Removing secondary brakes.

Muffintop

Hello All,

I have a Specialized Dolce 2011 which has 'pinch brakes' which sit on the centre of the handle bars as well as the dual pivot main brakes. Are they easy to remove? I've never used them once - they seemed like a good idea at the time - and they get in the way of holding the top of the handle bars. How complicated is it? They look like they could just slip off but doing that might wreak the tension through the cable, and the bolt at the end could mean I would have to unwind the whole thing.

Cheers
Mx

nicklouse

You will need to replace the whole cable runs and unwrap and rewrap the bars.

sungod

the brake cable passes through them, and the cable outer is in two pieces

you need to undo the cables, pull them out, remove the excess levers and old cable outers that went into them, fit replacement cable outers, rethread cables*

* if the cable ends are frayed/splayed, you need to cut them clean otherwise you won't be able to to this, if the cables are kinked/old it'd be better to just replace them

it's not a difficult job, but you do need some decent cutters for the cable/outers (or you could use a dremel)

if you don't want to diy, a local bike shop can do it for you, shouldn't be too expensive

Muffintop

Cheers guys!

Might get a bike shop to do it. Looks like more of a faff than I can be @rsed with.

Mx