SPD pedals with 'road' shoes

[Chris James]

I have just bought a pair of discounted Shimano RW01 winter boots. These have both three and two holes in the soles and are advertised as SPD compatible.

I want to use them with some A520 pedals as that is what I currently use on my audax bike. I assumed that I would need to get some SH-70 /71 cleats with pontoons to get the sole to fit flush to the pedal.

But looking on the internet I came across a thread which suggested that someone had been unable to get their (Sidi Genius) road shoes to fit onto an A520 using these cleats and had ended up using MTB shoes instead.

I can't see anything unusual about A520s in comparison to other SPD pedals, so after all that waffle I suppose my questions are:

Has anyone used road shoes and SPDs together?

Did you use the SH-70 cleat (or SH-71)?

Did it all work okay?

Thanks.

 

[gavintc]

I did initially use road shoes and my old SPD pedals when I moved from MTB to the road. It did not take long before I appreciated that this mix provides all the disadvantages of road shoes with none of the advantages of SPD. In essence, you cannot walk in them, the contact point between pedal and shoe is small and there is very little float I found when cycling hard out of the saddle that I did not feel stable in them. So after a couple of months, I got myself some road pedals and road cleats.

But, on my commuting bike, I have MTB shoes and SPD as I value the ability to walk in them.

 

[Chris James]

Food for thought.

I picked the boots cheapish and am not really bothered about being able to walk off the bike in winter. I am more concerned with cold feet!

Did you use the SH71 cleat and or SH-85 adaptor on your road shoes when you used them with SPD pedals?

Mind you, the SH-71 cleat costs £12 and I could pick up some '105' (actually 540 which look not as good 5610) pedals from Ribble for £20!

I just don't fancy swapping pedals over as my summer audaxy shoes are Shimano T071 with recessed cleats, hence SPD, and I am more likely to cycle longer distances and potentially wander around in the summer.

 

[gavintc]

Not sure what cleats - just the standard SPD cleats. To be honest, I had not realised that there was different types of SPD cleat. I have just looked at Wiggle - I did not need the adaptor as my shoes had holes for SPD and 3 hole systems. I used the SPD SL initially and over time have migrated again to Look Keo

 

[Chris James]

Yeah, these winter boots also have both 2 and 3 holes. I think the SH-71cleats are designed for road shoes (i.e. not recessed cleats) to go on SPD pedals and have 'pontoons' at the side because otherwise there would be a gap between the shoe and the pedal when the cleat is engaged. Basically the pontoons mimic the sole of MTB shoe and thus recesses the cleat to flush with the pontoons.

As I say, I think that is the case. To be honest it just looks quite confusing.

At least your experience has shown that you can ride okay with just normal SPD cleats on a road sole!!

Unless someone on here tells me in the next day or so that I will die buying the SH-71 cleat then I think that is the way I will go. If it doesn't work well then I'll just end up buying some cheapo road pedals and use them over winter.

 

[Chuffy]

I used SPD cleats with my road shoes. No idea which cleat it was though. I have to say that it was a lethal combination as my pedals were tiny single sided jobbies, which made for many unpleasant moments trying to clip in at traffic lights, roundabouts etc.

 

[Chris James]

I used SPD cleats with my road shoes. No idea which cleat it was though. I have to say that it was a lethal combination as my pedals were tiny single sided jobbies, which made for many unpleasant moments trying to clip in at traffic lights, roundabouts etc.

Ahhh .. not sure if that is good news or bad news!

 

[Chuffy]

Ahhh .. not sure if that is good news or bad news!

Hmmmmm. The trouble with SPDs on a road sole is that they are very...binary. The cleat stands so proud of the smooth sole that you're either on target, or you ain't. And if you ain't then you'll slide off the pedal. Your pedals have a bit more platform than mine did, mine had no surround, just the mechanism and nothing else. Not a big target to aim at. If I were you I would consider buying these

which I'm pretty sure can be used with SPD cleats and will give a bit more interface between shoe and pedal and make clipping in much easier.

 

[Chris James]

Thanks for that Chuffy. Yet another cleat to consider! The feedback I got from Chain Reaction (where I bought the shoes) was that there may be compatibility issues with A520 pedals but as far as they are aware no issue with A515s.

Looking at these two SPD pedals the top profile look exactly the same so I think Chain Reaction are probably covering their arse - as I volunteered the possibility of this combination not working. The pontoons on the SH-71 cleats are supposed to provided some sort of support a bit like the Crank Brothers cleat, albeit only sidewards and not forwards and back.

Shimano instructions say you can use SH-71s on A520 pedals albeit with an ambiguously worded proviso that these road cleats can be used with non road SPD shoes but you don't use the pontoon (obviously!) but it isn't clear if you can use this cleat with road shoes on A520.

Anyway, after beating around the bush umpteen times I am going to buy the SH71 cleats as they seem the cheapest option. I reckon they will probably work okay on the A520 and almost certainly on the A515s. If it all goes tits up I'll buy some R540s from Ribble for £20.

I am not too worried about clipping problems as I ride mostly rural routes and may never unclip on my typical winter morning training routes, which is what I bought the boots for.

 

[Chris James]

Well, justy for the record, in case anyone tries the same thing in the future.

Here's how I got on.

As well as asking the great minds of Cycle Chat I also emailed Chain Reaction and Madison.

Chain Reaction said that there may be problems with SH-71 cleats and A520 pedals but as far as they were aware they should work okay with the A515s.

Madison said that SH-71s are not compatible with either pedal.

Chain Reaction had it right. The A515s work fine. The A520's don't. Looking at the pedals and cleats closely I can see that the pontoons have a step on them to act as a lead in to clip in. Since the A520s have a wider platform then they foul on the step and result in the cleat being too far from the pedal to engage.

The A515s have a smaller surface area and slip in between the steps fine. I woudl imagine just about any SPD pedal except teh larger platform A520 / 530 s would work okay with SH-71 cleats.

You could probably set about the pontoons with a stanley knife and get them to work fine on the A520s but I have just chosen to put my old pedals back on the bike and save the A520s or summer.

The 'road' boots are fine with the SH-71 cleats, quite walkable and they engage the pedals fine, albeit a bit slippery if you are careless lining up.

 

[bonj2]

Surely that's the worst of both worlds. The sticky-out-ness of road cleats, but still only mountain bike pedals?