Hey BAIC,

Just wondering if any of you guys ride fixed gear/track bikes? I am looking into buying/building one but don't know where to start. I have been riding BMX for years now but want a bike I can just cruise around the city with. Do you guys recommend any bike shops that I should check out in the bay area, closer to SF the better? How much should I be looking to spend for my first fixed gear? I know alot of people that have gotten their fixed gears built at Mission Bicycles here in SF and they love em. I believe they start at $750+. I am planning to check them out this Friday. Any advice/feedback/comments would be appreciated. Thanks guys.

Andy

 

uh, unless you want to pull the hipster I'd get something with gears. Get downtube shifters if you want a happy medium between cool and practical. My reasoning is that SF has some mega hills that will:

\make a fixie either buck your ***
\or you ride no feets and get raped by the seat

Cruise around the city on an old ten speed and snub the hipsters with their impractical knee muncher retarded geometry fixed gears.

Or get a fixie and ride backwards. Everywhere.

 

. . .

 

track bikes are tons of fun!

im not sure about shops near San Francisco, but check out bikeforums.com in their single speed section/fixed gear. There is some good information in there, as well as some asshats, but you can sort through that.

Ive heard good things about mission bikes, good luck picking one up!

I've ridden SF a few times and definitely recommend running brake, dont let anybody talk you out of it.

and you dont have to be a hipster to ride a fixed gear. hipsters drive me crazy. and i ride one...

and a pic of my bike for fun

 

I ride a single speed. No fixie for me. It makes NO sense in the real work. Unless you're a hipster.

Ohhh!!! Did your friends tell you it was the cool thing to do?




Please, take it all in stride. Read the sarcasm. I'm serious, but not being a jerk. I'm just playing with ya.

 

Haha. I'm FAR from hipster LoL

I just think fixed gears are really fun to ride

AVA, beautiful setup!

 

To each their own I suppose.

 

Brakes in the city are for the weak minded.......man without brakes in the city is a bit risky, guess I'm weak minded , actually, in my opinion you need gears too in SF and a turbo.

I can think of a shop that stands out (where I would go should I wish to purchase a track bike):

Box Dog Bikes
494 14th St.
San Francisco

415.431.9627

It's a co-op, and the last time I looked they had very good prices.

 

When I was riding before, I picked up my Masi at Freewheel Bikes off of Hayes in SF. Talk to Dustin (1.415.752.9195). They'll give you advice on gear ratios for the hills. I think I dropped my cog a few teeth and kept the stock chain ring. Many singlespeeds come with flip flop hubs, so you'll be alright.

Watch out though. The hipsters will expect you to do long skids, so be prepared. LOL! Here's a map of some routes if you're not too familiar with the City.

http://www.sfbike.org/download/map.pdf

Riding a fixed gear helps out a lot though if you do other type of riding.

AVAWRX: Nice rig man.

 

Personally, i wouldn't waste that much money buying a brand new fixie. Check out craiglist and sffixed becuase you can find some really good deals. If you are interested i am selling my track bike. Pm me if you want info.

fixed gears were popularized in relatively flat cities like London and New York. Sf is not a good place for one as there are a lot of hills. But if you wanna **** up your knees go ahead.

I have owned two track bikes and the only reason I'm selling mine is because i like my road bike more and it has some broken parts that need to be fixed.

Riding fixed can be a lot of fun but it is a fad and i have come to terms with that. For mw the consequences of riding (joint injury) outway the fun factor. Also, i have never used a brake.

 

Bikesdirect.com

First bike would recomended clist or if your looking new you could find a decent bike for about 500ish on bikesdirect. Kilo maybe a bianchi pista. But I would suggest c.list. Who knows maybe won't even like riding a fixed gear, on those hills. They do put a toll on your knees if you ride brakeless and a high gear.

 

Mission is nice, I'd probably go there unless I wanted to piece everything together on my own.

Around $750 is pretty hard to beat. Don't go too crazy if you're locking it up on the streets, it will get stolen if its ultra flashy.

 

its a little out the way, but you might wanna check out Montano Velo in Oakland.. staff is super helpful and friendly too, prices are comparable to most local shops

if you want an iro, its easy to pick one up at Avenue Cyclery, its across the street from the Haight McDonalds parking lot

check out Sac Craigslist, kids from UC Davis sell their bikes all the time

 

 

I thought you said you drive an automatic because you have knee issues which is a zillion more reasons to have gears. Pretty much everywhere I ride, a fixed gear single speed would be absolutely useless. I ride around a lot on the Peninsula in San Carlos/Belmont/San Mateo and in the city from Caltrain around the Embarcadero through the Presidio and down into the Panhandle and a lot in GG park (though this is usually on an MTB as there are soooo many 'bummy-hoppin' fun trails through there).

My "track bike" was a fixed single speed for as long as it took to correct that problem. Every once in a while I leave it in 5th (1:1) and see what it's like and yeah it's still really dumb. Even here on the peninsula there are some pretty good hills and I do not see why you would want to huff and puff up them and pedal a zillion rpm to go down and never be able to just coast (after a 15-20 mile ride it's nice to coast sometimes). I have a friend who commutes on a fixie in SF and I have asked him numerous times why - he cannot explain it. Why do I like my bike? Many reasons - mostly because it's light and easy to ride, has 8 gears and a brake but you really can't see any of it since it's inside the rear hub (coaster brake). Whole setup cost around $350 (not including the hub) using a new track frame from Performance Bike and some eBay and left-over gear. I run a CF mtb bar that is cut down about 4" on each side and Conti R-ACE tires which have never let me down even on the occasional offroad excursion. 120psi is a little weird, but they work very well. I rode part of the bay trail yesterday and it's soooo fun.

I thought AVAWRX posted a site a while back that had some pretty nice bikes (single speed, some fixed I think) in the $350-$400 range. $750 seems like a load of cash for probably the simplest bike this side of a BMX. If you do end up w/ a fixie at least get yourself a flip-flop so you have the option of coasting. I personally really like my coaster brake - so there's my ode to old technology. I have only had one "incident" where a front brake might have been helpful but then it might have also put me into the ground w/ these super skinny tires.

Here's a fairly recent pic of my bike, but I have changed the front quick release (KCNC Ti) and added some really tiny LED lights for night time. Only "wart" on the simple style (IMHO) is the shifter cable, but that can be changed if it's important. Can't say enough about this hub - it's perfect and especially perfect in cities as you can tear down a hill in 8th, stop, and crank it over to 3rd or so to start out - while holding still, or you can shift under power. No dereuaxuielluer or however you spell that. Used to have "bullhorn" bars but I have to say I like these better. I am going to change the stem soon as this one is adjustable, and I have found my happy place with it. I think it's really fun to put your own bike together, and especially to come up with something totally unique. The expensive parts on my bike are the rear hub and the Salsa front fork but it can be done w/out these bits especially if you are set on a single-speed. It was a little difficult to adapt the hub to the narrow track rear dropouts, but well worth it to me. Since adding the hub I ride this bike pretty much all the time where I used to take my MTB out a lot.