Colorado’s House of Looptail is a small company that not only celebrates old bicycles but is dedicated to keeping you riding them. Their first products were licensed reproductions of classic tires, like the Panaracer-made Snake Belly and Ritchey Megabite Z-Max (coming Summer of ’25). Well, they just released a cool lil’ doodad that they are calling These Things. They look like a very well-thought-out, simple in-line-cable adjuster.
These Things are created to solve problems, and are the perfect addition to some old-timey builds, or a drop bar conversion with cantis. House of Looptail says that they remove the slop and improve shift feel when placed behind vintage thumbies or bar end shifters. I don’t know about you, but I like where their head is at.
Back in the 80’s, and 90’s, there were a few bike component brands, like WTB, that made these. But nowadays availability of those older parts is not so great. There are modern solutions, but House of Looptail thinks they look “dumb on a Prewar Klunk, an ’85 Commando, or a ’91 Jellybean”. I would tend to agree.
All that being said, House of Looptail has gone ahead and produced the simple and functional These Things. They are stealthy, and might even look like they belong on the vintage bike build you’ve got going on.
A cool lil’ feature of These Things is the included solid double-male connection. This allows the user the option of butting the adjuster directly against a shifter, brake lever, or cable stop.
These Things offer a “full 1/2 of cable adjustment”, are sold in pairs, and are suitable for either shift or brake. They retail for $35 and come in black or silver. These Things are in stock now and ready to ship.
