Accelerator Cable

My car came equipped with a Porsche? accelerator cable setup. The cable broke, and I'm in the process of replacing the cable, cable tube, and accelerator cable tube guide.
The Real Source sells the accelerator cable tube, and tube guides for VW's.
Does anybody have experience replacing these items?
Any guidance will be appreciated.

Description of parts from The Real Source:

Accelerator Cable Tube is flexible, flared on one end and extends from the body, over the transaxle, through the front breast plate tin around the firewall area. The accelerator cable runs through it to prevent wear against engine sheet metal.

Accelerator Cable Tube Guide 4-piece kit with cable guide, spring, tube-over-spring and the correct washer/clip.

Thanks

Dave

I used a Morse type sleeved cable that I got at an off road sand rail place. It can be bought in just about any lenth - cost about $25, but should be impervious to debris and breakage.

I figure the off road guys know the right way to do things so they don't have to repair in the boonies.

Mike

MIke, I like that idea. I bought a bus throttle cable (I like the ring end) and shortened in. No matter how hard you try (taping the end and using a new hack saw blade) the end still will fray.
Ron

Ron,
Try going to a bicycle shop and asking for a cable end. They are little aluminum caps that go over the ends of shifter and brake cables to keep them from fraying after you cut them. They should give 'em to you- I have about 300 of them I bought for 5 bucks. The REALLY hot set-up in the bike world (where we still use cables) is to silver braze the ends of trimmed cables to keep them from fraying, although only retro-grouches like me do it. Ah, but then I ride a Brooks B17 all leather saddle....

WOW! ANOTHER rider with a Brooks B-17!!!!! I've had one of those for about 20 years!! All I do to keep it nice is treat the underside with Neatsfoot oil once a year or so. It's now permanently molded to my butt. None of the newbies with their ergonomic plastic saddles can ever convince me that they are any good.

I still ride a really old Takara Tour d'Italia factory racer (circa '84) with lots of Titanium so it's still pretty stiff, even after over 50,000 miles!

gn

Another source for cabling and anti-fray goodies is the lawnmower shop, seriously they have all sorts of little doo-dads

Ron, I'm going to try an experiment - heat up the cable and touch it with some solder (where I'm going to cut the cable) and see if that prevents it from fraying.

Try the ol' Dremel with a cut off wheel, after taping the cable. After a practice cut you can get a clean cut with no fraying. Empi makes a variety of cables. The rest should alredy be there. If you want to upgrade, CB sells what they call 'Turbo Gas Peddle' or something, Its an aluminum peddle that rides on a metal roller and replaces the bug peddle easily. If you want to keep the retro appearance, trim the top corners and glue on a vw peddle cover. The flex tube, & guide tube both help protect the cable. The flex tube does not come with the CB kit, every thing else does. A nylon string pulled through by the broken cable helps get the new one in place.

Gordon,

Yeah, I've tried em all- I probably spent $500 on various permutations of the cut-out saddle looking for the "perfect" fit. The B17 was something I went back to when everything else left me feeling pretty scared about what was going on "down there". Last year was the first full season on my single bike, and I'm definately going to put one on the tandem this year, as I seem to get more miles in riding with my wife than alone. Honestly, if anything ever gets me out of my speedster, it will be the time it takes away from riding.

I've got a Merckx butted TI frameset with early (93) 8 spd Campy ergo stuff. I ride clipless (Look), so in mid-summer when I'm in my full dork "space suite" at a c-store, I feel pretty self-concious... until I get back on the bike, then it all melts away. If I could, I'd build framesets for a living- but not until the kids are out of college. for now, I'll just keep tinkering with wheelsets, etc.

Its great to meet another rider in an unlikely place.

David, let us know how your solder cut goes.
What is a Brooks B-17? Is it a seat? I'm interested in a new seat for my Rocky Mountain Metro (half mountain bike/half road bike). I'd also like two for our tandem bike. Hey Stan, how do you like going up hills on the tandem? No fun, but going downhill is great. Man, can these things pick up speed quickly.
Ron

Ron,
Wow! another kindred soul. Here in IL, the ability to climb is not nearly as important as the ability to cut the wind. Its all road riding here- nothing but flat, paved, straight roads... and wind. Out here on the plains, the tandem is like an express train on greased rails- it's just plain fast. We've had the tandem since '95, so we work together well enough to stand together while climbing, but it's still nothing like climbing on the solo. A Brooks B17 is a seat that was designed about 100 yrs ago- its a piece of thick cowhide shaped into a saddle. Check out Rivendell.com for more Brooks details. The saddle looks really uncomfortable- no padding at all, but the shape is just right, and after a while your "sit bones" will make little dents in the saddle, making it even more comfortable. Of course, everything was more comfortable 20 lbs ago. The down side to a Brooks- a good soaking rain will pretty much ruin it unless you reshape it quickly, and I have yet to know a woman who likes them. Men either love 'em or hate 'em. My wife rides more than I do now (I gotta find a job with less summer hours, or move to a place with more summer), and she loves the Terry "Cite". Nashbar and Performance both sell them I think.

I rode for quite a while after I quit smoking ('88). then I started running and did that until this winter when my bod said it didn't want to do that anymore. May have to return to biking. I used a jell saddle cover to break in my butt until I was up to 200 or so miles per week then I could sit on a 2x4 the narrow way and wouldn't feel anything. There is (almost) nothing as neat as rolling with a group on a long run over 20 mph barely pedelling in the draft.
ed

Here in Rhode Island, each Summer we have "the flattest century in the East" which runs through a bunch of coastal towns (Tiverton, Little Compton, Westport, Padanaram and Dartmouth) for the day. It runs right in front of my house and they get over 2,000 riders. It is amazing to hear some of the larger peletons coming - you can hear the whoosh from half a mile away and they power by (usually with a Tandem leading the pack!) at over 30mph!!

I rode to work (12 miles each way) for close to 12 years, then got head-on'd by a pickup truck. Should have killed me I guess, (same type of accident killed a friend who was riding on the Canadian Olympic team) but I came out more or less OK (I managed to save the bike (and my knees), thanks to Look clip-lesses that didn't let go), and then rode another few years until work/time/travel pressures pushed it back to a hobby. Now I ride my Speedster far more often than my bike, but am thinking of getting more into biking this coming Spring. I remember how good I felt when I was riding a lot and miss that feeling. I also remember being able to eat anything in any amount and never gain weight!!!!!!

Best of Holidays to everyone!!!!

Gordon

I Know this is WAY OFF the topic, but since this is the direction of the thread, are any of you Mountain Bikers?
Terry

Ron, I ended up using a Porsche 914 cable.
No cutting required - fits perfectly.

FYI - I heated up the old cable, and touched it with solder - it didn't seem to stick to the cable strands, and frayed when I cut it.

Speaking of biking - I did a tinman triathlon in 2002 - rode a Trek 5200 carbon fiber frame bike.

Great bike, but the seats on those road bikes are not comfortable.

Dave

cut by original cable last night for practice before cutting the new to replace. I am replacing BECAUSE the old one was frayed and broke off at the linkage... i pulled it out w/out tying anything to it to help fish the new one back through... now its getting stuck near the tranny and I cant get the new one run...

about cutting: vw shop here said solder then cut...

I just used a cordless dremel. 25k rpm with a reinforced cuttoff wheel.. cut it and no fraying... put some superglue on the tip and let it dry, its solid. :)

solder should work though, maybe flux the cable first then do it? idk, but just cutting it slowly allowed mine not to fray. I should have just cut my old one off a bit where it frayed and reconnect it and readjust my linkages instead of replacing the cable but....

I'm learning the hardway. THATS FOR DAMN SURE.

any help on refishing the new one through now that the tube's empty :)

Nic, old buddy, you sure have interesting problems. Of course, the rest of us have had our share of wierd ones, too!!

Good job cutting that cable! I used to solder them, but then went to clear silicon caulk. It works pretty well, too.

Part of your problem may be if you have a blob of super glue on the end of the cable preventing it from going through a transition point or around a radius. The glue on the end should be very close in size to the size of the cable, otherwise it may get hung up going through. The tube it's running through is something like 1/4 inch in diameter or smaller so it can get hung up easily. Another hang-up would be if there is an internal "edge" where the tubes were cut for the pan shortening and it keeps getting stopped by that edge. Try putting a very slight "kink" in the cable about 1/2 inch from the end and feed it through again. If it hits something, try rotating the cable while you're pushing on it back and forth toward the rear and see if that gets it by the obstruction. If that doesn't work, see the next paragraphs.

Try fishing a stiff, solid wire through from the back of the accelerator cable tube toward the front. Use something like "mechanic's wire". It is solid, NOT stranded, smaller diameter than a coat hanger wire, comes on a roll and is reasonably stiff. Try either an auto parts store or Home Depot for it.

Pull it out straight for three or four feet longer than you'll need for the distance from the engine to the accelerator pedal. Make sure it's pretty straight on the floor, then take one end and feed it through toward the gas pedal.

Once you can see it sticking out the other end near the gas pedal, pull it out so you can work on it, and attach the engine end of the cable you want to pull through with some quick-set epoxy. You can lay the two wires parallel for an inch or so and glue them together (lay them on wax paper and dab them with glue - they shouldn't stick to the wax paper). Don't get "blobby" with the epoxy, just flow it on and smooth it out. You could also try soldering them together, but I don't know if the solder will stick or not.

Once they set up, have someone gently pushing the stranded cable through from the front, while you gently pull the solid one from the back end. If it gets stuck, gently jiggle the solid wire until it frees. When the stranded one emerges, cheer, have a beer, cut it off a bit longer than you'll need and attach your linkage end.

Hope this helps, and glad the brakes are braking..........gn

I actually solved one on my own! :)

here's what needed done. well, first, i had to cut the stock linkage end down to about an 1/8 inch instead of 1" because it wouldnt clear a turn in the tube... that allowed me to thread it through with NO resistance or problems.

however, again with design of the car, I had to pull out the cable and fish the wire THROUGH the accelerator pedal because the little bend/hook wouldnt go into the accelerator without threading the wire in first... there isnt enough space to angle the 1/4" tip into, and turn straight the pedal connector. simple fix but stupidly designed and built.

anyway, i cut the cable SLOWLY without force with the highspeed cuttoff wheel after applying superclue to it. NO FRAY. and then attached the adapter for the linkage with the dual allen head screws. Guess you might have to have the solex setup to know what I'm talking about here as I'm sure other linkages are better designed.

Anyway, now that I have the linkage cut to the correct length etc. and it pulls cleanly... I can actually attain full throttle!!!!!! (which I suspected I wasn't ever getting before because the car was such a DOG).. It's awesome now, I was thinking I might need to think of a new engine. Um, NO - this 1600 - if that is really what it is, hauls ass now!

I was in SUCH a good mood tonight, I celebrated a good running car with a nice glass of red wine and great loud music and friends. :) Then after the wine was completely out of my system of course, I took her out on this perfect 68 degree clear sky, half moon lit night.

I'm sold. :)

I'll re-adjust the brakes tomorrow and this car will be a GREAT driver... now for some interior cleanup and trim eh?

Hey, FINALLY!!!!

You've finally gotten a chance to see what we all enjoy about these little cars. Congratulations! Guess all that work on little things is finally paying off!

Good Luck with it!

gn

Cut that stuff with a cold chisel and an anvil. Quick clean and no frayed ends. TOM