After having a throttle cable break on my 86 heritage I decided to go ahead and replace all the original cables.

The only clutch cable available aftermarket was the Barnett with the fancy Teflon liner thing.

I have now broken two of them in less than two years!!!! They have both broke right up by the lever just inside the cable housing.

All I can assume is there must be a sharp spot inside their cable.

Anyone else have bad luck with Barnett cables???

 

I have Barnett cables and have been very happy with them for the last 8 years.
Not a lick of trouble out of any of them.

 

Make sure that your cable end at the lever is able to rotate, otherwise it flexes the cable near the end leading to breakage.

 

I dunno about "bad" luck with them, but I am not a Barnett Fan Boi. I think their quality is OK, and better than the cheap stuff, but not up to OEM quality. I am currently running a NOS HD cable, and it is night and day better than the Barnett it replaced. Dunno if you could find another one. '86 was the last year for that style.

And what Beemervet says makes sense.

 

Just put Barnetts on mine. No opinion as to longevity at this point, but it feels nice.

Did stretch a bit over the course of my road trip. Took about eight flats on the adjuster after I got home to get it right.

 

This is good to know. I'm running Beach bars so the cable has a really nice straight pull.

And I haven't looked for an OEM one yet but I think I will because the 30 year old one is still working....

The hardest part is that the 86 heritage used a different cable than any other bike ever made.....

 

I have always heard good things about them too.

One breaking is a fluke, it happens. But two breaking makes me think there is something wrong with how they put it together.

 

I still had the stockers on mine when I changed them out with Motion Pro cables a few months back. So far so good. Can't speak to longevity yet. Got the original stockers as spares now at least.

 

Speaking of that, I've got my stock (1990 Electra Glide) clutch, throttle and idle cables sitting here.

Anyone wants them, they're yours for the cost of shipping.

 

It would make me think the same thing.
Just a thought but have you thought about upgrading to a splined shaft transmission?
Doing that would definitely solve your cable availability problems.

Just a thought.