Success on 7 deg F motorized bicycle work commute!

[rogergendron1]

alright my bike blast through the snow pretty good with the new knobie tires, but i need to tighten up my clutch flower nut and readjust the linkage and slack, the bike would fair a lot better with a studded rear tire and a ski on the front lol it a lil slippery at over 10 mph in snow over 2in thick. i think a front ski conversion would eliminate that and i would just keep the rear wheel for a drive wheel

i am also thinking of swapping out to a 55 or 58 tooth rear sprocket to get a lot more torque and keep the speed down to 20mph, right now with the 44 she wants to do 30 - 40 and the power band is to high to really ripp through the snow at a slower speed and 30 mph is out of the question here lol so i am now driving out of my power band and need to regear ! i think i want to do 20mph max in this snow and hard packed snow so i am thinking a 58 tooth will limmit me to around 20 and put my my midrange top end power band right at 10 - 20 mph the speed i am looking to do in this snow.

so aside from swapping out to a larger sprocket to slow my self down and gain lots of torque what are some great winter snow mods to do to make the bike preform better in the snow and ice ?

1 larger sprocket
2 studdd tires
3 front ski mod ?
4 k track ? anyone actually use one ?
5 trike rear end conversion ?
6 knoby tires

i think a motorized bike would do quite well with just a larger sprocket and a ski instead of a front tire, although that would be a minimum for a winter snow bike

a good set up would also be a trike conversion with studded knobies and a front ski, you deffinatly cant go wrong there lol you would have no worries of falling down !

could you imagine a trike conversion with dual k track rear tires !

the best snow bike i would have to say would be a full k track conversion with a shift kit !

am shooting for 58 tooth rear, front ski, and studded knoby tire. all i have to do is make up the ski for the front and stud my rear tire. i have a trike conversion kit but do not have the money for the hollow hub tire yet so its just sitting on the floor lol

 

[bluegoatwoods]

You've got some good ideas there, rogergendron.

The one problem I can see with them, though, is that then the bike wouldn't be good for anything but snow.

And that's the rub; in the modern world, with salted and plowed roads, we've got to deal with plenty of clear pavement as well.

We've got to figure out a way to make it work in both cases. And I guess by the time we do, spring'll be here.

 

[rogergendron1]

just thought i would share this for all you winter snow and ice riders !

i know you have heard of zip tie snow chains but this is the chicken wire snow tire !

it combines the zip tie snow chain idea with a 2 inch strip of chicken wire or concrete wire mesh wrapped around your tire !

concrete wire mesh is 3.88 a roll at lowes and zip ties are not expensive ether so for around 10$ you can make some insanely good snow tires that grip to ice and packed snow like you would not believe !

1 first get some concrete wire mesh and cut a 2 inch strip the long way with tin snips
2 deflate your tire 50%
3 wrap the 2 in strip around your tire till it over laps itself by 1 inch
4 now zip tie the the mesh to the rim ether by going over the whole mesh and rim or by routing the zip tie through the holes in the mesh and into itself under the rim and pull the zip ties tight
5 reinflate your tire and you now have a snow tire with a band of 2 in wide steel mesh around it !

you can also use 3-4-5-6 in strips of mesh and space tham apart evenly if you do a lot of riding on clean roads and dont want exsessive wear on the metal and better breaking fom the bare tire spots.

ohh and blue goat woods.... a quick release front ski is pretty easy to make and remove, allong with the snow tire mentiond above, you would have a great snow bike that could be easily converted back, gearing is an issue though too. for those with a manic mechanic type adapter swapping sprockets is not a big deal at all.

so for the cost of 10$ at the hardwar store, a old scrap ski and some DIY brackets, and a new 50 pluss tooth sprocket.... you have a nice snow bike that can easily be converted back in a matter of an hour or so !

 

[rogergendron1]

here are a few front tire ski mods that do not even involve removing the front tire ! also an easy way to install actual tire chains.

going to pick up a sheet of concrete mesh and some zip ties tomorrow at work and make up a set of chicken wire tires ! i wanna try em out !

 

[CTripps]

Interesting ideas. I'm not about to try it myself, but if I were to try a ski mod for my front wheel like the yellow bike there, I'd have another mod to add... put an eyebolt or similar near the front lip of that 'front ski', and connect it to the handlebars with a bungee to prevent the wheel/ski from turning. It could help keep the front edge of the ski from catching and giving you a flying lesson.

 

[rogergendron1]

well i made up a nice rear tire with snow chain and i am going to do the front tire over with around 150 1/2 in screws, studded front tire and chained rear !

for starters i bought 10 ft of #200 chain, a box of 260 #8 x 1/2in pan head screws and a bag of 100 zip ties from the hardware store i work at . actually....... lol it was all free ! the box of screws was opened and the zip ties are for hanging things and the chain was cut for a customer and never bought ! i ended up with all the stuff i need for free ! one of the percs of wrking at a hardware store is you get to keep all the open ripped torn and returned nuts bolts screws and springs !

the screws are for the front tire the chains for the rear, my thoughts are the rear tire is only for driving foward so it only needs chains running across it to get it going with traction, the front tire is for turning and you need that to stick as good as possable so i plan on loading it up with 150 - 200 studs just long enough to cut in but not interfear with the pavement if need be.

first i cut the chain into 12 link sections that fit nicely around the rubber tire and come just short of the rim
then i took each section and zip tied it to the rim
i have standard 36 spoke rims so i used 18 chains spaced evenly apart between every other spoke.

now if you have rim breaks this wont work but for coaster or disk breaks its a nice cheap alternitive to expensive tire chains !

 

[rogergendron1]

the chains interfear with the rear fender and i feel that the studed front tire with a fender would be a horrible idea also lol so the fenders come off tomorrow when i go to stud the front tire.

all in all i think it came out real well ! the chains are nice and tight and i feel like they are on there pretty darn good !

now all i need is a nice set of bar mits !


the screws are going in the pattern shown in the last pic. idk though i have a brick pattern flat top tire that may be better for studding simply because its flat across the top and a lot more screws can be added to the brick pattern, this way the tire would ride across a flat row of even spikes but i will try out the side stud method first.

the rear tire is a 26in and has 36 spokes and 18 # 200 chains