Build a winter bike for snow and ice need advice!

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Briscoelab
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Joined: Thu Jan 26, 2006 6:01 pm

by Briscoelab

I'll reiterate: if you're commuting in the upper midwest (Chi-town, Madison, Milwaukee, The Cities, etc are not like New England or temperate maritime climates like the UK) or want to be able to ride no matter what, studded tires are a great idea. It snows here in November and stays on the grown till spring. You're going to be riding on hard packed snow and ice a LOT. Nothing melts when it's -20 F :)

Once the fatbikes ride the trails in, you can have a LOT of fun with cx tubulars at really low psi or even a regular mtb at lower pressures. I ride my 29er SS all the time with non studded tires. But, a patch a glaze ice will put you on you @ss quickly :)

It's really quite awesome to be out on a country gravel/dirt road that's basically a sheet of packed snow/ice and be able to bomb down it at 25mph+ when you have studs on.


Buy the best gloves you can afford. Some of my best winter gloves are ones that I bought for really cold xc skiing. They are very warm, but not too bulky and are very slim around the wrist. They also have zippers on the back side to vent them if it gets too warm, or you can put hand warmer packets in there. If it's cold, I always put warmers in.

Decent winter shoes do help. I have a pair of specialize defrosters. Inexpensive, so I don't care if they get trashed, and they do have nice coverage and some insulation. But, you can go a long way with a your normal shoes and decent shoe covers. I like the Louis Garneau Dry SL covers. I'll put a hand warmer packet on top of my shoe, just behind my toes, then the cover over that. For me that's good well below freezing. Colder then the mid/low 20's (F) and I'm going for the winter shoes, likely with shoe cover as well.


Consider taking up XC skiing, if you don't already. Most of the fast riders I know in the upper midwest only ride a couple days a week in the winter. But, they're skiing everyday. You can comfortably ski in much colder temps and Madison has tons of well groomed trails in the area. Seriously, if you go out and skate ski for 2-3 hours... you'll be smoked, barely able to walk the next day :) Even a set of inexpensive waxes classics will greatly extend your range of outdoor activity opportunities and provide a killer workout. Pick up a bike and skis if you can :)

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ultimobici
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by ultimobici

One thing that is overlooked, when cleaning a bike in regions where salt is used, is rinsing the bike off with cold water. Warm water will allow the salt to dissolve. Cold flushes it away.

by Weenie


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brettmess24
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by brettmess24

Again, awesome info!!!!! Thank you briscoelab for details and first hand experience. :thumbup:

tinozee
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by tinozee

I ride a Ridley x-fire with studded schwalbe tires (when it's frozen) and no fenders in New England. It works for me. I prefer frozen black ice over slush, I avoid slush! Castelli winter tights, Gore jacket over ls jersey ibex base layer... it's all good down to about 15F.

brettmess24
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by brettmess24

So regular rim brakes or is there a big advantage to go disc for winter.

Briscoelab
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by Briscoelab

Both work.

Most people have some old wheels laying around though or want to buy some used wheels for the winter bike. Hence a lot of people go rim, for now.

Discs are nice though. It's up to you.

I'd give a hard look at a Surly crosscheck frameset or if you want disc; the straggler frameset. They are both well made steel bikes and can be ran SS or geared. They are affordable and have plenty of options for mounting fenders, racks, tons of fender and tire clearance.

dogg
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by dogg

i wish i had a bike with discs for my winter riding. the feeling of road grit, salt, etc grinding away at your rims while braking is horrible. and your brakes/rims/wheels get filthy.

but yeah, they'll work well enough to stop you

aaric
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by aaric

I think the issue with discs is the availability of the frames/bikes used. You can get a pretty decent used cross bike for ~$500. Discs push that number over $1000. New, its pretty easy to push that to $2000 ;) Perhaps that premium is worth it in the harsher climates, but not out here in California :-)

mattr
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by mattr

If you are going for a new build, with new parts, disc is the way to go. Bigger tyres, more clearance, less maintenance.

My training/bad weather bike is basically decked out with old race kit, as many peoples are. But if i was going to start again, i'd bite the bullet and go disc. Once you've actually bought the kit, the actual cost of running should easily offset the purchase cost.
Instead of new rims every spring and new pads two or three times through the winter, you'd probably keep the rims until corrosion or a pothole killed them (which would take ages, as you can go to larger rims and tyres, even using MTB 29er or full on touring rims) and new pads maybe every 5000 miles (properly bedded in disc pads last for AGES on road bikes) and maybe new discs every two or three years....... if you play it a bit smart, you can *probably* get some commonality with your MTB as well. Use the same pads and disc sizes, cuts down on spares.

bm0p700f
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by bm0p700f

Sounds really cold in chicago!

bm0p700f
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by bm0p700f

Studded tyres are great even in the U.K. It does snow sometimes here too and sometimes that snow and ice stick around for a month or more. Studs allow you to ride without the fear of falling of every time you turn the handlebars.

tinozee
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by tinozee

I have to agree about the discs, would love to have those on the winter and rain bikes. So over cantis and V brakes in wet. My winter bike is also my cross/lite off road bike where discs make sense. On regular road though rim brakes all the way.

mattr
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by mattr

You can actually get quite a few different variants of studded tyres.
The ones i have for my MTB have ~300 studs and allow me to basically ride anywhere, polished sheet ice is no big deal. They weigh a kilo each.
Riding on clear surfaces is a pain in the arse tho.
The 700s on my wifes CX bike are around 120 studs, none on the centre band, so they roll nicely (for a heavy, shit tyre!) but still bite if you either drop the pressure, or lean over (so cornering is ok), there are tyres with less studs, i think about 80 is the smallest count i've seen advertised, and you can get 150/200/240 and all sorts of variations.

The tyres we got for my wifes winter MTB are actually some soft compound race tyres, with 240 added studs, so they weigh in at 650/700 ish

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showdown
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by showdown

Last winter in Chicago was amazing. Sigh.

My commute is about 30 mins give or take in the summer. This past winter it was easily 50+ minutes on a good day, an hour or more on the really tough ones.

I wore just about everything I owned- it took at least 20 mins to get ready and undressed.

Craft wool base layer
Craft wool long sleeve jersey
Craft thermal winter jacket
wool glove liners
Heated insulated gloves
Chemical hand warmers
Windproof mitten shell
Balaclava
Turtle fur
Craft wind proof hat
Ski goggles
Bib shorts
Craft wool lower base layer
Craft thermal windproof tights
Wool socks
Specialized defroster boots
Chemical foot warmers
Pearl Izumi amfib booties
Cozy Winters heated footbeds

My bike is a Taiwanese-made Motobecane Titanium cyclocross frame with SRAM Rival, Powertap open pro 32 spoke wheels with Continental studded tires. Nite rider Mini Newt headlamp, 2xSuperflash lights on the seatstays and one on my Osprey Talon 11 backpack.

I've been riding in the winter for years and I'm really good at spotting ice and handling it but inevitably with 2 commutes a day for 3+ months you're going to fall. I hit the deck a lot this winter mostly due to the 40+mph winds off the lake- even with studded tires you just get blown over. Luckily there was enough snow and I was wearing enough clothing that I wasn't hurt- also my top speed was probably not above 20 mph. The bike took a ton of abuse from the falls, salt and sand but held up fine and this spring when I rebuilt it I found that nothing was broken or totally shot- I needed a new chain (probably needed a new one every month) new jockey wheels and I'll likely get new chainrings as they were pretty gnarled.

With a one-year-old I'm on daycare duty so no more commuting for me... Can't say that I'm terribly sad as this coming winter looks to be really bad as well. (Wahoo kicker + big-ass tv in the basement for me this year.)

A few tips that saved my ass many times:
Keep a spare set of socks at work or in your bag and keep two plastic grocery bags in your bag- if it's really wet, wrapping your shoes in the bags will keep them dry and dry is key.
I keep a pair of latex gloves in my bag as well for the same reason- if my gloves get wet I can put on the latex gloves and keep the wet off my skin and it helps a bit.

I still swear by cheap "good enough" equipment for winter commuting or riding. The fancy stuff is great but it will get destroyed. The amount of salt and sand will just kill delicate equipment.

by Weenie


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kode54
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by kode54

Reviving this thread on winter. This morning...some areas hit 18F. Face area mostly covered with a balacava and winter hat...but exposed skin area and eyes almost froze.

Who's wearing ski goggles and what fits with bike helmets? Mostly ride when the sun is just coming up...so maybe yellow tinted lenses would help with on coming car headlights.
- Factor Ostro VAM Disc
- Factor LS Disc
- Specialized Aethos Disc
- Sturdy Ti Allroad Disc
- Guru Praemio R Disc

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