Stopping quickly with a fixed gear without doing a header



>>>"Peter" wrote:
>>>Hi fellows. I was wondering if you fixed gear riders can tell me how you
>>>stop your bikes in a panic situation without launching yourselves over the
>>>handlebars as once happened to me when a kid made an illegal left hand turn
>>>onto a one way arterial road.


> In article <[email protected]>,
> Sheldon Brown <[email protected]> wrote:
>>You apply the front brake so hard that the rear wheel just about lifts
>>off. This is the shortest that you can stop any bike of normal
>>geometry, fixed gear _or_ coastie.
>>The advantage of a fixie for this is that the pedals give you a better
>>feel for what's happening to rear wheel traction than you'll get with a
>>coastie.
>>That's the reason fixers are better in traffic and on slippery surfaces.
>>Sometimes you might actually lift the rear wheel off a tiny bit.


Paul Southworth wrote:
> This is a good thing?? Sounds like a lot of risk when one can
> simply install a rear caliper. When braking you want maximum
> friction against the road. When the wheel lifts off, you get zero
> friction against the road, and the braking power of your feet on the
> cranks is likewise zero.
>

I think it _is_ a good thing. If you haven't lifted the rear
wheel a tad, you left some front brake capacity on the
table. At those decelerations, about the only thing you do
with the rear is skid.

--
Andrew Muzi
www.yellowjersey.org
Open every day since 1 April, 1971
 
On Thu, 22 Apr 2004 06:53:58 -0700, Mark Hickey <[email protected]>
wrote:
>>I know the bike had more brake available, and I know I was panicked,
>>but something deep in my usually slow-thinking* brain was up to the
>>task of limiting my brake force when I felt the rear unweight.

>
>I think the ability to brake at the threshold is one that you develop
>by doing it (it's a good idea to practice - you don't want your first

....
>I've found that riding off-road (especially in steep terrain) makes it
>easier to practice this skill.


When I bought that bike, it was near the end of a very good mountain
biking season; I had a lot of off-road miles and I had gotten
reasonably good at the technical stuff. That might explain why I
braked so well even on an unfamiliar bike in an unfamiliar situation
in unfamiliar territory...

All last year I didn't ride off-road. I went tonight, and was awful.
--
Rick Onanian
 
on 4/21/04 7:12 AM, Peter asserted:

> Hi fellows. I was wondering if you fixed gear riders can tell me how you
> stop your bikes in a panic situation without launching yourselves over the
> handlebars as once happened to me when a kid made an illegal left hand turn
> onto a one way arterial road.


Learn to skid turn. Lock up the rear wheel, lean into the turn, either to
get parallel in the same direction of the turning car or just enough to get
by it on the other side. I'm assuming you mean the car was coming toward
you, not that you were riding on the left side of traffic- if the former,
then just skid turn inside the radius of the car.

This is not a stopping maneuver, BTW, it's an avoidance maneuver. Given the
width of the car + length of your bike, there's only about 10ftx2ft of space
you don't want to be in, ie the space where bike and car make contact-
anywhere else is safe.

Seng
 
G.T. <[email protected]> wrote:
>"Vrishni Vibhuti" <[email protected]> wrote in message
>>Zog The Undeniable <[email protected]> wrote about skidding the front
>>>was dry but there was a bit of loose grit on it. I've also done it on
>>>completely clean dry asphalt and on wet smooth asphalt. Grabbing a

>>You're lying.

>Why is he lying? Just because you don't know how to get far enough back on
>the bike to do it?


That's still a red herring; a tourer with laden rear panniers has a CoG
still further back and down.
--
David Damerell <[email protected]> flcl?
 
Originally posted by Sheldon Brown:

> The advantage of a fixie for this is that the pedals give you a better
> feel for what's happening to rear wheel traction than you'll get with
> a coastie.


> That's the reason fixers are better in traffic and on slippery
> surfaces.


I dispute that fixed bikes are able to stop quicker than free ones.

When I stop my free bike quickly, I'm able to slide my bum off the back
of the seat, pushing my weight back, and thus increasing the maximum
braking torque that can be applied without lifting the rear wheel
excessively.

However on my fixed gear bike, when I want to stop quickly I have to
continue pedalling, and I'm yet to work out how to do this while pushing
my weight back significantly.

I guess I could always brake enough to get the rear wheel off the
ground, then stop pedalling and push myself backward off the seat, but
fear I lack the coordination...

Regards,

Suzy



--
 
On 04/30/2004 12:49 AM, in article
[email protected], "suzyj"
<[email protected]> wrote:

> Originally posted by Sheldon Brown:
>> The advantage of a fixie for this is that the pedals give you a better
>> feel for what's happening to rear wheel traction than you'll get with
>> a coastie.

>
>> That's the reason fixers are better in traffic and on slippery
>> surfaces.

>
> I dispute that fixed bikes are able to stop quicker than free ones.
>
> When I stop my free bike quickly, I'm able to slide my bum off the back
> of the seat, pushing my weight back, and thus increasing the maximum
> braking torque that can be applied without lifting the rear wheel
> excessively.
>
> However on my fixed gear bike, when I want to stop quickly I have to
> continue pedalling, and I'm yet to work out how to do this while pushing
> my weight back significantly.
>
> I guess I could always brake enough to get the rear wheel off the
> ground, then stop pedalling and push myself backward off the seat, but
> fear I lack the coordination...





Use your legs to help slow you down ... Resist pedalling while squeezing the
front brake, and you'll see that you can slow down/stop quite quickly.



--
Steven L. Sheffield
stevens at veloworks dot com
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