Thought I'd share a slightly customized cork grip idea that, so far, works well.
First, thanks to Luis Garcia (making longer cork grips) for the reminder about the Dan Stroud video (Albatross bar more useful if brake levers moved far forward). I used grooved, constant diameter Meisha's cork grips for bar-end shifters, plus a small section I sawed off of another pair of flared cork grips using a mitre box and hack saw with a fine blade. After installing the brake levers as far forward as I could before the curve of the bar, I slipped the small flared grip section on first, with the bigger flare end facing the front to act as a hand stop. I was careful to saw the rear (smaller) end of the small section at a point where its diameter matched that of the main (Meisha's) grip. Also, I cut this section a little long so that I could use various sandpaper grits to hone the end flat and smooth. Even so, there was a tiny gap, so I did a single wrap of twine in the tiny gap to act as chinking, which adds a very small but cool detail I think. [image: 2-piece_cork.jpg] This time I remembered to rotate each bar-end shifter so that the levers flare outward a bit to better align with the natural position of my arms/wrists/hands when I'm riding. Of course this requires that you play around with the angle and twist the grips so that the groove is more outward ... before the grip adhesive dries. Lastly, some of you probably know that the handlebar twine wrapping technique that Riv advocates is known as a form of "whipping", as in whipping the end of a rope so the ends don't fray. This time I remembered to whip my grips with the knot on the inside of the grip (unlike the Riv demo video) so that the small knot/bump is not on the outside of the grip, and is in a spot that doesn't rub anywhere. As I was looking around for different whipping techniques, I came across these 2 videos demonstrating whipping used as an accent in fine furniture building, as well as the more typical use as a means to bind rope ends ... thought you'd enjoy: Riv video: Cork Grips Installation <https://youtu.be/0VaUlzsDDvk> Fine Woodworking: How to Wrap and Handle with Cord with Mike Pekovich <https://youtu.be/BnWD58gWY10> WhyKnot: How to Whip The End of a Rope - Common Whipping Knot <https://youtu.be/wECupgmIJio> That's it! And now, in the immortal words of *Devo*, go forth and "Whip it. Whip it good <https://youtu.be/j_QLzthSkfM>." (sorry.....) Tom -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to rbw-owners-bunch+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/rbw-owners-bunch/1204bcca-b504-4ebc-b103-af8b58648b67%40googlegroups.com.
