I have used these kits before and they are designed for a short-ish run of the links with sections of regular housing or using the stops for internal routing. I tried doing a long run from the lever to the read bottom bracket brake on my Shiv by mixing the links from two kits. It ended up being very spoungy. Your results may bary, but I would say that these work best when you can keep the total length of the kits to ~2 feet.

Is this an "old" P3 or something? My P3 has the rear brake port on the side of the headtube area.

NP3 has two options for the brake housing run, either the "traditional" one on the left side of the top tube or the "aero" one behind the stem. I'm using the latter.

I've been setting up link style cables for about 10 years now and I've tried pretty much all of them.

If you want the absolute tightest bends, it's the i-link mini's. Nokons behind that and then the Jaguars. That said, the Jaguars are the most user friendly to install by a wide margin.

You can get tight bends with all of them (vs standard housing) but none of them will perform miracles and the further you push it to that extreme, the spongier it will get. IME you can get really good feel and sleeker bends from them IF you spend the time to dial it in (most of the time people don't compress it enough in install and then you get that slop/sponginess feeling - it helps to have 3 arms when working with a rear brake especially) AND you don't try to get some crazy bend that just obviously isn't going to work. Only way to know when you get there is to push it though :D

links are only meant to be used where they are exposed. Anything internal should have a stop and then you can run either bare cable / just liner / actual normal housing through (depends on the frame sometimes)
I ran some internal all the way through years ago on a gen1 speed concept 7 and it made a hell of a sound over any kind of vibrations :)

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Gene, I was just going tell you i have not had any problems with my P3 routed the way you want, but went to check and surprise, its not working so well. looks like recabling time

soooo, not cable, brake itself needs cleaning/lube

also, you likely know this but you don't use the holes in the bottom of the box, you add one to the back of the plastic box

This is awesome; thanks for the reply. Any tips to help dial things in?

The issue with the way I have the P3 rear brake routed is that the section behind the stem uses full-length housing, and has a sharp S where it goes from horizontal external > vertical top tube > horizontal top tube. Do I correctly understand that would involve links for the S section, an adapter ferrule, and a normal/compressionless housing run from there back to the brake (which is a straight shot)?

Right. It's been so long since I was in there that I've forgotten what the section looks like.

I really shouldn't borrow trouble here, and should probably just leave the Maguras alone.

I too used to use Nokons, and only Nokons for everything on both of my race bikes. Nokons can do tight bends. But installation is a PITA, and spongee is very true.
2 years ago, I switched back to regular cables. I use Shimano Dura-Ace housings for shifters and brakes. Not Ultegra, but true top of the line Dura cable housing sets (housings and cables in the package). IE: Shimano BC-9000, and OT-RS900, and OT-SP41. BUT,,, I do NOT use the Shimano cables that come in the kit packaging with the housings. I use JagWire Elite Ultra Slick -Uncoated cables for both shifters and brakes. IE: JagWire 73EL2300, and 94EL2000.
I have found this combo of Dura housings, and JagWire cables to be the most supple and bendable of the traditional cabling type, yet still provide a decent feel and shifting performance.

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Team Zoot-Texas, and Pickle Juice

Go slow, make sure things are not loose, that the lengths are right...etc. Sometimes you really need to be putting full tension on the back of the cable to be sure everything is compressed correctly up towards the cockpit.

I have had Ventus gen1 bars, USE Tula pods, etc set up on TT bikes with bb mounted brakes (including a Zipp 2001 which had a notoriously crappy rear brake feel) - basically if it doesn't spring back at the lever when you release, something is not right.

*fwiw I almost never get through the entire cabling of a bike with links without cussing at least once.

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Ah, I find the traditional one works great with the TriRig Alpha One. I don't really consider it "not aero".

Interested in selling your maguras? I'd be interested.

Leaning toward not, but will let you know.

Will the i-link mini's also work for brake cables? Seems like they are inteded for shifting, but maybe they are big enough to acommocate brake cables and inner liner also?

I like the Jagwire Elite Link segmented housing for tight TT cable runs. It is similar to the Nokon already mentioned, but one thing I like is that you have a length of inner liner which the individual links slide quite tightly over. For the most part the links will stay put, which helps an awful lot with installation as you can cut the inner liner to length and then slide over the segmented links without them ending up in a big pile all over the floor.

Works well on my setup using Felt Devox bars with the Tririg Sigma XF stem and a modified P3 with top tube entry. Some tight turns in here, especially through the stem and down into the top tube.

Another benefit, the brake housing is essentially compressionless which seems to have helped sharpen up the braking with my Tririg Omega front brake, feels less squishy.

Cheers, Rich.

Thanks! My setup actually is generally similar to yours (older Devox bars on a NP3) so this help me visualize how things would look.

+1 for smart upgrades to an excellent frame, and +100 for the Certified Slammed sticker.

I did use them this way once... but I was using old vision crab claw levers with a shifter cable ran through them... (I know I know) It's been quite a long time now, but I believe the id of the liner is different (I know it is on Nokons) which will likely be the primary issue to overcome to "make it work."

Might search through some of the old WeightWeenie threads on the i-links. I'm sure someone over there has at least tried to run them for brakes, as they are marginally lighter than the normal ones.

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I wouldn't. Alligator does have a brake-specific version:

https://www.alligatorcables.com/...brake-cable-kit.html

I did the same briefly with my Vision levers until I clocked that they produce a brake cable and housing specifically for that set. The brake cable inner is 1.5mm, just with a smaller nipple to fit their levers. The proper housing is constructed (from memory) with spiral strands, rather than longitudinal which could be prone to separating and splitting under very heavy brake loads (in theory). But yeah, loads of people got by using shifter cable without dying.

Of course the real solution is to fit Shimano DA levers :-).

Yeah, for sure the vision specific cables were the "right" way... I always accidently cut them too short (never failed on the $5 cable vs. the $.50 cable) and eventually just got lazy.

I think the major concern was with most "normal" brakes (like a sidepull) the pinch area for the cable was designed for a thicker cable, and running the thinner shifter cable you might pull through. I always used already scary centerpulls (at least until the omega's came out :D ) so figured it was lower on the list of what would fail first with my brakes hah

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Thanks for the reply.

Now I think about it, I actually do already use a shifter inner cable now for the rear brake (proper brake inner for the front, less worried about a possible snap for the rear) with Jagwire Elite Link outer + liner all the way from lever to BB-mounted TriRig Omega One on my P5-3 currently. It works OK, but room for improvement. So I was thinking if the i-link mini would be an improvement (maybe with Dura-Ace housing inside the frame) it could be worth a try. And maybe the Jagwire Elite Ultra Slick Uncoated inner cable as one also suggested here.

Thanks, I did see that. That's why I asked. I was thinking the mini was better for tight turns since he specifically mentioned those.

For the rear brake I feel OK about using a shifter inner cable if that gives a more frictionless cable path. For the front, I would probably stick to a proper brake inner cable as that's the much more critical brake.

Either way, when pulling the cable to screw it down at the brake..........buy a "4th hand" tool. It works great for brakes and mechanical RD/FD. It gets ALL the slack out versus trying to yank on it with your hands or using pliers to pull the cable while you tighten the lock nut down.

This: or cheaper equivalent
https://www.amazon.com/Park-Tool-Brake-Locking-Ratchet/dp/B000OZBIDO/ref=asc_df_B000OZBIDO/?tag=hyprod-20&linkCode=df0&hvadid=312065280674&hvpos=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=9031486139648479580&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=c&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=21180&hvtargid=pla-756044552792&psc=1&tag=&ref=&adgrpid=62425943472&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvadid=312065280674&hvpos=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=9031486139648479580&hvqmt=&hvdev=c&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=21180&hvtargid=pla-756044552792

Are you running mechanical or electronic shifting? ...If you are using electronic, you can do away with the 'plug' housing stops behind the stem and easily route your brake cable through the top Tube hole (behind the stem) and out the back. I'm currently doing this with my Di2 NP2 (same frame as NP3) using Ultegra (cable) brakes.