i was looking at some tips for a neat externally routed di2 cable set up and a few sites suggested 150mm cable for the shifters to the under the stem junction box (bars i think were either 42 or 44 width). I have looked at my bike and i cant see how anyone could run a cable that short, either my measuring tape is very odd or i am missing something here. What length cables do you people use just to give me a better idea of likely lengths that i will require?
i will measure against my bike once i have all the component parts on it but i want to order the cables soon as they are the last piece of the jigsaw and i dont want to strip down my current set up as its still in use.
Can you just make a mock-up using bits of string and a pretend box, battery etc? Then just measure the string. Once you kow how long a piece of string is it's easy.
My wires are very flexible so string should be a good proxy.
You generally need 350mm from shifters to stem junction, maybe 300mm if bars very narrow. Â you need to account for 20mm for the cable loop near the shifter too, to stop the cable pulling out of the shifter in a crash.
Thanks blazing saddles, that seems to tally up with my very crude measuring.
i have done a bit of a mock up guess but without knowing exactly where they connect on the shifters and how much depth they go to plug in it does leave it slightly inaccurate. I deffo dont want cables that are too long so i would prefer to be a bit more precise.
I'd not use anything less than 350mm in that case, it's the right length really, 300 would do at a real push but it's not ideal.
I'd agree with that. You can easily take up any slack, having them too taught will cause problems.
