Bit the bullet today and succumbed to my (perhaps irrational) desire for internally routed dropper-post stealthiness, seeing as my Mojo HD isn’t set up for such things, I had to do a bit of ‘modding’… this involved drilling out the lower bottle cage mount and then punching a hole ( 😯 ) through an internal thin sheet of carbon (I’m assuming/hoping ‘leftover’ from the layup, i.e. not structural!! It can’t have been as it was very thin… ❓ 😆 ). End result is pretty neat I think, just need to work out a way of guarding the cable as it’s exposed to rocks etc (and we have plenty of them on our trails here!)

Anyone else taken the drill/tools to their bikes to instal an internally routed dropper?

2014-01-18 17.14.14 by ten_sim, on Flickr

2014-01-18 17.13.26 by ten_sim, on Flickr

Is that the underside of down tube down to the BB? The top pic?

I have given this some thought, on my scabrous battered-to-**** twice snapped in half possibly terminally cracked Hemlock. Odds of me doing it to something actually worth money? Slim.

Is that the underside of down tube down to the BB? The top pic?

I would say so, looking from the headset end with the bike upside down…chainring visible in RHS of photo.

I’ve drilled my seat tube just above where the front mech band would sit (if a ran one) on my Rumblefish. My old man then made me an aluminium top hat shaped insert with a hole drilled at 45 degrees through the centre so that the cable runs in to the frame at a nice acute angle and doesn’t risk getting sawn on the sharp edges of the hole. This is then held in with Loctite.

Works a treat and love the clean lines

I would run the hose into a slot cut in a seat tube (on an out of warranty frame), but I don’t like these straight in through a hole runs that people do. Probably won’t cause any issues* but just looks nasty imo.

*although on second thoughts I’d probably kill it if I had to shoulder the bike

Looks tidy. I’m tempted to mod my BFe frame, along the lines of what rob describes – and pics rob?

Voilà

Nice, but its a lot of work for something that I cant see making any difference.

So, when your riding your bike, enjoying the trail, just how many times does a non-steath dropper bother you ???

Robarnold – what sort of bike stand is that? Looking for something like that to help clean the bike!

You drilled holes in a frame that costs over two grand 😯

Spudly1979- that’s an Andystand- great bit of kit-
http://andystand.co.uk/

Not too sure on the home modding side of the thread!
I wouldn’t drill my frame-

I worked at a Trek dealer and paid about £1200 for the complete bike in its original guise, sold everything apart from the frame and suspension units then fitted all my own bits on it. It was a calculated risk 🙂

So, when your riding your bike, enjoying the trail, just how many times does a non-steath dropper bother you ???

Mine sometimes seems to buzz the back tyre through the swingarm on heavy compressions.
I’d rather have a stealth but meh…

Some gash looking mods right there^