SkyDog75

I've never tried Plasti-Dip on cable ends before, but I've never had a problem with it on other things after being allowed to cure overnight.

auldmagoo

A dab of lacquer based nail polish will do the job quite nicely and can also be used as a poor man's thread lock. Just apply enough to "wet'' the cable, not leave a blob that won't go through the housing and let dry.

Lazyass

A drop of superglue. I've used it for years. No, it doesn't come apart when wet.

Y2kota

Super glue user here. Apply to cable before cutting. Flex the cable a little to work it into the cable. Let dry, cut cable and reapply small amount to the cut. Works great!

Amesja

Soldering/tinning Stainless Steel cable ends is rally as simple as soldering the old zinc-covered steel cables if you have the right flux and properly clean and etch the steel before you solder on it, and clean the acid residue off again when you are done so it doesn't turn black.

I use Ruby's acid flux. I know it's a little more money than people want to spend, but it's under $20 on Amazon and it's a lifetime's supply. Maybe go in with a friend and split it up.

Applying it is very simple. I use a glass baby-food jar to store a little of it on my work bench. When I want to tin the end of a cable I simply brush off the end of the cable with a brass brush (or use my dremel with a tiny brash wire cap brush if the cable is coated, very oily, or dirty) and insert the end of it right it into the jar. I use a tiny pinch clamp on the rim of the jar to keep the cable right where I want it so it doesn't just fall right back out from the weight of the rest of the cable pulling on it. I'll let it sit in the acid for about a minute or so to be sure it gets a good etch. Of course I'm contaminating my flux by doing this but I only use a little bit in the bottom of the baby food jar so when it gets very cloudy or I'm having trouble getting the stainless to etch I simply replace it.

While I'm doing this I'm letting my soldering iron heat up and making sure the end is clean and well tinned. I use a regular 30w iron that I think I got at a big-box store a couple of decades ago if memory serves. You don't need a larger solder gonne (gotta spell it that way here on this wee nee forum or else you get *** instead. It is like kindergarten here sometimes and certain evil magic words are banned)

You do NOT need a lot of heat. If you use too much heat the solder balls up and runs right off the cable instead of flowing into the strands. If you make the steel glow red you have ruined the temper of the SS and you need to cut that part off and throw it away as it is no longer safe if it is a brake cable. Using a torch is too much I have found, it's too easy to get the cable too hot. It can be done, but a 30w iron is actually easier to control than a larger gonne or a torch. You don't need to bend the strands back like I have seen other folks mention if you let the cable sit in the acid flux for a minute. It'll get up there on its own, trust me. why screw around unravelling and re-spinning the strands when you don't have to? The Ruby SS acid flux works. Let it do its job, give it a minute to complete it.

I use regular 60/40 lead/tin solder you can still find in the US. I bought more just last year, Maybe it is banned in eurodisney, I don't know but in Murkah it can still be found. You aren't going to be sucking on the end of this cable are you? Then don't worry about it. Wash your hands after handling solder, don't eat doritos or popcorn while soldering. I know a lof of folks reading this live in Murkah or Eurodisney and need all these warnings. For those of you who live in Extra-Murkah (Cali) lead solder contains evil right-wing extremist spirits that have been known by the state of bliss to cause birth defects,cancer, and other reproductive harm in lab animals and hippies.

It doesn't matter what kind of flux the solder has in it. You don't need it but it's not going to hurt any if it is in there. The Ruby's or other SS-approved flux is pulling the load. It'll smoke a little bit when you are soldering. Don't go huffing that. It's all sorts of bad for you. Do this in a well-ventilated room. We are using lead, acids of various types, and heating up stainless steel which also puts off its own poisonous gases if it gets hot enough. Don't breath that stuff. If you have bad vision and need to get up close don't. Get a nice jeweler's visor so you can see what you are doing without putting your nose over the soldering ***. (See above warnings for all of you children who need that sort of hand-holding. If not, have someone hold your beer while you perform this stunt.)

When I tin the cable end I like to go all the way up as far as the acid etched. You'll know when you go past that point because the solder stops sticking and balls up. Wipe down the still hot cable with a towel to get any excess solder off and to make a nice shiny surface. Don't brand your hand with the hot metals. You are using heat remember?

It's best, IMHO to flux and then solder up to just where the pinch bolt is and just a mm or two beyond that point. This seems to be controversial but Shimano says to tighten cable pinch bolts to 5-7NM. That's plenty enough to break strands if you are tightening it the way you are supposed to. I like to be able to reuse cable and pull it in and out through the housing when I replace it so if you are tightening the cable pinch bolts to spec that's not happening. If you tin it first the cable stays pretty nice but you can still see where it was a little deformed by the pinch bolt. Solder is mostly lead, it will deform and the cable below it will flatten a little bit. If you got the cable too hot you will see how the individual strands easily break here under the solder when the cable is deformed because its temper was ruined. That's not great. They might break anyhow in certain circumstances depending on the bolt and how sharp it presses into the cable. Some vintage components and pinch bolt designs really are harder on the cable here.

If you tin too far up past the pinch bolt on a derailleur cable you might have issues with the cable being honeymoon stiff and not bending where it is supposed to and this might alter the throw/travel of the derailleur and mess up indexing because it is messing with the lever arm length, like an alternative cable routing would, effectively making it larger since the cable can't bend. Don't do that, m'kay. It's not a good idea, but not illegal yet -even in Californaie. All bad ideas should be again da law, m'kay? Sure...

Since we are using acid flux (and maybe acid flux solder) you need to clean the cable of any acid/flux residue right away once you are done or it will stain the stainless steel (ironic huh?) and it'll look like rusty yuck. You can use water and soap but I just wipe it down with a little alcohol which works great for me. I always have denatured alcohol in another baby food jar right on my workbench so a paper towel dipped in it does a great job for this cleaning chore. Isopropyl alcohol works too, but denatured is cheaper and easier to find by the gallon (I go through a lot of the stuff.) I go through a lot of ethanol of the taxed variety too, but that's another story...

Amesja

Oh, I forgot to mention that I like to take my dremil tool with a sanding drum end and round the end of the cable off so it is nice and smooth and not sharp or jagged. You will know if you got a good tinning at this point because if you didn't the drum will often pull strands right out of the end of the solder and peel them back a few mm. It depends on which side of the drum you are sanding the end off whether it has enough force and angle to catch them to peel them back. If you have a really good bond it is very hard to do this.

A well-rounded end is not really any sharper than a crimped end, although it is a little smaller and could possibly poke through skin. On the front derailleur or rear brake it might be a good idea to put a crimp end over the tinned cable end anyhow for scratch/poke prevention if the end is somewhere that your arms or legs might brush up against it. The tinned end will be much stiffer than braided cable so it might be an issue. A crimped end is easily removed without cutting if you pinch at at 90-degrees from the original crimp or just grab and yank smartly outwards with a good pair of pliers like a linesman's/sidecutters. This is how I usually remove crimped ends anyhow. It's a very rare crimp I can't just pop off after strain-relief pinching the crimp at 90-degrees. Sometimes even that isn't necessary.

IrishBrewer

From time to time, I use my stick welder to finish cable ends. I clamp the end of a cable in a metal vise with the end sticking out that that I want to cut/finish and attach my ground clamp to the vise handle. Then I turn on the welder and "touch" the cable where I want it cut with the electrode and it melts through the cable and leaves the ends of the individual strands welded together. Sometimes it leaves a little ball of weld that I can easily grind off with an angle grinder so it fits through the cable housing nicely. So, in the end, you are left with something that looks like a factory welded end and you can easily remove the cables from the housings, clean/lube and re-use without risk of fraying the cable.

If you already have it cut to length, rather than using the welder to cut the cable, you would just touch it on the end for a brief moment. You'll get a quick flash of sparks and its done.

DaleW

Hot glue works too.