Ice bike 2013-14

The old Shogun. Fixed up proper. Hakkapaelitta studded tires. Mostly new wheels. Old hubs.

That'll do. But I'm going to have to put Noodles on it if I aim to commute on it.

The light is an ancient Lumotec. Good enough for be-seen and general commuting.

Ice

It's easier to ride this than walk it. Assuming studded tires of course.

Winterizing

Before we start, let me just carry on about these awesome tires. They're Maxxis MaxLite 310. Yes, they weigh 310 grams. I put them in the vise to show how super thin they are. They're basically a thin casing to hold your tube to your rim. Seriously, these are great all-rounders. I had them on the pump-beer version of the MB-2 this summer and they were perfect for bar rides and tooling around on the trails. I think I only had one flat on these. They're for racing, but they're perfect for a tool-around bike. Fast, supple, a bit of tread for the dirt, and enough plump to allow you to bang around.

This bike proved itself last winter as a perfect work horse winter bike. Recall this particularly cold and wet week. It's ready for winter time trudging now: fenders, rack, studs, generator lights front and back, Thudbuster, Thermos-holder.

I love these grips. Click for big.

So this was the river bike all summer. And it rocked. It was perfect for fishing, beer-runs, day tours, and junk-food runs. It's just such a great bike I couldn't bear to think of it just sitting in a shed all winter long. So, I put the old Hakkapeliitas (going on year 5 now?) on there, flipped the rear wheel to the fixed side and it's going to be the ice bike. But the reality is -- I'll probably ride this bike a half-dozen times this winter. The MB-2 is just so easy and fun and useful.

This is the big experiment. I have to say, I have my doubts on the viability of this bike as a super useful snow bike. I could dump $100+ into some new tires to make it probably, nearly viable, but I want to try these out first. I put a fender solution on there. Those huge-ass tires can throw a boatload of slushy gunk.

The careful observer will notice that the tandem is gone. It turns out the tandem was the logjam. I took it to Glens today and the garage just nearly cleaned itself. I can now hang up most of the bikes, which clears up a huge pile of bikey/hose/tire mess that was against the garage door.

Note the walkable space in front of the garage door. I also replaced 4 bulbs in the overheads. Wow. That makes a huge difference. I don't have a lot of bike stuff in my winter plans -- and what I do have planned will hopefully happen in Glen's garage or Pat's garage. But I probably will re-work Maddie's Elephant with drops and a rear rack.

From the other side. Yes. This is clean. Very clean.

Lest we forget. The wife is certified.

Black Friday ride update and general carrying on about snowy cold riding on Thanksgiving morn

I can't get around on the trails. I tried just riding through the snow of Cannon Hill Park last night and it was not rad.

And there's more snow a-fallin, so it won't get easier. But it's going to be warm!



So, ride has been downgraded from a trail ride to a ride-whatever-we-can-get-through-ride.

And we'll leave at Scoop at 8:00-ish.

I made a store run yesterday on the Hakkapeliita-shod CX bike. The streets are basically compact snow that acts like ice. With studs, it's like normal riding. Except yesterday it was about 3F.
My thinking was that it would be lovely to have gears -- since my proper winter bike is a single speed. But, I never really cleaned up the CX bike after the last cross race I did, which was rainy wet lame sandy. So in about 3 blocks of riding yesterday in the freezing temps, my CX also became a single speed. I wanted to blame the brifter, but my guess is that there's water in the cables under the bottom bracket and water in the housing by the rear derailleur. And probably water in the brifter. And any water anywhere certainly froze solid.


Last night was a Benniditos/Park Inn run on the winter bike. That was lovely.

I'm trying to talk Liza into hooking up the kicksled to the winter bike today before we get the turkey on the grill. In any case everyone who is able aught to do a pre-Thanksgiving meal ride.

Winter with a fury

Beth. Ruling. At the FBC Festivus last night.

Yowsa. Three days ago we were riding around in clear streets and it was 40 F. Last night it was snowy slushy for the Festivus. Tonight, it's 18 F and will drop below zero before we wake tomorrow. With the wind gusting as it is, it's probably already under zero. 

Winter has descended upon Spokane like a wolf on a fold. As old William Claude would proclaim, "It's not a fit night out for man or beast." 

I took a short ride today when it was about 20 F. The slush from yesterday has turned the streets into knarly ice-covered obstacle courses on the south hill. The streets don't look two days into winter here. They look like streets look about a month into winter.


Hank won "Best Lights" at Festivus, as voted by his peers.

I took the Rawland out on the high drive trails. I'm running the 2.3" Neomotos at about 30 psi, which make for a nice float over the snow. But on the icy-rutty streets I want my studs. For icy rutted streets, I think the Nokian Extremes, with the studded knobbies in all directions would be ideal. The Hakkapeliittas that I run on my ice bike just have studs down the center, which work great for compact snow and sheer ice.

So far the disc brakes on the Rawland are nice. But not yet required. I think there are pretty specific conditions that push icy snow up onto your rims where disc brakes really shine. We've not had those conditions yet.

Last year, Liza gave me some Pearl Izumi lobster claw gloves for x-mass. I was thankful, but I considered them overkill. On days like today, I really appreciate them. 

For cold like this, I put my rain legs over my pants to cut the wind, and I wear poly long johns. Up top, I have thin wool base layer, a bit thicker wool turtleneck, Ibex wool/Dash Hybrid vest, and the O2 rain jacket as the outer shell: many thin layers. I have a smartwool gaiter and a smartwool beanie. I wear clear glasses to keep the icy wind out of my eyes.


Joe and Jon (and Jon's soul as it leaves his earthly body) discuss the finer points of lighting up a mobile nativity scene, loud-ass sound system, and various xmass lights with marine batteries

So far I'm neutral on the Lake Boots. They are warm and they clip in, so they perform their essential job, but I really don't like the lacing device. I'll go into more specifics with a full report in a few weeks after I get more time with the boots. I wear two pair of ultra thin (liner) wool socks in my boots.

This kind of cold freaks me out. It's easy -- especially in our day, where we're at once so disconnected from real nature and so confident in our technology to avoid it -- to forget that intense cold can mess you up and even kill you. It's not "gonna kill ya" cold yet, but it's still good to keep a healthy respect at the forefront of your mind as you go off and enjoy winter pursuits when the temperature dips below the single digits.

If you haven't, a great short read is Jack London's To Build a Fire. I read this at least once a year, not just for a reminder of its simple lesson, but because I like that it gets into the mind of a dog and tells a bit of the story from the dog's point of view. And he does it in a way that is not corny. If you're not a reader, the Orson Wells-narrated short film version is really good too.

Still going on about the new commute

Ok, this will be my last post for a while about my new life as a born-again-commuter.

I left my house on my fancy Lyon's 747 this morning. I went a couple blocks and slid a bit on some ice, so I was sort of excited to turn back and get the ice bike.

As it turns out, the ice was pretty localized to the south hill. Or maybe just 26th and Monroe, because I didn't hit any more ice for the rest of the day.

The ice bike is set up as a fixed gear with 42/18 gearing, which would be just a tad tall for me even if the bike didn't have huge-ass (diameter and weight) Hakkapeliitta studded tires on it. I always notice the extra gear inches created by the larger diameter of these tires. I think I ran 38 or 39/18 last year.

I sort of dreaded the ride home -- specifically the climb up through Liberty Park and the climb up Snake Hill (aka Upper Terrace Road from Rockwood to 17th), which are both pretty steep. I also had about 15 pounds on the front rack. I figured I would be walking, but to my surprise, I grinded up them and with a bit of energy and knee tendons to spare.

That's the thing I always forget about riding the fixed gear, which I haven't really ridden since last winter: hills are mysteriously at once harder and easier. And much quicker. I think I got home in about 25 minutes tonight. I'll have to start timing and obsessing. Fun fun fun!

First Snow Aught Seven

We woke up to snow this morning and Maddie had a huge cow. She loves the snow. Here's Liza on the Schwinn snow bike, shod with Hakkapeliitas.

I took the Turd out, which has big fat urban-type knobbies. These are no good in the snow. I figured they'd rule because they were so wide and they have knobbies, but the knobbie profile is rounded so these things just slide around. You really do need the hooked knobbies that stick out at the sides to get traction. It's all about the front wheel and keeping it in control.

I put the Hakkapelittas on my 720 last night and it's a breeze to ride. The snow right now is mostly powder, with some areas that are a bit more compacted from cars driving over it. I would not call it "hard packed." This snow is hard to ride on because it's unpredictably unstable. This snow tends to slide out under the weight of the front wheel. Compare this to hard packed snow or ice, which is predictably stable. It may be slicker, but you know it's going to hold up under your front wheel.

Conventional wisdom says that studs are only useful on ice and hard packed snow. I need to put some non-studded knobbies on the turd and see if they perform the same as the Hakkapeliitas that I have on my 720. Is it the studs or the proper knobbies that make riding my 720 easier?

I also think the next set of studded tires I buy will have the full studded surface. The Hakkapeliitas only have studs running down the center of the tire. Which makes sense for city riding, but a little overkill in the stud department would be interesting to check out.

Snow

Yay. It finally snowed with some authority today. Looks to be sticking too. The last word I heard on weather was that it was now going to get very cold. Right now it's just over freezing, so we're getting a bit slushy. It should get down to about 25F tonight, so that will freeze everything up nicely for Monday morning. I'm happy that I ride a bike on days like tomorrow will be... but even happier that I work from home.


Here in the Speare/Mattana household we'll be running fixed gear bikes with studded tires this winter.

The picture above there is Liza getting her snow legs worked in. That miserable Fuji does well in the snow, even though it feels like it's just sucking away your energy at twice the rate of any other bike we own. What a dog.

I also hit the trails on the bluff after the snow had piled up for an hour or so. I was not the first cyclist to hit the trail with snow this year, as I followed some wide mountain bike tracks for a good portion of my ride.

We're running the Nokian Hakkapeliitta W106 studded tires on both the Quickbeam and the Fuji. The tread and stud pattern is optimized for city riding, with a row of carbide studs essentially down the middle of the tire. So, on trails, I wouldn't mind a few studs sticking out of the side of the tire to grip the side of the hill, but overall, these tires are great and I wouldn't want the extra studs on the road where I do the majority of my riding. Tires with carbide studs cost about twice as much as those with mild/normal steel studs. The carbide wears much longer. My neighbor, Dennis, is a year-round commuter, who has about a 20 mile round trip commute. Last year, he left his Nokian's on his bike for about 4 months, so these tires rode on a lot of non-snowy/icy pavement. Last time we chatted about these tires, he said he couldn't even tell the wear on them.

It's going to be a great winter.