Snow Bike
Each winter I think about building a dedicated winter or snow bike but we really don’t get enough snow to justify that. This winter though we have gotten more snowfall then we have the past few years that I can remember. So far we’ve had 3 where the amount was enough to hinder riding and that stuck around for more than one day. In anticipation of the first snow I swapped out both tires on my old Schwinn klunker to studded.
After that first snow I tore down the Schwinn to make room for another bike I was building. When the next snow came I put just one studded tire on the front of my Trek. I seemed to get around just as well with only the front studded tire.
So instead of a dedicated winter bike I decided to just have a dedicated front wheel with studded tire that I could easily swap around to different bikes if I wanted to. The only spare aluminum wheel I have is an old one that has a small diameter axle so I had to use those washer adapter things to fit it in snuggly in the dropouts that most of my bikes have. Not ideal but will work till I find an appropriate wheel.
This now leaves me with an extra studded tire that I can put on the front of Nova’s old Schwinn MTB if and when she decides to join me riding in the snow.
I’ve thought about the “dedicated winter bike” too, but Portland’s significant snows are infrequent. And over the past few years on snow days I’d rather just walk. When I had to bike commute into a job that never closed, regardless of weather, I did have that spare wheel with studs ready if needed. Though I usually just took the bus. 😉