I recently purchased a digital scale to hang and weigh my bicycles with. I was surprised at the results and all of my bikes were weighed with pedals installed. What did I find?

Not very many vintage road bicycles come in under 20 pounds (I ride 54-56cm bikes). The top dogs in my collection weigh between 21 and 23 pounds. The mid level rides between 24 and 26 and the entry level Bike Shop bikes between 27 and 30 pounds. Department store offerings always come in over the 3o pound mark and I have weighed about fifty bikes so far.

As for frame set, I haven't taken the time to break the bikes down to check and will not do so unless I have a reason. Weight of a bicycle is dependent on both the frame type, make-up and size plus the components used. In closing, if you want a light old road bike, you must be prepared to sacrifice user friendliness and install tubulars at the very least. The question is, why are we so worried about this factor?

The lighter the bike the lighter the rider must be. I have let great bikes go simply because I am too big to ride them safely. By safely, I refer to damaging the frame set itself due to over loading of the bike.

For those of you who want to understand the weight issue a bit better, check out the engineering specifications of the different high end tube sets. You just might be surprised.