rideorglide

Vintage Single speed, I mean really vintage:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/pwpl/40...7622644909455/

WoundedKnee

SADDLE SLAMMED FORWARD TOTALLY WRONG MAN

That saddle looks high tech for the period though.

TejanoTrackie 

You don't know what you're talking about, man. Back in the day, saddles were attached in the rear so they'd be close enough to the cranks due to the extremely slack frame angles. You'll see a lot of old bikes like that.

WoundedKnee

I was being extremely sarcastic. Hence all caps/no punctuation.

TejanoTrackie 

OK, I guess I needed the emoticon to figure it out.

wearyourtruth

great, an old bike photo!

illdthedj

holy carp i need a wheelie bar on my 68 schwinn racer

Noir Lethal

Look those clothes... their hipsters I daresay!

elemental

With a 35 lb 15 oz wheelie bar, I think it'd be a permanent wheelie on any of my bikes. Although that would be pretty cool too.



(Yeah, I know that's probably the shipping weight)

wroomwroomoops

Isn't that a fixed gear, actually? I'm no cycling historian, but I thought the oldest bikes were all fixed gear. And the bike in the photo doesn't seem to have any brakes whatsoever. Sooooo.... thread title failure?

shubonker

Could be a spoon brake since you can't see the entire front wheel...

NateRod

poseurs

TejanoTrackie 

You are correct. The first bikes were the ordinaries (aka high-wheeler, Penny-farthing, boneshaker), which were direct drive from the front wheel. These were replaced by the safety bicycle we know today with chain drive from cranks mounted on the bottom bracket to a cog mounted on the rear wheel. Both these types of bikes were raced on tracks as well as ridden on roads as fixed gears san brakes. Freewheels and brakes were introduced later on.

wearyourtruth

spoon brakes started to go out quick with the invention of pneumatic tires. that said, they were used through the 1930's in some places, despite the fact that the freewheel was invented in the 1880's. either way, if it has a spoon brake or not, it's almost certainly a fixed gear. fixed gears really didn't go out of style until the coaster brake was invented, which certainly wasn't on this bike.

Brian

No, that's for six of them. They're actually 5lb, 12oz.

cnnrmccloskey

Fixed gear=1 gear= Single speed

continental88

Looks a lot like the wright brothers bicycles, same chainring, same seat and seat post, same geometry. Can't tell for sure, but might be the same bars, though this kid has his flipped upright instead of dropped.
https://images.google.com/imgres?imgu...26tbs%3Disch:1

KevinF

While fixed gears and single speeds do both have one gear (i.e., you can't shift), there is a critical difference between the two. On fixies, you can not coast -- i.e., if the rear wheel is turning, the pedals are turning, simple as that. Coasting is possible on a single-speed.

So fixed gears != single_speed

ismellfish2

elemental

Oh, muuuuch better.

And can't we all just agree that these are "fixed wheel" bikes?

antiaverage

Just... no.

Single speed means you have a single gear ratio you can use and no other. It means you don't have any others gears you can move into out out of...
It does not actually state whether the cog incorporates a freewheel or a lock ring.

I even have friends in the industry who rile up when people use the term fixed gear to mean no freewheel, because to them a fixed gear means you are fixed into a single gear and cannot shift to another. So, even a single speed with a freewheel can also be called a fixed gear to them. They prefer the term fixed wheel.

I don't like their pickiness, but please don't be so ignorant as to think that single speed means the cog incorporates a freewheel. A cog with a lock ring or fixed in any way to prevent coasting is still a single speed, so long as there is only a single gear ratio on the bike.

milkcratebasket

Pussie-va-jayjay

TejanoTrackie 

This is much ado about nothing. Many terms are technically incorrect but we all know what they mean. It's called "common usage". So when I refer to a clincher bicycle tire, we all understand that it's an open shaped tire that mates with an open shaped rim and usually requires a separate tube. Nonetheless, this is technically wrong, since true "clincher" tires have not been used on bicycles for many decades, and the more proper term would be "wired-on". By the same token, we all understand that fixed gear means a cog that is somehow fixed to the hub such that coasting is not possible, and a single speed is a subset of a multi-speed that does permit coasting. Unfortunately, when you're dealing with the Walmart crowd, about the only thing they can understand is that a bicycle has two wheels, maybe....

wroomwroomoops

"I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Miss Lewinsky."

Brian

Fail thread.