Winter Cycling - Winter's coming!

As is salt and corrosion :eek:. I've decided to HTFU this winter and keep riding everywhere, but my components are expensive and I am not made of cash. Does anyone know if walmart bike cassettes would be compatible with Shimano Deore hubs? I'm hoping so, because I can get into the junkyard and get winter cassettes for pennies along with a chain.

When I get home from a commute. And the weather has been particularly bad, with snow or slush. I just dump a bucket of hot water on the bike to clean it off. I don't think you need to go the extreme of adding a cheap cassette to a nice wheel. Just keep your bike clean, clean and lube your chain often and you should'nt have to worry about anything getting ruined.

Why would you want to put junkyard parts on your bike anyway?

Does it shift too nice?

Is the drivetrain too smooth and quiet?

Is the reliability of good components too great?

Do you want chains to snap at inopportune moments?

Perhaps you enjoy slipping gears?

It sounds like an exercise in false economy to me. I'm car-free, so I ride almost every day. Cassettes for my bike run $65. I get thousands of miles out of them, but ride only hundreds of miles in the winter. A winter's worth of wear is nothing.

The other day I heard a co-worker complaining about $65 to fill her gas tank. And it lasts just a few days.

Chains for my bike run $30. Yeah, I plan wearing one out over the winter. In 90 days of winter, that's 33¢ per day. Compared to the price of lunch, I think I can afford it.

I hear MTB components are even cheaper.

If you're in some sort of contest with yourself for how big a cheapskate you can be, you'll save even more if you turn off the furnace and electric.

Sorry to sound like I'm living out of a cardboard box, but I've learned to take great care in everything I own: shoes to cookware to bikes. My current chain and cassette are still in great condition, after paying good money for them. I see no point in putting them out of commission in a midwest salt winter, even if I have had good use out of them. Let's say you have a light grey suit that's two years old. Do you wipe your chain with it?

As for being a cheapskate, yes I am. This would just be an experiment to see if I could be reasonably happy with almost free bike parts. The worst that could happen is that it sucks and I hate it, even for winter use. The best that could happen is me getting an extra $60 to buy some winter clothing.

WD-40. Hose down the driveline after riding to displace the water and grit and prevent rust. Replace the chain in spring.