Fitting Bullhorns

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  • Hey there, looking to swap out the drops of my Lemond Fillmore for Bullhorns, bit of a newbie, is this the right procedure?

    1, Remove drops, and brake levers - preserving the brake cabling? (i.e unscrewing, dissembling the lever?
    2, Get appropriate diameter bullhorn / chop and flip
    3, Add either TT style brake levers, or stem mounted BMX styley
    4, Retape

    Anything I've missed?

    I'm particularly interested in the brake cabling - is it easy to remove the cabling from the levers themselves, and what about lengths, any problems created by swapping from road drops to BMX brakes?

    Tool wise :
    Allen Keys
    Set of Various Screw drivers
    ?

    Cheers,

  • brake cabling should be fine assuming your not going to lose any length, if so might be worth redoing the the outers and inners, but try first, are you running down the bartape of through the bullhorn, i would recommend getting proper bullhorns as imo they are much more comfortable than chop/flip

    hope this helps :)

    will

  • Cheers Will,

    I'm hoping the cabling will simply match up, Cable route-wise. If "inside" the bullhorn is simple enough then that's the way it'll go, if not route under the tape as I'm used to - depends on the levers as well.

    Next question - taping the damn things.

    Is it the same with drops, start at the end (using the lever as a bar plug) and finish at stem, or other way round?

  • er, dunno, i would assume the same as drops, il find out when i tape mine up ;) i would think it would be less bother to run the cable down through the clothe unless your willing to drill your bars, personally i wouldnt bother, but seeing as mine already are drilled, might as well use what i have :)

    good luck
    Will

  • The cable lengths are unlikely to be right, and if you're using TT brake levers most of them take MTB cable nipples (barrel type) rather than road (pear) type. The same goes for BMX clamp on levers, although Cyclocross 'crosstop' type levers work best with pear nipples. In general, my policy is to take advantage of the opportunity to fit complete new cables, although if the outers are long enough you could get away with just replacing the inners.

    With TT levers, the cable run is usually determined by the lever (can't think of any off the top of my head which give you the option), and I would also advise against drilling your bars, so either get pre-drilled bull horns or make sure you get levers designed for outside cabling. Oh, and outside cabling is uncomfortable enough that I swapped out my levers for internal routed ones on my TT bike, where I spend 30s per ride on the bullhorn, although YMMV

    Taping with TT levers is a PITA, because you can't use the lever as a substitute bar end plug, as it F's up the mounting of the lever (would you want you brake lever attached via a bit of cork tape?), so you have to apply finishing tape at both ends. PVC electrical tape works well enough, a roll of it should be in any toolbox for these occasions.

    Rocker: if you're talking about the Cinelli 62s you just got, those holes were for clampless mounting of Modolo Kronos levers, not for cables. That was the old skool method, upside down road levers, which had the virtue that the cable didn't run along the hand grip part of the bar.


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  • Oh ok, i was wondering why there were only 1 set of holes, im sure rookie and i have enough info to tape our bullhorns now :) hehe PMed you about that wheelset

  • /attachments/10699

    Taping with TT levers is a PITA, because you can't use the lever as a substitute bar end plug.

    I have managed this, with a TT lever mounted on the bottom of a drop-bar. But it was fecking difficult, and took hours to do (had to trim the leather carefully). TBH I dont think I'd attempt it again.


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Fitting Bullhorns

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