Bicycle Mechanics - Possible to create wheel drag to provide additional resistance?

This might sound a bit crazy, but I'm trying to create additional wheel drag on a road bike to make my commute bike rides more of a workout. I live in a flat area with lots of great bike trails but can't go too fast because of joggers and other cyclists. I know this is what indoor bike trainers are for but frankly I commute to work on a bike and it's really the only time I have in the day to exercise. Unfortunately, the fact that I can't ride fast on the trails really limits how much exercise I can get. I've thought about different ways to make my rides more difficult and the best seems to be to create additional drag on my wheel(s) similar to how spinning bikes work. I guess the problem is that adjusting the brake pads so that they rub against the rim will heat up the rim possibly causing a tire puncture. I thought about going with heavier wider tires and decreasing in tire pressure but wanted to see if there are other ideas before I invest in new tires. I also thought about switching to a mountain bike but would rather not spend the money on buying one (I also don't the have the room for 2 bikes at my place).

Does anyone know of anyway to create adjustable wheel drag on a road bike without possibly doing damage to the rims? Maybe installing a disk brake in the rear and somehow using felt pads to create resistance?

That's one of the worst ways you could do it. Get onto the road and try to keep up with the cars -- now that's a workout. :thumb:

Wear a parachute.


Tom

I vote for a sub-$100 used hardtail mountain bike with underinflated 26" knobbies and a rusty chain.

Put on low pressure knobbie tires on rims with crappy hubs that need to be repacked. You should use both a dynamo hub and several side wall generator charging a car battery that you carry on the rear rack. :D

Edit: I really like the rusty chain idea. Just make sure you are up to date on your shots.

fill the inner tubes on those knobbies with that flat-proof goo, too.

Another vote for riding on the street. It trips people out to see a bicycle passing cars lol. gotta get with that 53:11 baby

I feel your pain. I typically only ride the bike paths in my town in winter as there are fewer people out.
In summer, it's simply too crowded and I switch to auto-jousting.

Though, in your area/route, it may not be practical, pleasant nor safe.

I haven't explored 29ers at all (next MTB), but then I'm still on URT ;) -- SO TAKE THIS AS AN IDEA TO EXPLORE, NOT A RECOMMENDATION

I don't know if 29er tires will fit a 700c rim, but some MIGHT (I've heard that some of the kendas actually have a 700c spec right on the sidewall, but can't confirm it)

One downside of larger tires is dealing with the caliper brakes (a lot of times with those sorts of wide tire with caliper configurations, you can't put the wheel on with tire inflated) - not the end of the world, but can be a hassle on a commuter

eh, just a thought

Run in a higher gear and increase your distance. Or use your commute to hone your spinning skills.

Attach some slats from a mini blind to the spokes, then it will be like a schwinn aerodyne.

I don't know if 29er tires will fit a 700c rim, but some MIGHT (I've heard that some of the kendas actually have a 700c spec right on the sidewall, but can't confirm it)


29er *IS* 700c, but the fatter tires (often way over 50mm wide) won't fit on most non-mountain FRAMES.

hybrid tires come in 700c 32,35,38,40mm wide, depending on your frame and rim width, you might be able to fit one of these. trouble is, a good hybrid tire, like a Vittoria Randonneur Hyper, is nearly as fast as a 'road' tire.

Ride a unicycle.

just add weight to your frame. ie. put some panniers and cheap heavy racks on it and load it with 2 liter bottles of water, or carry a really large hydration backpack. or adjust your brakes to drag, or lower the air in your tires, or tie some string around your cranks at the BB or fill the BB with heavy grease, or set your drive train to allow only one gear and make it 100 gear inches. put on a couple of those ancient dynamos to both the front and rear wheels, etc, etc.

essentially think of what we all do to make it EASIER and FASTER, then do the opposite.

Sorry to take the OP seriously and try to answer his question in the midst of your merry japes, but there you go.

295523

Touring bikes use drag brakes to reduce speed down hills when laden. One such is a front hub drum brake like this (http://www.sturmey-archer.com/products/hubs/cid/2/id/28) which could be retrofitted to your commuter. Instead of running the cable to a standard lever, it is run to a mechanism which allows adjusting the drag (and releasing it when needed). You could jerry build something with an old fashioned friction shift lever (you'd need to drill the cable hole to 1.6mm).

thanks for the suggestions. I'll look into the dynamo hub. Anyone know if the drag for these is noticeable? I don't really want to buy them and then find out it's not going to make a difference. I think I might try going with cyclecross tires, puncture resistance tubes and tire liners. One of the reasons I was going with the adjustable brake pad resistance idea was that it would give me the option of just doing a regular ride w/o drag if I wanted to. About the traffic riding suggestions, I live in an urban city and it's either stop and go riding with cars or bicycle trail riding with not having to worry about cars.

Sorry to take the OP seriously and try to answer his question in the midst of your merry japes, but there you go.

295523

Touring bikes use drag brakes to reduce speed down hills when laden. One such is a front hub drum brake like this (http://www.sturmey-archer.com/products/hubs/cid/2/id/28) which could be retrofitted to your commuter. Instead of running the cable to a standard lever, it is run to a mechanism which allows adjusting the drag (and releasing it when needed). You could jerry build something with an old fashioned friction shift lever (you'd need to drill the cable hole to 1.6mm).

thanks. Is this the same as a drag brake used on tandem bikes? Since these were designed to just slow a bike down on long descents do you see any problems with having them applied in a constant manner?

I have used drag hubs on tandems (as captain for blind riders) and the were pretty effective at slowing us down, but you are getting into expense/complication at which point you may just want to go the MTB route. I think there are better options (can't speak to the dynohub specifically)

Tires are certainly an option (the user above brought up the good point about checking all clearances) -- if you search around you can usually find a tire that fits your needs (I didn't drive cars for years and found myself building up "omni-purpose everybikes" with a variety of mutt configurations. Oddly, they were some of my favorite bikes compared to my special purpose rides)

Clothes pin some playing cards on the chain stays and seat stays so that they drag against the spokes. Your bike will sound kool, kind of like a motorcycle, and people will get out of your way.

Forget the dynamo hubs, they are typically rated at about 6 watts which is less than 1/120 horsepower. Remember that anything that dissipates power through friction is going to get pretty hot unless it is distributed through a large area.
Is there a sandy beach that you can ride on?
How about filling your inner tubes with BBs or bird shot?

EDIT: Maybe you could adapt the magnets from a mag trainer to act on your rims instead of the aluminum disc in the trainer.

Get a trailer and load it with bricks. Get a job driving a PediCab

I run a dyno-hub daily on my bike and there is very little friction... definitely not enough to make my commute any harder!

My bike came with low resistance 700c x 35 Michelins and when they were worn out, I changed them to Maxxis Overdrive 700x40 (they're actually really 700x42) and I saw a huge difference in rolling resistance. I opted to keep the Maxxis on because I'm overweight (290lbs) and the Maxxis will live longer and protect my wheels.

Other than a thicker tire, try riding on higher gearing (as mentioned above). If your bike has conventional gearing try riding only on the middle and large front gear (but watch out for cross chaining; i.e. large front gear to small rear gear).

Not trying to be funny, but why not just take the long way home from work everyday? No need to buy anything, no extra parts, and it'll simply take extra time (which unnecessary drag on the bike would do anyway.)

Why spend time/money on making your bike less efficient? You can just be a less efficient you. (Also, I'm sure folks on the roadie forum have posted lots of methods for interval training and using the "wrong" gear to enhance the workout benefit of a training ride...)

Forget the dynamo hubs, they are typically rated at about 6 watts which is less than 1/120 horsepower. Remember that anything that dissipates power through friction is going to get pretty hot unless it is distributed through a large area.
Is there a sandy beach that you can ride on?
How about filling your inner tubes with BBs or bird shot?

EDIT: Maybe you could adapt the magnets from a mag trainer to act on your rims instead of the aluminum disc in the trainer.

I like the mag trainer idea. Got any ideas on how to incorporate it into the wheel assembly? Maybe somehow mount the flywheel assembly from the trainer on the rear stays somehow. It sounds ridiculous yes.

why don't you add 100lbs of bricks to your backpack.
it will make your ride much more difficult.

BITD the early trainers were rollers, with esentially no resistance when riding them. Some one came up with the idea to use a pair of squirrel cages/blower fans to add some resistance. Racer Mate first made these attach to the back side of the seat post, running off the top of the rear tire. There was a bike holding stand too but you could use the resistance unit while riding rollers. A racer type I knew would ride the road with the resistance unit for his training. I made a version of the unit and would use it if the seat post clamp was compatible with 27.2 posts (the post I designed it around was about 25.? on a late 1960s Frejus track bike). Andy.

BITD the early trainers were rollers, with esentially no resistance when riding them. Some one came up with the idea to use a pair of squirrel cages/blower fans to add some resistance. Racer Mate first made these attach to the back side of the seat post, running off the top of the rear tire. There was a bike holding stand too but you could use the resistance unit while riding rollers. A racer type I knew would ride the road with the resistance unit for his training. I made a version of the unit and would use it if the seat post clamp was compatible with 27.2 posts (the post I designed it around was about 25.? on a late 1960s Frejus track bike). Andy.

check this out http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hDaFS_uL8UQ.

... I'm trying to create additional wheel drag on a road bike to make my commute bike rides more of a workout.

....Does anyone know of anyway to create adjustable wheel drag on a road bike without possibly doing damage to the rims?

The easiest way is to use wind drag rather than friction. Use cloth and cloth glue to stretch "sails" between parallel spokes so your wheel begins to look like a windmill. You can get staggering drag that increases proportional to the square of speed, yet won't make climbing steep hills much harder.

BTW- many decades ago, before the advent of stationary trainers, the first wind trainer was a RacerMate device that mounted behind the seat and rode the rear tire. There were 2 squirrel cage fans to provide drag. These were for use on trainers, and if you hunt around you might find one.

I recommend moving farther from work! or taking a new job farther from home....

"I like the mag trainer idea. Got any ideas on how to incorporate it into the wheel assembly?"

Maybe take the magnets and mount them to the rear brakes in place of the pads. You can use the levers to adjust the spacing from the rims; closer will exert more force. They need to run near to but not touching the rims. You don't need the disc from the trainer, the magnets will act against the aluminum rim just the same way. Here's a Wikipedia article describing eddy current braking: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eddy_current#Electromagnetic_braking

Over the years I have been in the same situation because work or school was too close. My solution was always to take a longer route to or from my destination. Whenever I am riding in Ottawa with my wife she often expresses concern that we will not be able to find an easy low-traffic route home, but I can assure her that I have ridden those streets before and know a nice route.

A dynamo hub with lights left on all the time would be my second, more complicated choice. If you look I am sure you can find one of the 'bottle generators' that rub against your tire. Those, I find, are terrible drag-inducing devices that are only suitable for people who want it to be more difficult to ride... until now I didn't think anyone like that actually existed!

You could also try getting fatter softer tires.

http://i.istockimg.com/file_thumbview_approve/8944711/2/stock-photo-8944711-anchor-with-chain.jpg

Or buy a Schwinn Varsity for your commute............same thing really.