fixed gead bikes.?

justin m · 12-10-2007, 11:08 AM

so soon i might be moving to a big city and i was concerdering taking a job as a bike messenger. what kinds fixed would be a good choice. brands and websites would be great. i was concedering a felt. any thing will help.

mgm531 · 12-10-2007, 11:10 AM

I used to ride a fixed gear bike for training and found it to be a very fun way to ride, but riding a fixed gear bike in traffic is insane! Especially if you have never ridden a fixed gear bike before. An easy way to get the 'fixie' experience while not having to be a fixed gear expert rider is to get a single speed freewheel instead of a single 'fixed' sprocket. I used to use a BMX freewheel for my track bike, but you might have to do some thread modification. I used a 39x15 and it seemed to work really wheel with a good balance of cruise speed and acceleration. I would also strongly recommend you use a brake as well. Okay, maybe not as 'cool' as going brake less, but for me personally I value my life over how cool I look. Most people put a front brake on and that's what I would recommend as well, but one word of caution with a front brake is that it makes handling to bike dicey in wet conditions.

You can probably find lots of true fixed gear track bikes, but being that they are track bikes they will have very agressive geometry that will make them a bit twitchy to ride in traffic and won't be the most comfortable rides either. A better and probably cheaper option is to convert a halfway decent steel 'road' frame into a fixed gear bike. Pretty easy to do and the ride will be a more confortable and predictable. Checkout 'craigslist' for whatever city you move to and I'm sure you will find plenty of both the choose from.