ultra-g

... and your chain breaks...

Are you FUBAR? Probably need to carry an small parachute to bail out right?

Has this happened to anyone?

HereNT

Nope, just lost a cog. And I wasn't fubar. I had an out before skidding off the cog, and I took it, then coasted for awhile.

ultra-g

I used to brake by putting my foot on the front tire... back when I was a kid, on my BMX... my shoe caught on fire once, it was great. I guess you could do that, but as an adult, if you never tried it before it might be scary.

PriO

heh ive done before when i was little. once my foot got tucked under and the whole bike just stopped and completely flipped over

vindicator

Yeah that used to happen to me when I was a kid too so I started putting my foot on my rear tire. Not sure if I can still do that though. Not quite as flexible as I used to be.

KrazieF00

I assume the only time you'd be TOTALLY FUBAR'd when your chain snaps is when you are flying down a hill at 40mph and there is an intersection about 100 feet from you with the red light showing. I can only imagine that would be certain death...Thinking about it scares me...

drolldurham

the human mind can be surprisingly clever in those kinds of situations.

if you wear gloves you can just reach forwards and grab the wheel.....

i guess it all depends on how quickly you need to stop

filtersweep

Breaking a chain is rare... throwing a chain, on the other hand...

PriO

yea after that i put my foot on front of the wheel, that usually works but wont stop u as fast

SSSWEET

ever broke a chain pedalling up a hill before? i did that fully out of the saddle and cranking along at about 40kmh.

the total lack of friction when i had my momentum threw me up over the handlebars superman style and I landed head first. took about 9 months for the pieces of road to get out of my skin. tore the tendons in both wrists too. i now have a phobia of chains snapping.

went riding the other day on the fixed wheel and couldnt get out of the way of a pedestrian who thought it would be cool to just walk out in front of me. i hit a pole and ate some poo. ive given up on riding a fixed without brakes, its just suicide.

16x54

Broke a chainring once then threw the chain. Just sit on the top tube and grind down the chucks.

jordache

Turn right.

My cog has come off before, but I was able to slow down surprisingly fast with my shoe on the front tire.

FixednotBroken

that's exactly why i always wear gloves. it's how i imagine stopping should such a scenario be realized - whether or not it'll work, i dunno. but it comforts me.

brunning

i saw a dude do a (totally sweet) skid stop the other day on havemeyer st by putting his foot up on the rear wheel.

invisiblah

thanks! just the mental image i needed in my head. but then it made me realize that you can't let yourself think about stuff like that. i've thrown my chain once before when i was first learning how to skid, but never knew a track chain to ever snap. i have, however, roadie friends who's chains have snapped but even that is rare. i've even heard of peoples cleats getting ripped out of their shoes, but never a chain snap. so far i think the odds are in our favor of than not being a worry.

hyperRevue

thanks...now i do too.

r0cket-

Maybe 10 years when I had my Kona mountain bike set up in this ridiculous 5-speed configuration, I dropped the chain while cranking hard from a stop, and I managed to throw myself over the bars while rotating one end of the bar into my right knee. I'm not sure if I didn't have the ends capped or if my knee just broke through the cap, but the end of the bar put a nice hole in me. There's still an almost perfectly-round scar on my kneecap from it.

I've also had a cog spin off while descending a steep hill, thankfully at low speed. I jammed my foot between the fork crown and the front tire and slowed down pretty quick. I'd suggest doing that rather than trying to grab the tire with your hands--that sounds like a good way to lose a finger.

junioroverlord

I've thrown a chain and unthreaded my cog twice, both downhill. It wasn't that big a deal, I just unclipped and put my feet down to stop. Since all three instances happened within a month I have a strange fear whenever I ride that something like that is going to happen. You'd think I would have put a brake on by now...

soulcialist

i snapped a chain and had a rusty cog crumble in traffic. both times the fred flinstone was sufficient...

Slartibartfast

I can't imagine breaking a chain in mid stride ... maybe if you were going down hill and using lots of back presure but I get the feeling you would skid before your chain would snap. That being said, I broke mine the day after I went brakeless but it was just as I was pulling out of a pseudo-track stand at a red light so i wasn't going that fast. i just remember thinking "wow, its really easy to pedal now ... oh."

kennethalan

I had a chainring basically disentigrate while going around a corner in a residential area. I ended up in someone's front yard. I am sure there are still five chain ring bolts and tiny pieces of hand drilled chainring in a street in suburbia. Moral of the story...don't trust the chainring that was drilled twenty years ago on the bike you bought, it might not be real strong.

also, I have a brake now.

soulcialist

there is no way you're gonna get me to grab my front wheel with even an oven mit.

kennethalan

You could always try and grab onto a car and let them stop you...hopefully slowly. Might be better than running into one.

Plow Boy

Another thing to look out for is the master link coming apart. I had a SRAM chain unattach itself while climbing a steep hill on the mountain bike once. Smacked my knees on the handlebar/stem as I fell over. I did find the connector links and put the chain back together and rode the rest of the way out to the trail head.

South Fulcrum

I've dropped my chain twice. The first time I Fred Flintstoned it. The second time I was wearing gloves and just grabbed the front wheel.