing a pinch is when you pull a string with your thumb and index finger strongly and release it. The string slaps against the fretboard doing a weird sound. Not a technique you'd use often.

 

Pinch harmonics!

 

Why bike cables aren't flatwounds or have a construction (not equal) but similar to guitar strings? Flatwounds have very small friction. I dare to say much less than normal cables.

Because on a guitar string the center strand takes all the tension, the stuff wound around it provides no structural strength, only width. This is why a wound g string sucks if you do bends a lot, it can't stand the stretching. In a shifter cable, all the strands carry the force. You don't really need a shift or brake cable flatwound because the strands are oriented in the direction of the movement, so there is very little friction there compared with a wound guitar string.

 

Slick wires?

I thought that there were some shifter cables that were run through a draw mill after being wound which essentially crushed the cable down so that the windings were all burnished into a smooth round shape. (in cross section) I seem to remember using tandem length housing like this from Quality Bicycle Products. It has far less friction than ordinary cables. Then there are all the coated cables, the teflon- whatcha-ma-callits that you can get. They also are supposed to be more slippery. So, not really a "flatwound" but similar!