How much can you do to offset the weight of a bike?

[DCBassman]

Note I said offset. Not able to remove much.
The reason? I'm a bit torn about flogging my two mtbs in order to refurbish the Norco hybrid, which weighs around 30lb anyhow...

There's not the remotest possibility of just buying a new bike. I'd stick to further modifying the Scott, but can't fit the wider tyres needed to give my knackered shoulder some comfort.

I could easily fit much lower gearing, for example.
If I really went for it, I might shave off enough from the Trek to get the weight to 30lb, but that would be pretty much the limit.

Your collective wisdom would be hugely appreciated.
PS can some kind mod edit that title, please?

 

[vickster]

Take some weight off yourself, much cheaper

 

[Threevok]

Indeed - losing weight is the easiest and cheapest way to lighten the load.

You could also look at carbon forks, bars, seatposts etc - can be expensive - not my cup of tea personally

Also look at what you are wearing and what you are carrying

 

[DCBassman]

Take some weight off yourself, much cheaper

Yup, been doing a bit of that - around 15lbs so far in the past 12 months or so. Another 25 to go!

 

[si_c]

I'd suggest changing the wheels, tyres and groupset to reduce the weight of the Trek. I've got an 820 kicking around at my Dads (although it's a bit newer and a front suspension fork), and it's a solid steel framed bike. However you've got limited options to reduce weight.

Picking a modern lightweight alloy wheelset (you might have to get this built up) will make a big difference, as well as I recall the original wheels weren't exactly featherweights. Good light tyres would also be a choice I'd go for as you can save quite a bit here.

Lastly I'd try modifying the bike to use a 1x style groupset - this should save quite a bit of weight over the existing triple setup - I'm not sure what the rear spacing is in there, but you could potentially upgrade to a 10sp config.

 

[Crackle]

Rear cassettes can be surprisingly heavy if it's a cheaper one. Going up a few levels can reduce the weight considerably. Changing tyres can be another one, you can even get lightweight inner tubes. Seat posts, pedals and stems can also be heavy and are easy to replace but after that it's starting to get expensive as per Si's post.

 

[fossyant]

Take some weight off yourself, much cheaper

This. Just lost 14kg and I'm lower than pre-broken spine weight

1: The weight loss from the ole belly means less back pain,
2: The weight loss is like not carrying an extra MTB up hills.
3: My pants keep falling down !

Best places to lose weight on a bike:-

Tyres - look closely at the weights - Depending on 'use' you might not need super heavyweight tyres. This makes a huge difference in bike 'feel' - MTB's can be a bit tricky, but lighter tyres will roll better if you don't need 'downhill' casings. Eg. My Nobby Nics are pretty darn light, and do most stuff, but aren't as good as 'Magic Marys' for grip, but they are over 300g lighter.

Saddles - quite easy to drop 100-200g here for not much money.

As mentioned cassettes - SRAM are much lighter than Shimano ones for ones of similar quality.

 

[DCBassman]

Here's how I see it just now:
Has reasonably light tyres (City Jets).
Has a light bar.
Have seen a Deore 8/9 speed hub on rim, around £55 new. It does have alloy wheels, just not modern ones.
Have a Deore 42-32-22 chainset, courtesy of @Milkfloat OTP.
Have shifters and derailleurs for 8-speed, courtesy if the Norco.
The thing that's needed is that rear wheel. All else bar consumables is just waiting to be used.

 

[DCBassman]

@fossyant , good post. Will certainly check out SRAM cassettes.
And I suppose I should have mentioned that although an mtb, that is not its intended use, hence the City Jets already fitted.
I might fit the big City Jets instead of the 1.5s on there now...comfort!

 

[fossyant]

To be honest, I wouldn't really bother as it gets massively expensive quickly.

My son complained that my FS MTB felt heavy compaired to his £300 Carrera Vengeance, despite mine costing 5x as much. It's slightly heavier, but you do get used to the weight. I've a fixie that weighs 8kg, but when you add panniers/lights etc.etc it's much heavier I also have two road bikes that are 9kg.

The MTB's are around 14kg - yeh it's heavier but there isn't really much I can do to make it lighter. Adding a dropper post was certainly much heavier than the carbon seat post.

 

[fossyant]

@fossyant , good post. Will certainly check out SRAM cassettes.
And I suppose I should have mentioned that although an mtb, that is not its intended use, hence the City Jets already fitted.
I might fit the big City Jets instead of the 1.5s on there now...comfort!

I had some Hutchinson 1.2" tyres on my old MTB for commuting - lovely and quick, but the bike looked so wrong. The bigger city jets would look better. TBH Nobby Nics roll very well on road for an MTB tyre.

 

[fossyant]

Yup, been doing a bit of that - around 15lbs so far in the past 12 months or so. Another 25 to go!

Nice one - makes a huge difference, as does putting it on !

 

[ColinJ]

PS can some kind mod edit that title, please?

You can edit the title yourself - go to 'Thread Tools', above the thread.

If you didn't live in such a hilly area, I would have suggested taking all but one of the gears off your bike. I knocked up a singlespeed bike from old bits and a couple of cheap new parts. It weighs only about 9 kg (20 lbs), which is quite impressive for something that only cost me £70-odd!

 

[DCBassman]

Yup , quite lumpy hereabouts!

 

[ColinJ]

D'oh - I was trying to edit YOUR thread title, which obviously I can't do! You can edit your own, as I initially suggested ...