Winter Cycling - switching tires

Hi,
I'm not very mechanical and know zilch about bikes, this is my first winter biking to work. I have a bike for good weather and plan to switch to Nokian 296 on a 12" Jamis mountain bike.
What do I have to do to switch the tires?
Do I need to get a new wheel set built?
What parts should I get?
Thanks in advance for your advice.

As far as I can tell, you are trying to replace a tire. I assume by 12", you mean frame size, and that you have 26" wheels. Just replace your tire.

It's very simple; just release the brake wire, undue your quick release lever, and off comes the wheel. Then you remove the tire from the wheel. All you'll need to remove the tire is a set of "tire irons", available at any bikeshop, or Walmart. Put the new tires on, and re-install the wheel in reverse order. Hope that helps.

Sounds simple enough, thanks. Don't know why guy at the shop told me I'd be spending 3 to 500 to install new wheels because of the Nokians.

Sounds simple enough, thanks. Don't know why guy at the shop told me I'd be spending 3 to 500 to install new wheels because of the Nokians.


A lot of people have spare wheels that they mount studded tires on, then you can easily switch back and forth, depending on whether or not you need the studs. It takes a while to change tires, not very long to change wheels.

I had a spare back wheel hanging around, bought a new cheapo front wheel with a Quick Release for $35 at my LBS

There is a $60 set of 26" cheapo 8/9spd Arraya rims (front and rear)from Nashbar, I bought them and use them with a set of Nokians Mound and Grounds. They are drilled for shraeder valves (like a car tire) but you can get adaptors for them if you have a stock of presta tubes. They're cheap and include skewars and STX-RC hubs. There's also a 10% coupon for nashbar floating around, check out the "hot deals" forum..

If you want to make a complete set of spare wheels, in addition to the rims, tube and tires, you will also need the following:

a pair of Rim Tape to cover the spoke nipples on the rim = $2-$3 per tape

another cassette for the rear wheel depending on how many gears your bike has: $17-$30

and a Shimano cassette tool which would be like $5 or so and a wrench (or chainwhip) to use the tool to install the cassette on the hub. So, not including the tubes and tire, the wheelset would cost you less than $100.

Jay


Jay

Actually, if you are running disk brakes it might be a whole different story. Don't they need a different hub? Otherwise, I, like some of the others here, have a couple extra sets of wheels and rims. For the winter riding stuff I like inexpensive, as there is salt and crud out there that will destroy good rims. I say that with a newly built fixed gear setup of a Surly hub with a new MA3 rim, that is now pretty well pitted. Damn road salts. This is another reason why I don't ride my favorite road bike in the winter months.