New bike for winter a bad idea?

timmyflash

Does riding a bike in winter damage it?

Pretty keen on buying my first proper road bike in next few weeks, but seen people talking about winter hacks, suggests they don't want to damage good bike so save that for fair weather. Am i way off the mark? Good idea to wait?

Cheers

Slow Downcp

Buy one, clean it when you get back, lube it when it's dry.

It's a bike, it won't dissolve The only reasons for a hack are so you don't have to worry about the cost of replacing parts so much if you neglect it, and crashing on wet/icy roads.

shmo

Lower headset bearing and rear hub on my bike nearly dissolved last winter . Hoping that the crud road racer mudguards along with a headset protector will save the bearing as I'm too lazy to drop the fork to clean in there regularly. Also hope that the rear wheel prob was due to crappy seals on Shimano RS-20 and my new Fulcrums won't suffer the same fate.

Only other thing that needed doing was new brake pads and some cables.

mfin

Read this thread after just posting what might be relevant thoughts to your OP on this thread http://www.bikeradar.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=12661349

timmyflash

Hmm, cheers for that.

I currently have a specialized sirrus (first bike i've owned since was about 12. 16 years ago...), but thinking about it, i might sell this and replace it with something of similar value of gumtree or ebay. Reckon i could get £200, and pick something up for the same until spring.

Might give me a better idea what i'm after as well.

Money is burning a hole in my pocket though. Can i hold out from treating myself?! haha

STEFANOS4784

That sounds like a good idea to me, what's the budget for the new bike incidently? Bikes don't melt in the winter despite what people may say but depends on what your looking at. If your thinking of buying a 5k carbon art piece then not a good idea because if you crash it'll be a nightmare but a spesh secteur/allez with 105 will be fine over the winter, just look after it :idea:

timmyflash

Joining the legion of people looking for a 1k bike.. so it's not a 'carbon art piece', but would obviously like to keep it 'nice.

Cheers all for input.

keef66

I bought mine last September, so only had a handful of dry rides before the clocks went back and the weather turned nasty. I carried on riding it all through the winter, and with a bit of tlc nothing's broken or dissolved.

It's a Racelight Tk with full mudguards, which makes an enormous difference to the amount of abrasive, corrosive road filth hitting the brake calipers, front mech, bb and lower headset.

I'm in the process of checking and greasing the bearings before winter; so far only done the front hub, but that was pristine, and judging by their silent operation, so will the rest be.

mfin

With a winter bike... for me its mainly having something I can ride in the wet and not feel I need to bother cleaning cos I don't value too much. If I rode something that was a grand upwards in the wet or mucky roads Id feel Id have to clean it all the time and look after it. In the winter that could mean washing a bike in the cold for half an hour 5 times a week for me and Im not doing that. Plus, of course, I can leave mudguards on it.

cougie

Full guards willl help a lot. My mates shagged the finish on his ultegra groupset after riding it on gritted roads - so if I ever do that - I make sure the bike is sparkly clean soon after the ride.

Personally though in winter I love my fixed wheel. Full guards, lights, far less to go wrong and it was very cheap.

giant_man

A new bike for winter is a great idea imo, just make sure it's winter equipped with mudguards and lights, some tools in a saddlepack, stuff like that.

grahamcp

Make sure you get a frame with mudguard clearance - for the good reasons above; also if you ride in a group, whoever happens to be behind you will thank you for it. The clip-on guards don't come down far enough to prevent spray being flciked up - so go for full guards with decent flap.

skyd0g

Go get your bike now! (Plus a set of Crudguards).
...if you hung on 'till the weather was decent, you'd be waiting until one Tuesday in July when your model would inevitably be out of stock.

...as it's a new bike, you'll take extra care with it anyway.

Philby

Might be worth buying now, unless you are on the C2W scheme - there's a few 2009 models being discounted in the LBSs I have been in recently.