BIcycle weight

With my race wheels on, about 19 pounds. The lightest bikes are in the 15 pound range.

funny, I was at my LBS last week and put my tri bike on the scale for kicks.

With bottle cage, empty water bottle, computer, pedals & Aerodrink bottle and bracket, it weighs just a little over 18.05lbs.

*edit*

I agree with Bear, it weighs a lot more with me on it!

Edited by Freeswimmingfish 2006-02-06 12:13 PM

This user's post has been ignored.

Edited by oneword 2006-02-06 12:16 PM

My road bike is 17 lbs. 1 oz., my tri bike was 20.5 lbs.

Average will be about 20 - 22 lbs. for most bikes that are sub $1500 or so.

If the coarse is flat to rolling, weight doesn't really mean a thing... Aerodynamics makes all the difference. If you are living and racing in an area with lots of climbing, weight will make a bit of difference. In general, calculate the difference between the two weight of two bikes as a percentage of your own weight. You realize quite quickly that a pound +/- doesn't really matter. You also realize that the lighter the person, the more of a difference a pound will make. Ex. I'm about 150lbs., my road bike weights in a 17.5lbs, which is 11.6% of my weight. My wife is 115lbs. and her bike is 16lbs. 13.9% of her weight. Thus, in relationship my bike is actually lighter than hers...

..and of course I forgot to answer your actual question....

My road bike is 17.5lbs (Orbea Orca), my tribike is 19lbs. (Kestrel Talon). A decent tribike shouldn't really exceed 20lbs. No reason for it to be heavier with todays technology... It may be as light at 15-16lbs., but then you will probably spend a minor fortune... the law of diminishing returns is pretty brutal when it comes to tri bikes... Don't buy something because it is light... buy it because it fits you well and has reasonable equipment.

gotta love the orca........









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Yes, absolutely!!! The Orca is an amazing bike. Rides like a dream, comfortable, agile, and just plain fast! Transformed even me into a half-decent climber... My 17.5lbs. was the weight as I built it up... Changed the wheels, handlebars, and quite a few other things since then. Probably down by a 1lb., but that wasn't the intention with the changes... The profile of the old bars just wasn't as the shallow drop of the new bars. The old stem felt a bit too long, and the new wheels are Ksyrium SSC SL and MAN are those nice!

All in all, there's no other road bike I would even consider... I did test lots of other brands, but nothing was even close in quality, performance, comfort and most importantantly, fit.

Maybe out of the things you tested, but I can guarantee this bike easily meets/beats all those criteria (after all the frame is custom built to your style and abilities before it is shipped out). But who has $5,000 to blow on just a frame??

Serotta Ohtrott - I will own one, oh yes I will one day ............





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my $1K bike weighs 21lbs.  but it's a great improvement over the 40lb steel mtn bike i rode my first tri on.....

My bike is upwards of 23 1/2 pounds. Yikes! No wonder I'm so slow.

When I decided to use triathlon to give me a fitness goal, I had to have a bike. Went around to a half dozen LBS's and soon felt like some kind of outcast (get out of our shop, we don't serve your kind here!) I found it impossible (at 6' 7") to find a reasonable fit for a tri or road bike, the ones that treated me the best at least explained about the options for custom frames, but no way was I going to spend thousands on a bike before I'd even begun any training.

So I watched eBay for several months untill I found a 68cm frame Fuji Sport 12 from the early '80's, it's in excellent condition and I got it for $199 (+$43 shipping).

The only problem with it I see is that it weights about 33lbs with no water bottles, pumps, or repair items. During training I guess I can consider the extra weight benificial (like wearing ankle weights or something).

Is there any cost effective ways of lightning the bike? I was thinking along the lines of slowly adding high quality items to the bike and when I'm ready, moving the good stuff to a new custom frame.

Since I don't know how much the steel frame alone weighs, is there an estimate of how much weight I could shave off? Is it pounds or ounces? Any way to make a standard road bike like this more aero? Carbon aero fork? Cool aero handlebars? aero wheels? What would make the most difference during a tri or training.

Here's a pic of the "new" bike

1 pound does not equal 1 pound does not equal 1 pound.

That is 1 pound off the body does not equal 1 pound off of the frame does not equal 1 pound off of the wheels. 1 pound off of the wheels will be more beneficial than 1 pound off of your frame or your body.

Jen

Short answer?? No .......

Real answer (explained). You cannot really upgrade the parts to the new equipment that is available today because:

1. Your rear axle spacing in the frame (the distance between the part that holds the wheel on the back) is too narrow to accommodate the wider stuff that the new equipment (read - mid 90's technology) requires. Yes, you can have the frame bent by a good local builder if you have one to fit the 130 mm axle, but shift quality is far from guaranteed.

2. The wheels will be 27", which is different than the 700c equipment out today, so even if you put on new wheels you'd be screwed. The brakes would not be able to be adjusted enough to fit the rims. And sometimes you kind of need to stop ....

3. The fork is a 1" threaded model, so your fork choices are fairly limited compared to the newer 1-1/8" aheadset threadless style stem/forks. You can still find some good stuff out there, but nothing that will easily transfer to a new bike later.

Advice then? Save your pennies and dimes until you have enough to make the plunge to better more updated equipment. There are companies that are out there that offer frame sizes that could accommodate your height, you just have to shop around.

(And hubba hubba .......... )

I'm glad it's not just me. I thought it was an otical illusion or something.

Nice...er...bike stand

Don't those helium balloons lighten the bike a bit?

I have a trek 2300 roadbike with ultegra components and it weighs 19 lbs. I spent about $1500 on it, but my husband used to work at a bike shop so he got a deal on the frame and built it up himself.

My mountain bike is a trek 8200 with XT and XTR mixture and it weighs 20 lbs.

I don't have a tri-bike, yet....

Bike weight is a little overrated, I believe, especially when compared to the total combined weight of rider and bike.

Personally, I know that I could probably get to the starting line of IMLP 10 pounds lighter than I am right now. That would be a very trim weight for me. I was curious about how that difference in weight might affect my time.

Using the calculators at www.analyticcycling.com I discovered that over a 15 mile climb with an average grade of 2% (which is longer/steeper than any climb at IMLP, by the way) and generating 200 watts (which is about right for me), I would save a total of 80 seconds on the climb, all other things being equal. A decent margin, but not that huge given the loss of 10 pounds. The steeper the grade or the lower your power output, the greater the time savings.

Understand that since you're lighter, you'll also lose time on the descents. I'd come down that hill about 17 seconds slower at the lighter weight. So being 10 pounds lighter, my net time savings of climbing the hill and coming back down would be 63 seconds.

Clearly, cutting a few ounces off my bike isn't going to do much.....

Edited by Nob 2006-02-07 6:24 PM