hmmmmm?? newbie needs help!

[lip03]

Hi there,

my girlfriend and i are expecting our first child!! but we have to move house and we are moving to the next village. As i work in london i use the trains to commute from bedfordhire every day but the move means a two and a half mile trip to the station. I already have two bikes that i use to potter arround on but wil be getting a new one when money and the Mrs allows!My first question is about the weather i would like to know the best way of staying warm on winter mornings as i work shifts and will be cycling at 4AM some weeks BRRR.

And my second is about my bike the two i have are in ok condition but as this will be a long term arrangement i would like a good bike that is well suited to my needs. The roads i will be cycling are mostly flat, strait A roads as i said above the journey is 2.5 miles from door to door. One of my bikes is a racer with drop down bars and i feel this would be uncomfortable after time. i dont have much of a budget as my partner has gone into ultra saving mode due the baby. Any help would be appreciated as you can tell i dont really know much about cycling other than tearing arround the local estate as a kid!!

Thanks for reading my thread and look forward to being part of this forum

 

[corshamjim]

Whatever style bike you ride won't make a great difference to your journey time over 2.5 miles, so if you prefer a more upright bike that's fine. For commuting I recommend you get something reliable and easy to maintain, especially get some puncture resistant tyres.

+1 to get a good lock. Consider maybe getting a cheap 2nd hand bike if security is likely to be a real issue. I have a rubbish-looking Dahon folder which is great for that, and if I'm going somewhere really dodgy I can fold it up and take it in with me.

 

[summerdays]

Over 2.5 miles you are unlikely to get that hot through cycling unless there is an enormous hill in the way so you ought to concentrate on keeping warm with layers including gloves. You will probably need more than one pair as the temperatures start to warm up in spring but it could easily be below freezing at that time for a couple of months yet. And it won't matter what the bike is either - get the new bike but keep it for best maybe ... what you want is something that you won't mind getting bumped by others in the bike stands at the station, and preferably not the nicest looking one. And as the others have said - get a good lock.

 

[lip03]

Thanks guys!!

some great advice there espescialy madcyclist thanks for the vid i was going to get my bike serviced at lbs but as it will cost about 50 to 60 quid i may as well get a new bike decathlon do a mountain bike for arround £139 it looks nice and comfy so will go with that i think. And as for the keeping warm well there is one hill about half way so should get a bit of heat there and my bithday coming up so have asked the mother in law for all my cycle gear gloves, tights, waterproofs etc o i am all set to become part of the cyclin comunity!!!!

 

[MacB]

I would be very wary of leaving anything remotely new looking at a station. For 2.5 miles I'd be looking for simplicty, 3 speed hub gear at the most but more likely a single speed. If you plan on doing this year round then mudguards would be a high priority. This sort of distance could be done on just about anything, you could even pick up a freebie and add some reasonable secondhand parts.

 

[mightyquin]

I'm a relative newbie/uniformed reformed cyclist - started off like you thinking I'd just replace my old unused Raleigh MTB with a cheap new one.

Don't do it! I read a lot of stuff on here and other forums and was given some very good advice.

Think about it. You're going to ride this new bike regularly to the station and back, in all weathers. You want something reliable, safe, and that will last well. If you spend a bit more than you anticipated, think about the money you are saving in petrol/parking/bus fares. The bike will pay for itself in a year. That said, you don't want to spend loads on a bike that's going to be left out at the station car park all day!

Buying s/h is fine if you know what to look for, or have a dealer who sells s/h and serviced bikes. I bought s/h off ebay - completely the wrong thing for me to do but I was lucky and got a great bike for a third of its retail price! There are places that get old bikes and restore/refit them - like a training scheme - if one of those are near you it's worth a look. I found one near me and most of the bikes were sold on for £50/£100.

From the advice I had, look at single speed bikes (what I went for in the end). They're virtually no maintenance and look great! You can get them as road bikes, hybrids or MTB's. Just depends if you have any real hills on your commute. Otherwise a hybrid would be a good idea. I almost plumped for a Kona Smoke - still on sale at Evans.

One thing about security, look at the bikes parked at the station next time. You'll see how crappy most of them look. Then imagine your shiny new bike in amongst them and an opportunist thief - which one is he likely to go for?

 

[Arch]

I'd say, use one or both of the bikes you have for the commute for now. Get a feel for it. You may find that actually your current bikes are perfectly comfortable over that distance, but if they aren't give it time to try and diagnose what you need to change - do you need to be more upright, is it just a saddle issue or whatever. I realise that 2.5 miles may seem a lot to a newbie, but actually once you've done it a few times, it's the sort of distance you can do on almost any bike. Give yourself time to work out just what would be ideal for you.

And the longer you leave it before investing in a new toy, the more you'll have saved up! But I agree that leaving a shiny new bike at the station isn't ideal - another reason to perhaps use one of the ones you already have. You don't say what the non-drop barred bike is like - if it's a MTB with knobbly tyres, then just changing the tyres to slicks may be all you need.

For warmth, layers - several thin ones if you can, as they are easy to peel off gradually as you warm up. Although on your distance, I suspect you'll just be warming up as you get to the station, so a thicker coat you can take of on the train may do it. It doesn't have to be really expensive cycle specific kit, although a coat cut low at the back keeps your lower back warmer. I got some windproof gloves at Millets last year, they've been fine. I wear thin fleece or wool gloves under them in the really cold weather.

One other thing - at 4am you may find that the worst danger you face is ice (although hopefully not for much longer this year). Beware, when you're snug and warm in your layers and coat, that the road surface could well be freezing. Just take it easy when it's chilliest.

 

[lip03]

Arch by mtb you mean mountain bike?? dont have the lingo down just yet! and if thats the case then yeah its MTB but its the worst of my two bikes would need a bit of work but from whats been said on here i may just get it serviced. We are not moving to our new place untill the end of june so i have a while to get things sorted

 

[Arch]

Arch by mtb you mean mountain bike?? dont have the lingo down just yet! and if thats the case then yeah its MTB but its the worst of my two bikes would need a bit of work but from whats been said on here i may just get it serviced. We are not moving to our new place untill the end of june so i have a while to get things sorted

Yes, sorry, I mean mountain bike.

If I were you, I think I'd get the mountain bike serviced, and swap knobbly tyres for slick ones. Then use the racer for a week, and then the mountainbike, and see which feels better. I've never got on with dropbars myself, but that may be due to the only bike I had with them on being a touch too big. However plenty of people find them perfect over any distance - you don't have to be right down on the drops the whole time of course, most people ride with their hands on the brake lever hoods for a more upright ride. And the other good thing is, you have a spare bike for if anything goes wrong with one - gives you the option of fixing stuff at the weekend or when ever you have more time.

You may find you want to use the road bike (the 'racer') in fine weather, and the MTB in the wet (get mudguards on it!). Once you've ridden for a while, you'll know which feels nicer, and you can narrow down your search for a new toy. Of course, there's a fair risk that you'll enjoy the riding so much that you extend your commute in which case the comfort over longer distances becomes key....

Oh, and congrats on the baby!

 

[Banjo]

Welcome to cyclechat Lipo3 .In your situation with a short commute by bike to the station then train to Lndon I would get a folding bike.

They are a lot better to ride than you might think.You can take it all the way to work and put it somewhere secure .Train stations are the worst place to leave a bike.

I often do 20 mile rides on my cheap single speed folder ,with a good quality folder you can ride all day if you want to.

 

[mightyquin]

MTB is mountain bike (I didn't know that at first either!).

I also have an old MTB, had the same advice to look at getting it back on the road first, which is fine if you can do the work yourself but I'd need a bike shop to do a full service/rebuild which was going to cost something like £100/£150 with new parts and tyres. I'm hanging onto it until either I can do the work myself (looking into bike maint. courses) or I'll turn it into a single speed MTB.

So, it depends what kind of bike you've got, and exactly what it needs. You might get away with just a clean up, lube and new road tyres which would be worth it, but at the level I had to spend I fancied getting a 'new' bike.

 

[Arch]

Welcome to cyclechat Lipo3 .In your situation with a short commute by bike to the station then train to Lndon I would get a folding bike.

They are a lot better to ride than you might think.You can take it all the way to work and put it somewhere secure .Train stations are the worst place to leave a bike.

I often do 20 mile rides on my cheap single speed folder ,with a good quality folder you can ride all day if you want to.

True, if you already have a road bike and an MTB, a folder is an ideal N+1..

(for newbies - the ideal number of bikes to own is N + 1, where N is the number of bikes you already have... )