A guy at the shop in Reno told me to always replace cables with housing, and I think he is wrong for most riders

Dylan Flores · 2026-09-23T06:20:03.323588+00:00

He said it like it was gospel: new cable means new housing, no exceptions, and I nodded along for a month. But last Tuesday I swapped just the inner cable on a customer's commuter, kept the old Jagwire housing that was only a year old, and the shifting was crisp as ever. If the housing ends are clean and there is no rust or kink, why toss $15 to $20 of perfectly good stuff? Anyone else run into this, or am I the only one who thinks the full swap rule is just shop habit?

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A guy at the shop in Reno told me to always replace cables with housing, and I think he is wrong for most riders | Bicycle Mechanics - HW Forums