Just dropping in to say I really appreciate the commitment to on-screen metric conversion for every unit mentioned. Usually I just zone out when I hear of miles, feet, and Fahrenheit. Here I immediately know what you’re up against and it’s way more fun to watch.
I started commuting by bike this winter. I didn't start until I had mudguards (fenders) and a rack on my bike and I'm pretty pleased with how that's worked out. I would love it if e-bikes in Europe could go faster than 15mph.
It’s a law, not a software or hardware thing. You can get illegal e-bikes, they’re reasonably common, and if you’re willing to risk fines and a criminal record then sure, but I’d say most aren’t so happy to do that.
Definitely go for the trailer. I've been able to get paper products home from Costco, as well as 25 pound bags of rice from the Asian grocery store. It'll easily solve your remaining "big grocery shop" problem
I enjoyed this video a LOT, also I can not stress enough how awesome proper fenders are for commuting and shopping. They make you go like 95% less wet from street water, and you have more space for cool stickers!
It's great to see the bicycle and companies like Niner as not just recreational. E-Bikes are a serious alternative to a car for a lot of people and the best thing about them is they make you 😁
Hi , I live in Melbourne Australia been following you for years now love your down to earth bike life . I’m nearly 70 am old roadie keep doing what you guys do awesome stuff 👏👏
I think the cycling lifestyle is a better turn for this channel. So many people do van life, go pro videos and the race videos are hard to understand what’s happening without a film crew. Keep up the straw houses and lifestyle related to being a rider!
The only right bike for winter commute or whatever non-sport cycling is a hub geared belt driven bike! I use a Rohloff for years with a gates belt but no motor and have had no issues with snow and mud. Using spiked winter tires and slick summer tires.
When I first started working in a shop, I decided to commute all winter long by bike...winter long meaning that I lived in Maine. For me, the most important thing was wearing goretex or some sort of waterproof clothing as the slush from the roads was sometimes a real challenge. Fenders kept the bike fairly clean, and also had less drivetrain wear because of it. I did run errands as well, but like you, used my vehicle for large items like dog food etc..Lastly, if I knew that it was going to be really wet, I would also wear gaitors as that helped my feet and pant line vs shoeline stay dry as well. But, truly loved the challenge everyday...
I've never had a car - and everything is done by bike and the nearest town is about 5 miles away, but they are hilly miles. Swapping over to an ebike in the last year or so has made it a lot less exhausting. I mostly use panniers - a bike can easily carry 25-50kg so even canned goods aren't impossible to carry. I do have a trailer, but it gets rarely used outside of carting firewood. I think you are right though, mix it up to suit your own lifestyles.
For those wishing to use a bike rather than a car on a more permanent basis, there are cargo bikes which carry much more than a regular bicycle. Good for larger items, more groceries, transporting kids, etc. An expensive cargo bike is still much less expensive than a car. You nailed it when you said it is a learning process (clothes, fenders, saddle bags, etc).
Front porteur rack with a 40L roll-top bag ..a puzzle to pack but easier than panniers or body-bag. I hang chips, cereal and other light/bulky items off the sides of the bag. Six years and I'm still learning. Thanks for the video!
I began bike commuting (errands) last summer and was pleasantly surprised to find out how feasible it was. I use a single wheel trailer (BOB Yak trailer) to get groceries once a week, and the Walmart grocery pickup app makes this easy. I pull up, they load my groceries into the trailer, and I leave within five minutes. I go to the gym and coffee shop by bike and anything else within a 5 mile radius. If it rains, I drive. If it's far, I drive. This bike pattern has made life much more enjoyable! And I live in Orlando and have been surprised how little the heat and rain have interfered.
Thanx for a good video about commuting struggles, good info for all newbies. Nice that you show us everything with honest transparent videos. Here´s some of my gathered insights in bike commuting; I´ve done all year bike commuting on and off for thirty years and recently gone from an average of 100km/week to 250km/week all work commute (5days/week)...leisure ride once a weekend if time permitting often offroad. As you state in the video, you need fenders, waterproof highcollar shoes for minimizing the misery on the bike during rain or winter, in summer gear up with waterproof shoecovers. During snowy conditions I also keep an De-icer spray in my backpack, good for prepping the drivetrain so that it does not clogg up by snow/ice-slush otherwise you´ll end up with only one gear working..... I always carry spareparts such as chain lock, lubricant, zipties, a small amount of duct tape rolled around my hand pump, extra innertube because you never know what will happen when your commuting and you need to arrive at your destination. Since I´m not using e-bikes clothing is more important in a classic manner with windshield front and perspiration/heat outlet in the back....a thumbrule is that with right amount of clothing for your needs, you´ll be freezing the first five minutes of the ride (except hands and feet of course). For the bike, coming into winterseason, I also do an overhaul and add lots of protective grease on all entrypoints of the bearings. If you ride in roadsalt you´ll need a good spray down at least once a day with lukewarm soapy water, wipedown and regrease/oil/wax on moving parts aswell as a silicon spray in the entrypoints of gearcables to keep moist and gunk away from freezing or clogging up the wires. A short list but at least some input to use or dismiss ;-D Thanx again Best /Calle
I parked my '99 Mustang GT in 2020 when I picked up an aluminum CCM hard tail MTB, I then installed my own hubmotor and electric drive system within a year. My trip around town is only a couple of miles and I live at the bottom of the hill, so grocery getting is uphill empty, downhill heavy. The 65L backpack makes a great re-usable shopping bag. Bike started at 38lbs, after mods (crankset, narrow wide chainring, fenders, comfy seat, pedals, tires, tubes, replacement rear rim, single speed conversion 36T front 13T rear, chain tensioner), and electronics, 60lbs, Rider with Toolkit and outdoor Northern gear including bike, roughly 280lbs on the wheels before groceries and postage pickup, 36 spokes 2.5" panaracer rubber, extra thick tubes with puncture goop inside, 50psi. The cost of the bike and parts were recovered after the first year of no gas or insurance costs for the vehicle. RIDE SAFE!!! Watch out for traffic and people and animals (domestic or wild). Alternate routes are awesome, back trails, skinny paths, and with limited carry capacity you get to ride more. Just like riding motorcycle, other riders like to talk with you (how fast, how long on one charge, costs, effort, durability, concerns, fun). I worked the overall costs of the bike to about $1.75 a day for usage (only when used, no cost for a day off), including the wear of the brakes, rubber, spokes, chain, gears/sprockets, battery life cycle, electrical expenses for charging (which takes 9 hours on a 2 amp charger), and me putting in just enough pedal power to keep the chain tight I can go around for 6-8 hours at 10-35 km/h without any real effort depending on hills, wind, human input, rolling resistance, pit stops. If I full throttle the whole time, 40-60 minutes of runtime. Take your time, smell the fresh air, give yourself plenty of travel time, plan to make a stop or two, you are not a race car, wind resistance is real and will limit your ride duration/travel distance. Regen Braking only works if you don't overvolt your battery. Using a 52v battery on a 48v motor system is a bad idea for regenerative braking because the battery potential is higher than the motors output and it doesn't function unless you are at crazy speeds and the battery is flat. Regen braking is hard to do with mid drive units on freewheel hubs. Mid drive units transfer power to the wheels through the chain, so when you stand on it and run the motor the combined forces might snap a chain or break something else. Geared hub motors seem to be better for slower hill riding. Non geared hub motors are what I chose to use. Quiet, smooth, and enough power/torque/rpm/speed for my 29ers. Thanks Syd and Macky. You've been a big help and very entertaining. Best Wishes, Good Luck with your races.
I switched to commuting on a Surly Big Fat Dummy this year. I’m loving the cargo bike lifestyle. I can pick up my kid from preschool, carry a lot of groceries (nearly as many if not just as many as my car), and it’s faster to get to work than my car. Also no endless driving around to find parking spots. We Americans, who try to go car light, are at a disadvantage because our cities are not really built for bikes and walking, and we also try to use bicycles built for performance to run errands they’re not really meant for, but I’ll encourage anybody to use whatever bike they have to do more trips by bike. Gettin a cargo bike has definitely been the biggest improvement to my daily satisfaction with my routine. It takes nearly all of the inconvenience out of replacing a car with a bike. Still have to deal with weather though, but that’s unavoidable.
Been living car-free in Chicago for over 10 years now and it's definitely doable. I've always had more commuter/utility/cargo bikes so I've always had the ability to really load on a lot of groceries in panniers. One cargo bike was even set up to carry 6 panniers (!) - 2 on the front rack, and four on the rear long-tail rack. However, I find that if you have a regular type of bike, not a cargo bike, then the easiest way to carry the heavy/bulky items is with a single-wheel trailer or a double wheel trailer. The single wheel is nice if you ever want to do some bikepacking as it tracks behind a fat bike or mountain bike better on trails than a 2-wheeler would. Lots of the single wheel trailers also come with a nice giant roll-top dry bag type thing. Just carry that into the store and load it then check out. You just go out to your bike and put the big bag in the trailer and go. The other thing that really makes life easier is the e-assist and you've already got that. For your setup with those e-gravel bikes, I'd definitely invest in the Burley single-wheel trailer for bigger grocery runs and just keep using your panniers for those quick, short trips. The main thing I learned was that if you buy whole ingredients and eat less packaged food, you end up eating healthier, even though it means hitting the store more frequently than doing those big "buy in bulk" grocery runs. Best of all, even with e-assist, you still get some exercise getting the groceries, runs to the hardware store, etc. You just learn to save the car for the really big/heavy purchases, long trips, etc.
Thank you for sharing. Appreciate the insights on going car-less. For those large, bulky items there are a few e-cargo bikes in the market. i.e. ca-go, riese & muller, etc.
I love your channels - so inspiring! Sorry for the long post - it got a little out of hand... :) Last year, my boys and I decided to start mountain bike riding together, so we started with inexpensive Walmart mountain bikes to see if they actually liked it, and I quickly realized that I'm an old man, who couldn't keep up with them. In addition to that, COVID working from home and no exercise for 2 years helped me get overweight and extremely out of shape. I couldn't make it up the hills to get back to my house. Walking up-hill for the last mile and a half of every ride completely sucked - so I decided to put a motor on mine. After a few more rides, the boys quickly realized that if they had motors, we could all ride to the more distant trails instead of packing up the car, and also get up the crazy rocky hills without killing ourselves. We went on several trail rides to figure out what we needed to have in the event of a crash (med-kit), or breakdown (spare parts, tools, tubes, etc). That was a great learning experience - quite a few crashes, broken derailleurs, bloody skin, exploded brake pads, etc. After being pretty comfortable with riding around we decided at the beginning of the year, we'd start making store trips and found our optimum setup with just to make more frequent smaller trips - a great way to get out of the house around sundown - see the sunset while on the bike, and pick up couple backpacks full of stuff. We have been using them 100% instead of cars since the beginning of the year. Our solution for the big bulky & heavy stuff has been to use amazon prime or walmart delivery. Kitty litter, cat food, toilette paper, paper towels are so nice to just have delivered to the front door - even easier than using the car to get them. Our routine is pretty simple most days - work all day, every other day hit a trail for a couple hours. On non-trail days, we just plan on a trip to the store to pick up enough stuff for the next few days. You'd be surprised how much stuff you can accumulate with just backpacks when you do 2-3 trips a week to the store. If we need something big, we check delivery options first, even from Home Depot - if you order enough, they usually offer free shipping, so build up your list before getting ready to order may be key. I work from home most of the time, but when I do have to go into the office, it's 12 miles each way - with a nice trail system right in the middle, so it's great to hit a small trail on the way to work, and an hour or two on the way home to decompress. I started tracking mileage on 5/1 and since then, I have ridden 458 miles instead of taking the car - that's ~30 gallons of gas and over $175 in gas savings. Total cost for battery charging is about 1 dollar. We're also huge fans of Syd Fixes Bikes - keep up the great work and keep inspiring!
Cool, both of you. Two years ago, I bought myself a Larry vs. Harry (a.k.a. Bullitt) cargo-bike. It's an acoustic version. Since it's so well designed and built, it's definitely manageable without a motor. Great for strengthening and training. But the beast can carry so much very, very easily.
I live without a car in Pennsylvania. I do all my errands by bike, and I do the following: 1. If I'm able to, plan my errands around the weather. I still have to commute to work, but if there's going to be less than 4 or 5 bad weather days in a week, I won't do errands on those days. 2. I use bungee cords or ties to attach bigger items. I've carried planks of wood, plants, my cat(obviously in a carrier or a trailer), large bags or containers of products, and boxes of school supplies on my bike
Fenders are crucial for any kind of wet (or salty roads and your drive chain), as are panniers for any kind of extended ride home with weight. Too much weight through the saddle isn't comfortable. As for bigger/ bulkier items I ran flat bars, a messenger style front Porteur rack that also connected to the bars (otherwise the bike could flex rather then steer) like CEMTA makes and 1" webbing straps or Bungies. 20 lb bags of cat food or litter no problem! 30-40 lbs also doable for a handful of miles especially if you don't have to stop too often.
How are you guys securing your bikes at locations? That's my #1 fear for not commuting more on my normal bike/ebike? I have massive anxiety that it being parked outside for multiple minutes/hours will result in it getting stolen.
Same thought and fear here. I guess Syd and Macky did couple rides followed by one of them shopping inside, the other one guarding the two brand new ebikes outside, right? I keep a very old and cheap bike for being able to do some trips on my own, and carry two locks.
We are locking them if we both go in. We live in a small town that is super safe so we are not worried about quick trips into the grocery store. We would be more concerned if we were establishing more of a routine, ie parking outside same building at same time everyday. But it would be great if grocery stores had indoor bike parking, especially for areas with higher crime rates 🤷♀️
@@sydandmacky honestly, this is the biggest reason I don’t do more “stuff” just by bike. I have a car, but it’s the same thing as you guys saw; tons of things I could get to and do probably by bike, but my city and the different plazas, businesses, etc. have abysmal bike parking solutions. It’s either an old rusted out rack thing in the middle of the parking lot not even secured to the ground, nothing at all, or my favourite, no bike rack, maybe a decorative fence or sign post or something, but then signs saying “don’t lock stuff to this”. I don’t live in a “big” city per se, but 1000% would not leave it unattended, ha. One grocery store nearby had for ages a sign post out front (“warning- falling ice” -🇨🇦🇨🇦) that was pretty handy, and I’m pretty sure it got taken down semi recently.
I don’t have a car and have commuted by bike for newly 10 years in 3 cities (2 small, one big). I carry a 2 lb U-lock from Kryptonite and always lock the bike through the frame and a wheel attached to a physical object such as a bike rack, public mailbox, stair railing (out of the way), or tall sign post, etc. I never got it stolen doing this even during grocery runs where I might’ve been in the store for an hour or so.
Back in 2016 I parked motorcycles, car and truck in storage and have been on a normal bicycle since then. Love Boise, ID I still dream of a ebike since my Polygon T6 isn't the best on the road but 45min to the trail is a great warm up. Welcome to what will become amazing life but it won't always be amazing.
Hi. Thanks for some great content. And this was a nice twist to what you usually do. I have been doing your setup with regular bike and shopping for years. Three years ago we got a front loaded E-cargo bike. They are also available as 30 mph versions. It's a game changer for all the reasons that still made you suffer with this setup. Still plenty fast and fun, and no issues with the bulky stuff. But of course not the dual function of a gravel e-bike. And yes, I have done your weather and worse, since I live in Finland! I find all that you do very inspiring! Keep it up!
Thanx for your great videos. They are always a great motivation! I don't have a car. But I do ride mountainbike trailers for over 20 years. My advice is: get a single wheel trailer that is connected to the seatpost (like e.g. the tout terrain mule or the aevon kit 80 or aevon std 100). It's a game changer, when it comes to transport stuff! And you can also use them offroad.
My wife and I have been living a car free life for more than a year now. We use e-bikes for commute, grocery shopping, and to drop off the kids at daycare/school. Luckily we live about a mile from a grocery store so we generally walk to get groceries but when my wife wants to go a specialty store we use backpacks and a bike trailer. When we need to purchase bulk items (once a month) we use Costco Instacart... which is more expensive then going to the store but we figure it's cheaper than gas and car insurance. Finally, in SacTown we have GiGi cars that you can basically rent like a scooter for an hour or two (we do that if all else fails).
I've ridden in -25F. My ultimate setup was a fatbike with a Rohloff hub & paniers. I ride with a full wool thermal layer, a wicking layer then a warm layer and finally a waterproof layer. I ride in warm hiking boots, and I had bar-mitts on the handlebars. It was a great setup that I'll probably build again - I lost my bike in the Marshall fire.
I lived for about 6 months without a car, I commuted 12 miles each way, 5 days a week plus other cycling so I was probably the fittest I'd been for a long time. I was able to borrow a car every couple of weeks to go shopping and run a few errands. I saved money on fuel, road tax and insurance but I was definitely eating a lot more!
This last weekend I went on a 20 miles stint. It was like 13F when I left in the morning. The big killer isn't the cold, but wind. I'll take 15F and calm over 25F and windy any day. Not having a hot water wash hookup, I fill a spray bottle like those used to spread poison or fertilizer on lawns.
Ha! Reminders of my 20s. Motorcycle only. Wisconsin. Fun! Oh, and a Parka, full face helmets had yet to be invented (or were too expensive, I don't remember) so open face helmet with bubble shield. Got so cold once that I froze a zipper mark in my chin. Used my booted feet as outriggers in the snow. Actually could go faster than cars. Probably because I didn't know better. Back pack on my back, back pack on the tank with bungee cords, milk crate on the passenger seat, bungee corded to the seat. Yep. good times.
Nice. I started commuting, and a few months later, I gave up driving all together. That's been over a dozen years now. For grocery shopping, I use the cart I bought to haul the dog around in.
very cool test, By car I have a 16.5 mile (26.5+ km) commute in a busy area of the Netherlands, this includes traffic jams and finding a parking spot. After parking there usually is a ~10 minute walk. All in all minimum travel time is about 52 minutes. When I started doing occasional trips by bike (only 22.5km ) it was like 1:15 or something like that, after some experience I did some around 0:58, effectively only 4 minutes slower than by car (bike parking at front door etc...) and as a bonus: 2 hours of medium/mild exercise per day for free! I do need a big pannier for two chain locks however... If only all neighbourhoods were nice 🙂With weather getting beter, looking forward to that again (these 3 storms in a row the past few days are not helping though) ...
Worst me and my son had riding in the snow was his pawls getting frozen and stuck down in the freehub and losing the drivetrain. Long push home. My advice here is strip down the freehub to access the pawls and degrease and use a much lighter grease and only heavy grease where the flange of the freehub sits against the hub, to reduce ingress of moisture. Worst still though, one of his pawls sprang back into action and he rode it for a short while but that ruined the pawl and ratchet teeth so he had to buy a new rear wheel.
I’ve been riding my bicycle as my main transport for a while now … and I’m a doctor, I got a bunch of equipment that I travel with … maybe one day I’ll do a video of my hour and half commute to work, I realized that I don’t need too much to go around … I drive a fixed gear to work, and groceries shopping normally got a large tumbak2 bag for everything … I go to work with cycling-ish gear and change at the hospital (scrubs all day), and in clinic days I need to take more clothing like tie and dress shirts, nice shoes etc …
For anyone looking to get into bike commuting, the best pro tip out there is that zip tying a milk crate to the top of a pannier rack is the single greatest storage upgrade that can be done to a bike. No specialty product works nearly as good.
As for bicycle-theft prevention, there are several GPS trackers that can be installed in the bike, so if in the unfortunate case that your bike is stolen, it can be tracked and recovered.
I have commuted by bike since 2012 (minus 1 year in 2017). I used to commute on an old 12 speed Panasonic touring bike. In 2019 I purchased my ideal / dream bike setup. Until just recently (it was stolen from my home) I had a Jamis gravel bike with 1x11 veering for hills and hydro disc brakes for the rainy / slushy / snowy Ohio weather. I loved it. I’ve used various setups, mostly a frame bag and panniers and used for travel to / from work, to the grocery store, and weekly runs to the laundry matt (a 12 Liter Ortleb dots $75 work of groceries or a single load of laundry packed tight). Laundry day was fun because the bags were bulky and the bike shifted a bit side to side as I pedaled. Yeah, fenders are super nice to have as well as bright lights for riding at night. I ride in flat shoes and platform pedals to go quickly from biking to walking once I reach my destination. I have goretex shoes (Salomon) and a goretex jacket (Gore Wear) that has been incredible in the wind and rain. And dress in layers! Several thing layers of polyester and wool are better than less layers of cotton or nylon. This allows me to manage my body temp so that I am just warm enough or only slightly cold. Being too warm on the bike while commuting makes me sweat which can be quite uncomfortable when it is cold out. In the winter I wear shoe spikes (ie Yak Traks) so that I can grip my feet in the snow / icy road if I slip or have to stop suddenly. The gaiters are also a good idea though I don’t have any myself. More recently I have considered either purchasing or building a utility trailer, to help with large loads of groceries as well as for carrying heavy items like liber and 40 lb bags of garden soil. I now live with my partner of 3 years who owns a car. And that has been super helpful to deliver fragile baked goods as I start my own baking business locally. So I’m finally considering getting a small van for business use. But I still prefer to ride rather than drive as often as possible.
Electric cargo bike with full fenders is the key to really going without a vehicle. The amount they can pack is a game changer compared to a set of panniers.
I've had a Spec Turbo Vado 4 for ~6 months and I love it, so much fun to ride, replaces the car for a majority of errands. It's a commuter with 27.5x2.3 gravel tires. I'll admit to not wanting to ride in snow though, too sketchy!
It's great to be able to use the bike for a lot of daily things and yes fenders are an absolute must. I commute to work with the bike, it's 24 km flat (130 m climb in the morning going there) and it's so much better than using public transports. I get to exercise a bit, it mostly on bike lanes and in green areas outside of the city. Plus I don't have to worry to be in time for train / metro. Takes some organization and also food planning otherwise I bonk hard after a day of work while biking home, but it's absolutely worth it.
I live in Morelia Mexico. I have a family of 3 sharing 2 ebikes. It is our main way of getting around. We haven’t had any issues with groceries or shopping. Hauling larger things. Life has been easier with the bikes than a motorcycle or car here. One problem we have is security. I have beefy expensive locks but we are always a looked at like we have more money. Which we don’t. I bought the ebikes used at a discount because I had cryptocurrency. Stealth would be a bonus for us. Not sure how to make a ebike look stealthy but would make trips around town feel more secure. Good video. I enjoyed it.
I'm all about that bike life. I've got studded 29x2.8 tires on my Orbea Occam ( just for winter) and a Yuba Supermarche, front loader cargo bike for taking my daughter around. I ride around 110 miles a week in beautiful northern Colorado.
I like your challenge. I live in Nebraska and use my bike as much as I can. When it drops below 40 deg I don't enjoy riding. I do use a trailer I built taking almost all the load off the bike. I have had over 150 lbs on it as I make two trips a month for groceries. First of the month I load up then about center of the month just a quick trip for milk an other perishables. Good work out.
I did go three years only the bike. Some of the coldest days I road our bus system, I have found I can get anywhere in town just as fast as the bus. And mine is a recumbent trike with no assist. Some of my trips are about 15 miles. About 6 miles to the nearest grocery store. I have ridden 18 miles to my cardiologist appointment.
I am kind of jealous because in Germany the standard pedal-assist bike can only go up to 25km per hour, and for the 45 km per hour version (same speed as class 3), you may not use cycle-paths, are required to use a motorcycle-rated helmet, and are required to have insurance for the vehicle and a license plate in addition to having the same DUI limit as a car.
Great video. An issue here in the UK is the 15mph/25kph limit of assist on e-bikes. It means you're going significantly slower in traffic and any trip longer than a few miles takes too long. I'm trying to cut down my car use for 'I'm just nipping out to get...' journeys. It does take longer than using a car though, as putting on the appropriate clothing for the weather and then changing when you get back adds to the overall time!
Dude, I've been looking up videos and guides about this exact same thing since you guys released the last video, crazy how the topic came up here. Super cool video! Glad you guys did it! You'll have to do some Fat Biking next!!!
I've used a bob trailer behind bikes lots. They tow good and once you get a feel having one behind you you can haul a lot more. I used them for trail building and would haul in way more then I should. You can also take them down single track.
Congrats on commuting by bike. I started commuting to work 6 years ago by bike & ever since then I do most of my errands/shopping by bike too. I still own a car but don’t use it that much. I only use my car when it’s not practical to use my bike or ironically when I’m driving somewhere to go mountain biking. I live in Sydney, Australia so I don’t have to deal with extreme cold weather. I’ve always found that dressing in layers always works best for me as the weather here can be variable. I always make sure I wear a bright Fluro orange or yellow shirt/jacket to make sure I am seen by other drivers. I always keep a basic wet weather riding kit with me at all times & I’ll have more winter specific wet weather riding kit ie jackets & pants. When it rains here, it really rains. I find having a good set of waterproof overshoes is really important all year round. There never is a perfect kit for cycling in wet weather as depending on how warm or cold it is determines what you’ll wear. This afternoon it was humid so I just wore my waterproof overshoes & then wore my normal cycling kit & got wet. I would have overheated otherwise trying to stay dry. I found that when it comes to shopping I have a dedicated set of large panniers works best. You can add a front basket & a top bag for large shopping trips. I won’t use these for commuting as they are too big & bulky.I bought a ebike about 14 months ago for shopping & it’s great as you don’t notice the weight of your groceries. The ebike has integrated lights, mudguards & pannier. It makes shopping & errands a breeze. I have a lot of hills in my area so it makes sense, especially during the summer. I commute to work on my gravel bike (non ebike) & I use a different setup. I have a pannier rack & use a Topeak MTX bag system. This works great for commuting as I don’t have the drag of pannier bags sitting lower on the rack. I have front & rear lights (I keep a spare set on me just in case a light dies). I’ll use the ebike to commute on days I need to carry extra stuff or it’s very windy as it’s nothing worse than riding into a strong headwind. Pretty much 90% of all my cycling is commuting. Overall I really enjoy it. Ps I love your RUclips Channel :)
Since i moved out like 6 years ago i do all my shopping and commuting by bike. At first a car was just no option cause of money and parking space, no i live outside the city (6 km, 100 m elevation, incline up to 15%) but still continue to do everything by bike. Keeps my outdoors and you quickly learn how to dress according to the wheater. As for my setup i use two big bags in the back and a backpack for the delicate or lighter stuff. With old road bike inner tubes i can easily secure bulkier loads like a box of beer ;) Sure having an e-bike would speed things up a little (here in germany they are regulated differently and you can get a fast one like yours, but then you arent alowed on most bike paths anymore) but on the flat the extra weigth (arround 25kg for my weekly needs) doent matter to much and on my last hill, well i gotta fight a little but i dont mind. For the 2-3 times a year i really need a car i just ask friends or rent one for the day.
Live in the countryside in Finland with 3km to the nearest town. Trying to ride my bike more for errands to town, but then every two weeks or so we go to the nearest city for a bigger set of purchases and big box items. Looking at your video definitely doesn't make me miss the US's lack of pedestrian / cycling infrastructure, something that bugged me as a kid when spending summers in the midwest and being used to walking or riding everywhere.
Great video. Part of the challenge for me is the time spent locking the bike, taking off the battery, stowing the helmet, etc. I just got a burley travoy and I think that’ll help streamline my “system.” I could see using our daughters bike trailer for bulk items which you could pack a ton of gear in. The prices are really good especially on the used/fb marketplace. Also, I think if you lived in a warmer climate it might be less of a challenge (California here!).
It's cool that you tried it! I don't think we need to replace all cars just now, especially in stretched out suburbia of North America. But using the cars less will only improve the bike infrastructure, which in turn will make it easier for people to use their car less, etc.
I have a special needs son that's with me half the week, so having a car is a necessity. That said, my car doesn't move sometimes for a week or more, especially when the weather is above 50 degrees. I've got a long-tail cargo bike and a trailer. It's so much more enjoyable taking my son to school and picking him up on the bike. Plus, I don't have to wait in the long pick up line with the other parents sitting in their cars. I just ride right up to the door and pick my son up and we're gone. It just feels so much better to be outside and not sitting in my car and waiting at stoplights. Plus, my son loves bike rides and depending on his mood car rides can be insanity inducing with him.
I don't miss that wet winter riding after moving to California. It reminds me of the Not Just Bikes video, "Why Canadians Can't Bike in the Winter (but Finnish people can)" that looks at a really good example of winter biking infrastructure and maintenance compared to what we do in the US and Canada.
Living in the netherlands this is status-quo for us (except for the snow and hills, but we get rain and heavy wind). Your distances are different from ours (3-5km max). But having fenders is a absolute must, we do have much more heavy duty bikes (full steel, internal hubs and protected chains).
An alternative is to not own a car and then hire when needed. I have a friend who is carless in a major city, (Sydney, Aust) and uses her bike to commute & shop generally. Hires a Goget car when needed to do major shopping or to travel away for a few days. It's actually way cheaper than owning a car.
You should try those cargo bikes (sorry niner) there are models big enough to carry even your bikes😉. Also there is cargo trailers that people use to carry their camping equipment + gear(even spare batteries or solar charger for your ebike) like a Coho Xc🤔. I do lots commuting in my ebike but in Canada, so for extreme conditions I use hiking boots with electrical warmer socks and skiing clothing like (you will sweat a lot but do not stop or you will freeze by it) and gloves for dry ice handling. Cheers
The gentleman that owns Rob and Charles bike shop in Santa Fe told me he’s never had a drivers license. I think seeing it can be done is the first step in actually doing it yourself. Have a good week.
I had a Specialized Turbo for about 6 months and then upgraded to a front loading cargo ebike. The companies that sell them really market them for carrying kids but they also excel at carrying huge amounts of stuff. In Los Angeles during rush hour on a class 3 ebike I can be time neutral or faster than a car anywhere between downtown and the ocean. The point Macky made at the end about the start and finish taking longer is true (even with an cargo bike). With a car you get in, close the door, put on your seat belt and go. With a bike getting on the correct clothing, helmet, locking and unlocking it all takes way more time and you feel it. I’m 13k miles into my cargo ebike journey and I think they really are the way you get people out of cars. There are just issues with cost and where you park them for apartment dwellers…
Oh also you end up needing to get decent at fixing bikes. Mid-motor ebikes eat drivetrain components (particularly in winter conditions). Chains, cassettes, brakes, chainrings, and flats until you go tubeless. You will need to deal with these. In fact Syd fixes bikes is house I found this channel in the first place.
I've replaced a lot of my car errands and commuting with an ebike, but where I live it's too difficult to completely eliminate a car. I use my bike whenever I can, but sometime you just need to use a car. Like you figured out, fenders make a huge difference. I've averaged about 4000 miles per year of e commuting and running errands. Keep up with the hybrid approach, it's better than nothing.
Do you consider having a dedicated bike trailer ? We are using a croozer cargo (135L) for more than a year now. Works fine, easy to fold/unfold, a lot of options to attach to the bike. Very practical.
I commute 10 miles to and from school and work, fenders was the best investment in bike commuting I've made. Also my training bike has fenders. Fenders will keep you drier, warmer, and happier.
"tire wear." E-bike battery weight remains a huge problem as daily driver work. One workaround is the use of Uber or Lyft or some type of "community based logistics system" as there are always Other People Biking and might be simply happening by to pick up odd and ends thus reducing the need for even the bike in the first instance for day to day. In the alternative is 24/7/365 dedicated "bike as service" delivery which i think United Parcel Service does do using a trike (one tire in front two in the back) to haul heavy and bulky. I would argue this latter is the best approach as "biking as a business" as the roads are already paved and rights of way established.
Great experiment! Thanks for sharing. I've been car free for a long time now...strongly recommend a cargo bike for that final "convenience factor" you mentioned in the retrospective towards the end. I have the Workcycles Kr8 and Fr8 bikes (with aftermarket motors from Bafang, but other folks have recommended great e-bike alternatives in the comments)...with the "box bike" I just load the bags of groceries directly from the shopping cart and roll away. My bike has a cover for the box as well which keeps rain/debris out and prevents my stuff from blowing away. Hope you keep it up!
the biggest issue here (in the city) doing all of my errands by bike is that I have to be constantly mindful that the bike can and probably will be stolen if I don't lock it up very securely in a very safe location. There are literally a lot of places I can't go by bike mainly because I can't safely park the bike. A lot of bikes get stolen in this city.
I gave up my car about 8 years ago. I used to pull a repurposed Burley kid trailer to do my grocery shopping. It held four bags of groceries perfectly. Then I sold the bike I was using, and the trailer was no longer able to connect to my new bike, so I switched to panniers. I can get an impressive amount of groceries in the panniers. I don’t have an ebike, but I also only live a mile from the grocery store. If I don’t feel like riding my bike to do an errand, I can take the city bus. Mostly, I ride because I can often get someplace faster on my bike than on the bus.
When I do my shopping I use Panniers, and a two wheeled wagon and I do this because I don't drive. I'm in western NY and I can do an entire shopping in one trip with the cargo carrier, and panniers. My main bike is a Gazelle C380+ and the round trip to the grocery store is around 20 miles each way.
I miss my lobster gloves! They were black/black and I once wore them in a play as Satan. I scared a few people. Back in the 90s I lived in Phoenix and ONLY had a bike for 8 years. I had a rack with a pair of shopper's bags. Once I got the hang of "how much" I could carry it was quite a success.
Hmmm, it's called Winterror riding!! Lol, if you had asked a Canuck from Southern Ontario we could have given you a head start on all those hard learned lessons about winterror riding... The bike protection, clothing, gear, cleaning is what we deal with every time we go out for a simple winterror ride on the skinnies or Fatties. By the way, a Wike trailer, normally used for transporting kids is also used for larger volume shopping trips... Stress less, ride more. Stay safe.
I mean as professional riders, there's got to be a little ebike in your life to make it feel complete, no? Lol. These life challenges are what are making you both very endearing to your viewers! Awesome to see you both setting these couple goals for yourselves not only as personal challenges, but to also incorporate training challenges wherever possible. Stay awesome, Syd/Macky!
I personally believe that for anything than large cities, car AND bike are best. You do what is non stressful on bike and everything else with car, which means for my household that we use the car only twice a week to shop groceries and my mom for commuting while I commute my 10km per day on my trusty bike. We do plan to do some more shopping on bikes, by my mom needs her own bike first and I need a bike trailer :D
Great video! Can you touch on any bike theft prevention measures you took while out shopping. A lot of towns are putting in bike lanes, etc., but aren't providing safe bike storage in shopping areas.
Not bicycle really but i lived with just a motorcycle for years. I only had a large back pack and i kept some ratchet straps and rope to tie larger items onto the pillion seat. Definitely had a few weird looks when buying larger items
I just moved to another city. Before i had a car from the company i work at, but wanted to change something. Now i am faster at work by train. So i don't have a car anymore. Next bus stop is like 400m away, a bus to the main station/ centre every 5-10 min. And it only takes 6 min. A small store and a bakery quite close. Bike routes are pretty good aswell. So i can get by pretty good without. Only time where it would be helpful is for bigger stuff, but also that can be done somehow. Most things you can get delivered anyway nowadays.
Burley coho with a cooler bag is a life saver for us. We are a family of seven so the number of groceries is a thing. Also have other bags on husband and big kids bikes 🥴
Not an ad/my own experience, - columbia omni-heat baselayers are super good with -10/-20C cycling with only windproof superlight jacket and pants. You'll be very warm and You don't have to put 3-4 layers in this cold weather
Came across this vid as a recommended one… nice 👍🏽 I’m into my 2nd winter on the ebike, got rid of the auto a few months into lockdown 2020. It’s been enjoyable. As you say, having an auto for the big shopping trips make sense. I might rent a car once a month, and would do that big shop then. But, otherwise, it’s bikepacking bags and delivery for shopping items. Fenders, yep. A big must for the wet and muddy bits. Oh yea, the speed. In my suburban context, 28mph is a necessity. Having that top end for a heavy bike after a shop is just a leg-saver. Am also finding it just a good bit more enjoyable to shop lighter. You do feel like you spend more when driving. And in my case, it’s just me. So having a week’s shop in fewer bags works. It has shifted what I buy a bit, but am also exploring some unfamiliar items in ways I had not before. Best of blessings on your journey with the eBikes. From the look of other vids, seems like it’s added nicely to your lives.
I really enjoy the great (and varied) content. Keep it coming. I've been car-free for nearly three years, although I do plan to buy a car soon due to the fact that my parents are getting too old to drive to visit me and I would like to visit them. Regarding bicycle commuting, I do work from home and shopping for groceries is the most challenging commute I have, which is not much of a challenge most of the time. It's uphill one mile to the supermarket and a cool downhill home. I use non-motorized bike, a flatbar Salsa Journeyman. I strongly recommend a Wald front basket for quick commutes. With the Wald I can easily pack a carton of 18 eggs, tortillas, dark chocolate, deli meat, cheese (flat foods are your friends!), along with lettuce, bread, other veggies. A nice bungee cargo net holds it all in. With a bike trailer I can carry much, much more. I do save money (and calories) by not buying excessive junk food, just occasional soft drinks. For me, I can alternate hauling a trailer every other time, if I really want. During those cold, sloppy days such as the one in the video, I can opt for delivery. Delivery might be a little pricey but much cheaper than owning a car. Once I have a car again, I'll likely get a "mega-haul" once a month and use just the Wald basket the other times, but we shall see.
I know several people that ride everywhere. Lorenzo, he doesn’t have a car. Chuck has a few DUIs going way back he’s ridden for years. They don’t have cheat rules for cars either. They live in a small town but they have to ride Walmart bikes. If more people who need real bikes could get them that would be amazing. Many times those bikes are more than a car.
I've been doing my commute and errands on bike for the past 3 years. If not a bike, it is on foot. It really takes some real planning to make it work, but I am seeing some great health benefits from it. That said, I am ready for a car again.
Yes to buggy. Facebook market please used baby trailer. I am a firefighter in Texas and I have a baby trailer that I use to take me gear from station to station. Love it Another great video 👍👍🍀
I really enjoyed this video because I started bike commuting the 15 miles to work when Diesel hit $5. I live in a fifth wheel trailer and only have the duelie. At $150 a week in fuel I needed to make changes. Hence the biking to work. My biggest issues are first in Texas right now it has been a high of 100+ and low of 79+ for over a month so biking Monday through Friday is not a race especially because I am riding a 1979 Cannondale road bike. It’s fast but my average total time is a little over an hour one way plus or minus with good wind. Luckily I start my ride to work at 4:30 am but the ride home starts at 5 pm. Can you say hot. Another issue is I am in the military so first thing in the morning we do Physical Training (PT) and everyone knows Mondays and run days! I fairly good shape so it is not that bad if it were not for the lack backpack I carry my military gear and laptop to work on Mondays and to home on Fridays. I kind of dread those two days now. Lucky I can show at work but really it do not help but I am right back on my bike going here and there and sweating buckets in my military uniform. Ugh! Something I noticed is my grocery bill increased but I am still saving money. A side note, I was lean before but now I am even more so and my wife is not complaining. On Fridays she bikes to my work near the end of my day and we bike home together. Sometime she bring a backpack to carry my laptop. Anyway thanks again for the video. I like that both of you are active like my wife and I.
July 2020 I **had** to live without a car - someone kindly wrote off my car for me. With two paniers, I could fetch a week's worth of groceries. Still do that occasionally. I think your plan of one or two grocery trips by car per month is quite reasonable as not all items really lend themselves to the bike. You could investigate a trailer (I've no space at home for one) if you wanted to go hardcore (perhaps a sponsor might make one?).
We also don't really want to store a trailer at this point, but I think it would be necessary for going fully car free. For the moment we will probably do the occasional big ship by car and the rest by bike!
I just got a street bike (Flat Bar Gravel) to ride when the trails around here are closed. I have to admit, Like Syd said, I felt like a kid again riding around the neighborhood looking for different routes and just wandering. Of coarse I ride our greenway as well but it's not as interesting as just wandering the streets.
Just dropping in to say I really appreciate the commitment to on-screen metric conversion for every unit mentioned. Usually I just zone out when I hear of miles, feet, and Fahrenheit. Here I immediately know what you’re up against and it’s way more fun to watch.
Yes! This.
Totally agree, thanks!!
jup thanks for that!
I started commuting by bike this winter. I didn't start until I had mudguards (fenders) and a rack on my bike and I'm pretty pleased with how that's worked out. I would love it if e-bikes in Europe could go faster than 15mph.
why cant they? just order an ebike from another country
It’s a law, not a software or hardware thing. You can get illegal e-bikes, they’re reasonably common, and if you’re willing to risk fines and a criminal record then sure, but I’d say most aren’t so happy to do that.
Definitely go for the trailer. I've been able to get paper products home from Costco, as well as 25 pound bags of rice from the Asian grocery store. It'll easily solve your remaining "big grocery shop" problem
I enjoyed this video a LOT, also I can not stress enough how awesome proper fenders are for commuting and shopping. They make you go like 95% less wet from street water, and you have more space for cool stickers!
It's great to see the bicycle and companies like Niner as not just recreational. E-Bikes are a serious alternative to a car for a lot of people and the best thing about them is they make you 😁
Hi , I live in Melbourne Australia been following you for years now love your down to earth bike life . I’m nearly 70 am old roadie keep doing what you guys do awesome stuff 👏👏
I think the cycling lifestyle is a better turn for this channel. So many people do van life, go pro videos and the race videos are hard to understand what’s happening without a film crew. Keep up the straw houses and lifestyle related to being a rider!
The only right bike for winter commute or whatever non-sport cycling is a hub geared belt driven bike! I use a Rohloff for years with a gates belt but no motor and have had no issues with snow and mud. Using spiked winter tires and slick summer tires.
When I first started working in a shop, I decided to commute all winter long by bike...winter long meaning that I lived in Maine. For me, the most important thing was wearing goretex or some sort of waterproof clothing as the slush from the roads was sometimes a real challenge. Fenders kept the bike fairly clean, and also had less drivetrain wear because of it. I did run errands as well, but like you, used my vehicle for large items like dog food etc..Lastly, if I knew that it was going to be really wet, I would also wear gaitors as that helped my feet and pant line vs shoeline stay dry as well. But, truly loved the challenge everyday...
I've never had a car - and everything is done by bike and the nearest town is about 5 miles away, but they are hilly miles. Swapping over to an ebike in the last year or so has made it a lot less exhausting. I mostly use panniers - a bike can easily carry 25-50kg so even canned goods aren't impossible to carry. I do have a trailer, but it gets rarely used outside of carting firewood. I think you are right though, mix it up to suit your own lifestyles.
For those wishing to use a bike rather than a car on a more permanent basis, there are cargo bikes which carry much more than a regular bicycle. Good for larger items, more groceries, transporting kids, etc.
An expensive cargo bike is still much less expensive than a car.
You nailed it when you said it is a learning process (clothes, fenders, saddle bags, etc).
Front porteur rack with a 40L roll-top bag ..a puzzle to pack but easier than panniers or body-bag. I hang chips, cereal and other light/bulky items off the sides of the bag. Six years and I'm still learning. Thanks for the video!
I began bike commuting (errands) last summer and was pleasantly surprised to find out how feasible it was. I use a single wheel trailer (BOB Yak trailer) to get groceries once a week, and the Walmart grocery pickup app makes this easy. I pull up, they load my groceries into the trailer, and I leave within five minutes. I go to the gym and coffee shop by bike and anything else within a 5 mile radius. If it rains, I drive. If it's far, I drive. This bike pattern has made life much more enjoyable! And I live in Orlando and have been surprised how little the heat and rain have interfered.
That seems like a great balance of car vs. not car!
Thanx for a good video about commuting struggles, good info for all newbies. Nice that you show us everything with honest transparent videos. Here´s some of my gathered insights in bike commuting;
I´ve done all year bike commuting on and off for thirty years and recently gone from an average of 100km/week to 250km/week all work commute (5days/week)...leisure ride once a weekend if time permitting often offroad. As you state in the video, you need fenders, waterproof highcollar shoes for minimizing the misery on the bike during rain or winter, in summer gear up with waterproof shoecovers. During snowy conditions I also keep an De-icer spray in my backpack, good for prepping the drivetrain so that it does not clogg up by snow/ice-slush otherwise you´ll end up with only one gear working..... I always carry spareparts such as chain lock, lubricant, zipties, a small amount of duct tape rolled around my hand pump, extra innertube because you never know what will happen when your commuting and you need to arrive at your destination. Since I´m not using e-bikes clothing is more important in a classic manner with windshield front and perspiration/heat outlet in the back....a thumbrule is that with right amount of clothing for your needs, you´ll be freezing the first five minutes of the ride (except hands and feet of course). For the bike, coming into winterseason, I also do an overhaul and add lots of protective grease on all entrypoints of the bearings. If you ride in roadsalt you´ll need a good spray down at least once a day with lukewarm soapy water, wipedown and regrease/oil/wax on moving parts aswell as a silicon spray in the entrypoints of gearcables to keep moist and gunk away from freezing or clogging up the wires. A short list but at least some input to use or dismiss ;-D
Thanx again
Best
/Calle
I parked my '99 Mustang GT in 2020 when I picked up an aluminum CCM hard tail MTB, I then installed my own hubmotor and electric drive system within a year. My trip around town is only a couple of miles and I live at the bottom of the hill, so grocery getting is uphill empty, downhill heavy. The 65L backpack makes a great re-usable shopping bag. Bike started at 38lbs, after mods (crankset, narrow wide chainring, fenders, comfy seat, pedals, tires, tubes, replacement rear rim, single speed conversion 36T front 13T rear, chain tensioner), and electronics, 60lbs, Rider with Toolkit and outdoor Northern gear including bike, roughly 280lbs on the wheels before groceries and postage pickup, 36 spokes 2.5" panaracer rubber, extra thick tubes with puncture goop inside, 50psi. The cost of the bike and parts were recovered after the first year of no gas or insurance costs for the vehicle. RIDE SAFE!!! Watch out for traffic and people and animals (domestic or wild). Alternate routes are awesome, back trails, skinny paths, and with limited carry capacity you get to ride more. Just like riding motorcycle, other riders like to talk with you (how fast, how long on one charge, costs, effort, durability, concerns, fun). I worked the overall costs of the bike to about $1.75 a day for usage (only when used, no cost for a day off), including the wear of the brakes, rubber, spokes, chain, gears/sprockets, battery life cycle, electrical expenses for charging (which takes 9 hours on a 2 amp charger), and me putting in just enough pedal power to keep the chain tight I can go around for 6-8 hours at 10-35 km/h without any real effort depending on hills, wind, human input, rolling resistance, pit stops. If I full throttle the whole time, 40-60 minutes of runtime. Take your time, smell the fresh air, give yourself plenty of travel time, plan to make a stop or two, you are not a race car, wind resistance is real and will limit your ride duration/travel distance. Regen Braking only works if you don't overvolt your battery. Using a 52v battery on a 48v motor system is a bad idea for regenerative braking because the battery potential is higher than the motors output and it doesn't function unless you are at crazy speeds and the battery is flat. Regen braking is hard to do with mid drive units on freewheel hubs. Mid drive units transfer power to the wheels through the chain, so when you stand on it and run the motor the combined forces might snap a chain or break something else. Geared hub motors seem to be better for slower hill riding. Non geared hub motors are what I chose to use. Quiet, smooth, and enough power/torque/rpm/speed for my 29ers.
Thanks Syd and Macky. You've been a big help and very entertaining. Best Wishes, Good Luck with your races.
I switched to commuting on a Surly Big Fat Dummy this year. I’m loving the cargo bike lifestyle. I can pick up my kid from preschool, carry a lot of groceries (nearly as many if not just as many as my car), and it’s faster to get to work than my car. Also no endless driving around to find parking spots. We Americans, who try to go car light, are at a disadvantage because our cities are not really built for bikes and walking, and we also try to use bicycles built for performance to run errands they’re not really meant for, but I’ll encourage anybody to use whatever bike they have to do more trips by bike. Gettin a cargo bike has definitely been the biggest improvement to my daily satisfaction with my routine. It takes nearly all of the inconvenience out of replacing a car with a bike. Still have to deal with weather though, but that’s unavoidable.
Been living car-free in Chicago for over 10 years now and it's definitely doable. I've always had more commuter/utility/cargo bikes so I've always had the ability to really load on a lot of groceries in panniers. One cargo bike was even set up to carry 6 panniers (!) - 2 on the front rack, and four on the rear long-tail rack. However, I find that if you have a regular type of bike, not a cargo bike, then the easiest way to carry the heavy/bulky items is with a single-wheel trailer or a double wheel trailer. The single wheel is nice if you ever want to do some bikepacking as it tracks behind a fat bike or mountain bike better on trails than a 2-wheeler would. Lots of the single wheel trailers also come with a nice giant roll-top dry bag type thing. Just carry that into the store and load it then check out. You just go out to your bike and put the big bag in the trailer and go. The other thing that really makes life easier is the e-assist and you've already got that. For your setup with those e-gravel bikes, I'd definitely invest in the Burley single-wheel trailer for bigger grocery runs and just keep using your panniers for those quick, short trips. The main thing I learned was that if you buy whole ingredients and eat less packaged food, you end up eating healthier, even though it means hitting the store more frequently than doing those big "buy in bulk" grocery runs. Best of all, even with e-assist, you still get some exercise getting the groceries, runs to the hardware store, etc. You just learn to save the car for the really big/heavy purchases, long trips, etc.
Thank you for sharing. Appreciate the insights on going car-less. For those large, bulky items there are a few e-cargo bikes in the market. i.e. ca-go, riese & muller, etc.
I love your channels - so inspiring!
Sorry for the long post - it got a little out of hand... :)
Last year, my boys and I decided to start mountain bike riding together, so we started with inexpensive Walmart mountain bikes to see if they actually liked it, and I quickly realized that I'm an old man, who couldn't keep up with them. In addition to that, COVID working from home and no exercise for 2 years helped me get overweight and extremely out of shape. I couldn't make it up the hills to get back to my house. Walking up-hill for the last mile and a half of every ride completely sucked - so I decided to put a motor on mine. After a few more rides, the boys quickly realized that if they had motors, we could all ride to the more distant trails instead of packing up the car, and also get up the crazy rocky hills without killing ourselves. We went on several trail rides to figure out what we needed to have in the event of a crash (med-kit), or breakdown (spare parts, tools, tubes, etc). That was a great learning experience - quite a few crashes, broken derailleurs, bloody skin, exploded brake pads, etc. After being pretty comfortable with riding around we decided at the beginning of the year, we'd start making store trips and found our optimum setup with just to make more frequent smaller trips - a great way to get out of the house around sundown - see the sunset while on the bike, and pick up couple backpacks full of stuff.
We have been using them 100% instead of cars since the beginning of the year. Our solution for the big bulky & heavy stuff has been to use amazon prime or walmart delivery. Kitty litter, cat food, toilette paper, paper towels are so nice to just have delivered to the front door - even easier than using the car to get them.
Our routine is pretty simple most days - work all day, every other day hit a trail for a couple hours. On non-trail days, we just plan on a trip to the store to pick up enough stuff for the next few days. You'd be surprised how much stuff you can accumulate with just backpacks when you do 2-3 trips a week to the store. If we need something big, we check delivery options first, even from Home Depot - if you order enough, they usually offer free shipping, so build up your list before getting ready to order may be key. I work from home most of the time, but when I do have to go into the office, it's 12 miles each way - with a nice trail system right in the middle, so it's great to hit a small trail on the way to work, and an hour or two on the way home to decompress.
I started tracking mileage on 5/1 and since then, I have ridden 458 miles instead of taking the car - that's ~30 gallons of gas and over $175 in gas savings. Total cost for battery charging is about 1 dollar.
We're also huge fans of Syd Fixes Bikes - keep up the great work and keep inspiring!
So awesome!
Cool, both of you.
Two years ago, I bought myself a Larry vs. Harry (a.k.a. Bullitt) cargo-bike. It's an acoustic version. Since it's so well designed and built, it's definitely manageable without a motor. Great for strengthening and training. But the beast can carry so much very, very easily.
I live without a car in Pennsylvania. I do all my errands by bike, and I do the following:
1. If I'm able to, plan my errands around the weather. I still have to commute to work, but if there's going to be less than 4 or 5 bad weather days in a week, I won't do errands on those days.
2. I use bungee cords or ties to attach bigger items. I've carried planks of wood, plants, my cat(obviously in a carrier or a trailer), large bags or containers of products, and boxes of school supplies on my bike
Wow, that's awesome! 💪
Fenders are crucial for any kind of wet (or salty roads and your drive chain), as are panniers for any kind of extended ride home with weight. Too much weight through the saddle isn't comfortable. As for bigger/ bulkier items I ran flat bars, a messenger style front Porteur rack that also connected to the bars (otherwise the bike could flex rather then steer) like CEMTA makes and 1" webbing straps or Bungies. 20 lb bags of cat food or litter no problem! 30-40 lbs also doable for a handful of miles especially if you don't have to stop too often.
How are you guys securing your bikes at locations? That's my #1 fear for not commuting more on my normal bike/ebike? I have massive anxiety that it being parked outside for multiple minutes/hours will result in it getting stolen.
That's what I'd like to know - thieves are everywhere!
Same thought and fear here. I guess Syd and Macky did couple rides followed by one of them shopping inside, the other one guarding the two brand new ebikes outside, right? I keep a very old and cheap bike for being able to do some trips on my own, and carry two locks.
We are locking them if we both go in. We live in a small town that is super safe so we are not worried about quick trips into the grocery store. We would be more concerned if we were establishing more of a routine, ie parking outside same building at same time everyday. But it would be great if grocery stores had indoor bike parking, especially for areas with higher crime rates 🤷♀️
@@sydandmacky honestly, this is the biggest reason I don’t do more “stuff” just by bike. I have a car, but it’s the same thing as you guys saw; tons of things I could get to and do probably by bike, but my city and the different plazas, businesses, etc. have abysmal bike parking solutions. It’s either an old rusted out rack thing in the middle of the parking lot not even secured to the ground, nothing at all, or my favourite, no bike rack, maybe a decorative fence or sign post or something, but then signs saying “don’t lock stuff to this”. I don’t live in a “big” city per se, but 1000% would not leave it unattended, ha. One grocery store nearby had for ages a sign post out front (“warning- falling ice” -🇨🇦🇨🇦) that was pretty handy, and I’m pretty sure it got taken down semi recently.
I don’t have a car and have commuted by bike for newly 10 years in 3 cities (2 small, one big). I carry a 2 lb U-lock from Kryptonite and always lock the bike through the frame and a wheel attached to a physical object such as a bike rack, public mailbox, stair railing (out of the way), or tall sign post, etc. I never got it stolen doing this even during grocery runs where I might’ve been in the store for an hour or so.
Ebikes rock! Training, shopping, and touring all work well.
Back in 2016 I parked motorcycles, car and truck in storage and have been on a normal bicycle since then. Love Boise, ID I still dream of a ebike since my Polygon T6 isn't the best on the road but 45min to the trail is a great warm up. Welcome to what will become amazing life but it won't always be amazing.
Hi. Thanks for some great content. And this was a nice twist to what you usually do. I have been doing your setup with regular bike and shopping for years. Three years ago we got a front loaded E-cargo bike. They are also available as 30 mph versions.
It's a game changer for all the reasons that still made you suffer with this setup. Still plenty fast and fun, and no issues with the bulky stuff. But of course not the dual function of a gravel e-bike. And yes, I have done your weather and worse, since I live in Finland!
I find all that you do very inspiring! Keep it up!
Stay home syd and stay warm and just send Mackey to do it all .✌️✌️✌️✌️✌️✌️👍👍👍👍👍👍
Haha yeah I need a load of canned beans and chopped tomatoes please Mackey 😎🤪
Thanx for your great videos. They are always a great motivation! I don't have a car. But I do ride mountainbike trailers for over 20 years. My advice is: get a single wheel trailer that is connected to the seatpost (like e.g. the tout terrain mule or the aevon kit 80 or aevon std 100). It's a game changer, when it comes to transport stuff! And you can also use them offroad.
My wife and I have been living a car free life for more than a year now. We use e-bikes for commute, grocery shopping, and to drop off the kids at daycare/school. Luckily we live about a mile from a grocery store so we generally walk to get groceries but when my wife wants to go a specialty store we use backpacks and a bike trailer. When we need to purchase bulk items (once a month) we use Costco Instacart... which is more expensive then going to the store but we figure it's cheaper than gas and car insurance. Finally, in SacTown we have GiGi cars that you can basically rent like a scooter for an hour or two (we do that if all else fails).
Very cool!!
I've ridden in -25F. My ultimate setup was a fatbike with a Rohloff hub & paniers. I ride with a full wool thermal layer, a wicking layer then a warm layer and finally a waterproof layer. I ride in warm hiking boots, and I had bar-mitts on the handlebars. It was a great setup that I'll probably build again - I lost my bike in the Marshall fire.
I'm so sorry you lost your bike in the fire. That was such a scary thing. All the best moving forward 🙏
I lived for about 6 months without a car, I commuted 12 miles each way, 5 days a week plus other cycling so I was probably the fittest I'd been for a long time. I was able to borrow a car every couple of weeks to go shopping and run a few errands. I saved money on fuel, road tax and insurance but I was definitely eating a lot more!
Full mudguards/fenders, with extension flap transforms utility biking. The other one is pogies - you can get them for drop bars too...
This last weekend I went on a 20 miles stint. It was like 13F when I left in the morning. The big killer isn't the cold, but wind. I'll take 15F and calm over 25F and windy any day. Not having a hot water wash hookup, I fill a spray bottle like those used to spread poison or fertilizer on lawns.
Totally agree. Wind is the worst for pretty much any activity (except sailing I guess 🤣)
Ha! Reminders of my 20s. Motorcycle only. Wisconsin. Fun!
Oh, and a Parka, full face helmets had yet to be invented (or were too expensive, I don't remember) so open face helmet with bubble shield. Got so cold once that I froze a zipper mark in my chin. Used my booted feet as outriggers in the snow. Actually could go faster than cars. Probably because I didn't know better. Back pack on my back, back pack on the tank with bungee cords, milk crate on the passenger seat, bungee corded to the seat. Yep. good times.
Nice. I started commuting, and a few months later, I gave up driving all together. That's been over a dozen years now. For grocery shopping, I use the cart I bought to haul the dog around in.
very cool test,
By car I have a 16.5 mile (26.5+ km) commute in a busy area of the Netherlands, this includes traffic jams and finding a parking spot. After parking there usually is a ~10 minute walk. All in all minimum travel time is about 52 minutes. When I started doing occasional trips by bike (only 22.5km ) it was like 1:15 or something like that, after some experience I did some around 0:58, effectively only 4 minutes slower than by car (bike parking at front door etc...) and as a bonus: 2 hours of medium/mild exercise per day for free! I do need a big pannier for two chain locks however... If only all neighbourhoods were nice 🙂With weather getting beter, looking forward to that again (these 3 storms in a row the past few days are not helping though) ...
Worst me and my son had riding in the snow was his pawls getting frozen and stuck down in the freehub and losing the drivetrain. Long push home. My advice here is strip down the freehub to access the pawls and degrease and use a much lighter grease and only heavy grease where the flange of the freehub sits against the hub, to reduce ingress of moisture. Worst still though, one of his pawls sprang back into action and he rode it for a short while but that ruined the pawl and ratchet teeth so he had to buy a new rear wheel.
I’ve been riding my bicycle as my main transport for a while now … and I’m a doctor, I got a bunch of equipment that I travel with … maybe one day I’ll do a video of my hour and half commute to work, I realized that I don’t need too much to go around … I drive a fixed gear to work, and groceries shopping normally got a large tumbak2 bag for everything … I go to work with cycling-ish gear and change at the hospital (scrubs all day), and in clinic days I need to take more clothing like tie and dress shirts, nice shoes etc …
For anyone looking to get into bike commuting, the best pro tip out there is that zip tying a milk crate to the top of a pannier rack is the single greatest storage upgrade that can be done to a bike. No specialty product works nearly as good.
Ha that's awesome. We might try this for our front racks 🤪
As for bicycle-theft prevention, there are several GPS trackers that can be installed in the bike, so if in the unfortunate case that your bike is stolen, it can be tracked and recovered.
Upgrading to a trailer. There’s a super good one wheeler,starting with A, A?!, plus panniers! With suspension
I have commuted by bike since 2012 (minus 1 year in 2017). I used to commute on an old 12 speed Panasonic touring bike. In 2019 I purchased my ideal / dream bike setup. Until just recently (it was stolen from my home) I had a Jamis gravel bike with 1x11 veering for hills and hydro disc brakes for the rainy / slushy / snowy Ohio weather. I loved it. I’ve used various setups, mostly a frame bag and panniers and used for travel to / from work, to the grocery store, and weekly runs to the laundry matt (a 12 Liter Ortleb dots $75 work of groceries or a single load of laundry packed tight). Laundry day was fun because the bags were bulky and the bike shifted a bit side to side as I pedaled.
Yeah, fenders are super nice to have as well as bright lights for riding at night. I ride in flat shoes and platform pedals to go quickly from biking to walking once I reach my destination. I have goretex shoes (Salomon) and a goretex jacket (Gore Wear) that has been incredible in the wind and rain. And dress in layers! Several thing layers of polyester and wool are better than less layers of cotton or nylon. This allows me to manage my body temp so that I am just warm enough or only slightly cold. Being too warm on the bike while commuting makes me sweat which can be quite uncomfortable when it is cold out. In the winter I wear shoe spikes (ie Yak Traks) so that I can grip my feet in the snow / icy road if I slip or have to stop suddenly.
The gaiters are also a good idea though I don’t have any myself.
More recently I have considered either purchasing or building a utility trailer, to help with large loads of groceries as well as for carrying heavy items like liber and 40 lb bags of garden soil.
I now live with my partner of 3 years who owns a car. And that has been super helpful to deliver fragile baked goods as I start my own baking business locally. So I’m finally considering getting a small van for business use. But I still prefer to ride rather than drive as often as possible.
Electric cargo bike with full fenders is the key to really going without a vehicle. The amount they can pack is a game changer compared to a set of panniers.
I've had a Spec Turbo Vado 4 for ~6 months and I love it, so much fun to ride, replaces the car for a majority of errands. It's a commuter with 27.5x2.3 gravel tires. I'll admit to not wanting to ride in snow though, too sketchy!
It's great to be able to use the bike for a lot of daily things and yes fenders are an absolute must. I commute to work with the bike, it's 24 km flat (130 m climb in the morning going there) and it's so much better than using public transports. I get to exercise a bit, it mostly on bike lanes and in green areas outside of the city. Plus I don't have to worry to be in time for train / metro. Takes some organization and also food planning otherwise I bonk hard after a day of work while biking home, but it's absolutely worth it.
I live in Morelia Mexico. I have a family of 3 sharing 2 ebikes. It is our main way of getting around. We haven’t had any issues with groceries or shopping. Hauling larger things. Life has been easier with the bikes than a motorcycle or car here. One problem we have is security. I have beefy expensive locks but we are always a looked at like we have more money. Which we don’t. I bought the ebikes used at a discount because I had cryptocurrency. Stealth would be a bonus for us. Not sure how to make a ebike look stealthy but would make trips around town feel more secure. Good video. I enjoyed it.
I'm all about that bike life. I've got studded 29x2.8 tires on my Orbea Occam ( just for winter) and a Yuba Supermarche, front loader cargo bike for taking my daughter around. I ride around 110 miles a week in beautiful northern Colorado.
I like your challenge. I live in Nebraska and use my bike as much as I can. When it drops below 40 deg I don't enjoy riding. I do use a trailer I built taking almost all the load off the bike. I have had over 150 lbs on it as I make two trips a month for groceries. First of the month I load up then about center of the month just a quick trip for milk an other perishables. Good work out.
I did go three years only the bike. Some of the coldest days I road our bus system, I have found I can get anywhere in town just as fast as the bus. And mine is a recumbent trike with no assist. Some of my trips are about 15 miles. About 6 miles to the nearest grocery store. I have ridden 18 miles to my cardiologist appointment.
I am kind of jealous because in Germany the standard pedal-assist bike can only go up to 25km per hour, and for the 45 km per hour version (same speed as class 3), you may not use cycle-paths, are required to use a motorcycle-rated helmet, and are required to have insurance for the vehicle and a license plate in addition to having the same DUI limit as a car.
Great video. An issue here in the UK is the 15mph/25kph limit of assist on e-bikes. It means you're going significantly slower in traffic and any trip longer than a few miles takes too long. I'm trying to cut down my car use for 'I'm just nipping out to get...' journeys. It does take longer than using a car though, as putting on the appropriate clothing for the weather and then changing when you get back adds to the overall time!
Dude, I've been looking up videos and guides about this exact same thing since you guys released the last video, crazy how the topic came up here. Super cool video! Glad you guys did it! You'll have to do some Fat Biking next!!!
I've used a bob trailer behind bikes lots. They tow good and once you get a feel having one behind you you can haul a lot more. I used them for trail building and would haul in way more then I should. You can also take them down single track.
Congrats on commuting by bike. I started commuting to work 6 years ago by bike & ever since then I do most of my errands/shopping by bike too. I still own a car but don’t use it that much. I only use my car when it’s not practical to use my bike or ironically when I’m driving somewhere to go mountain biking.
I live in Sydney, Australia so I don’t have to deal with extreme cold weather. I’ve always found that dressing in layers always works best for me as the weather here can be variable. I always make sure I wear a bright Fluro orange or yellow shirt/jacket to make sure I am seen by other drivers.
I always keep a basic wet weather riding kit with me at all times & I’ll have more winter specific wet weather riding kit ie jackets & pants. When it rains here, it really rains. I find having a good set of waterproof overshoes is really important all year round. There never is a perfect kit for cycling in wet weather as depending on how warm or cold it is determines what you’ll wear. This afternoon it was humid so I just wore my waterproof overshoes & then wore my normal cycling kit & got wet. I would have overheated otherwise trying to stay dry.
I found that when it comes to shopping I have a dedicated set of large panniers works best. You can add a front basket & a top bag for large shopping trips. I won’t use these for commuting as they are too big & bulky.I bought a ebike about 14 months ago for shopping & it’s great as you don’t notice the weight of your groceries. The ebike has integrated lights, mudguards & pannier. It makes shopping & errands a breeze. I have a lot of hills in my area so it makes sense, especially during the summer.
I commute to work on my gravel bike (non ebike) & I use a different setup. I have a pannier rack & use a Topeak MTX bag system. This works great for commuting as I don’t have the drag of pannier bags sitting lower on the rack. I have front & rear lights (I keep a spare set on me just in case a light dies). I’ll use the ebike to commute on days I need to carry extra stuff or it’s very windy as it’s nothing worse than riding into a strong headwind.
Pretty much 90% of all my cycling is commuting. Overall I really enjoy it.
Ps I love your RUclips Channel :)
Since i moved out like 6 years ago i do all my shopping and commuting by bike. At first a car was just no option cause of money and parking space, no i live outside the city (6 km, 100 m elevation, incline up to 15%) but still continue to do everything by bike. Keeps my outdoors and you quickly learn how to dress according to the wheater. As for my setup i use two big bags in the back and a backpack for the delicate or lighter stuff. With old road bike inner tubes i can easily secure bulkier loads like a box of beer ;) Sure having an e-bike would speed things up a little (here in germany they are regulated differently and you can get a fast one like yours, but then you arent alowed on most bike paths anymore) but on the flat the extra weigth (arround 25kg for my weekly needs) doent matter to much and on my last hill, well i gotta fight a little but i dont mind. For the 2-3 times a year i really need a car i just ask friends or rent one for the day.
Live in the countryside in Finland with 3km to the nearest town. Trying to ride my bike more for errands to town, but then every two weeks or so we go to the nearest city for a bigger set of purchases and big box items. Looking at your video definitely doesn't make me miss the US's lack of pedestrian / cycling infrastructure, something that bugged me as a kid when spending summers in the midwest and being used to walking or riding everywhere.
Welcome to the world of panniers. Ortlieb are amazing bits of kit, use one for my commute to work.
Great video. Part of the challenge for me is the time spent locking the bike, taking off the battery, stowing the helmet, etc. I just got a burley travoy and I think that’ll help streamline my “system.” I could see using our daughters bike trailer for bulk items which you could pack a ton of gear in. The prices are really good especially on the used/fb marketplace. Also, I think if you lived in a warmer climate it might be less of a challenge (California here!).
It's cool that you tried it! I don't think we need to replace all cars just now, especially in stretched out suburbia of North America. But using the cars less will only improve the bike infrastructure, which in turn will make it easier for people to use their car less, etc.
I have a special needs son that's with me half the week, so having a car is a necessity. That said, my car doesn't move sometimes for a week or more, especially when the weather is above 50 degrees. I've got a long-tail cargo bike and a trailer. It's so much more enjoyable taking my son to school and picking him up on the bike. Plus, I don't have to wait in the long pick up line with the other parents sitting in their cars. I just ride right up to the door and pick my son up and we're gone. It just feels so much better to be outside and not sitting in my car and waiting at stoplights.
Plus, my son loves bike rides and depending on his mood car rides can be insanity inducing with him.
I don't miss that wet winter riding after moving to California. It reminds me of the Not Just Bikes video, "Why Canadians Can't Bike in the Winter (but Finnish people can)" that looks at a really good example of winter biking infrastructure and maintenance compared to what we do in the US and Canada.
Living in the netherlands this is status-quo for us (except for the snow and hills, but we get rain and heavy wind). Your distances are different from ours (3-5km max). But having fenders is a absolute must, we do have much more heavy duty bikes (full steel, internal hubs and protected chains).
I have nothing against e-bikes, especially for those with disabilities or are elderly, but this is definitely a good use of an e-bike.
An alternative is to not own a car and then hire when needed. I have a friend who is carless in a major city, (Sydney, Aust) and uses her bike to commute & shop generally. Hires a Goget car when needed to do major shopping or to travel away for a few days. It's actually way cheaper than owning a car.
You pick the smaller front 12.5L panniers. Why not the normal 20L rear panniers? They can carry more stuffs.
You should try those cargo bikes (sorry niner) there are models big enough to carry even your bikes😉. Also there is cargo trailers that people use to carry their camping equipment + gear(even spare batteries or solar charger for your ebike) like a Coho Xc🤔. I do lots commuting in my ebike but in Canada, so for extreme conditions I use hiking boots with electrical warmer socks and skiing clothing like (you will sweat a lot but do not stop or you will freeze by it) and gloves for dry ice handling. Cheers
Snowboard helmet works well for me along with pogies, fenders and paniers last thing would be gaiters,all make a difference
The gentleman that owns Rob and Charles bike shop in Santa Fe told me he’s never had a drivers license. I think seeing it can be done is the first step in actually doing it yourself. Have a good week.
I had a Specialized Turbo for about 6 months and then upgraded to a front loading cargo ebike. The companies that sell them really market them for carrying kids but they also excel at carrying huge amounts of stuff. In Los Angeles during rush hour on a class 3 ebike I can be time neutral or faster than a car anywhere between downtown and the ocean. The point Macky made at the end about the start and finish taking longer is true (even with an cargo bike). With a car you get in, close the door, put on your seat belt and go. With a bike getting on the correct clothing, helmet, locking and unlocking it all takes way more time and you feel it. I’m 13k miles into my cargo ebike journey and I think they really are the way you get people out of cars. There are just issues with cost and where you park them for apartment dwellers…
Oh also you end up needing to get decent at fixing bikes. Mid-motor ebikes eat drivetrain components (particularly in winter conditions). Chains, cassettes, brakes, chainrings, and flats until you go tubeless. You will need to deal with these. In fact Syd fixes bikes is house I found this channel in the first place.
I've replaced a lot of my car errands and commuting with an ebike, but where I live it's too difficult to completely eliminate a car. I use my bike whenever I can, but sometime you just need to use a car. Like you figured out, fenders make a huge difference. I've averaged about 4000 miles per year of e commuting and running errands. Keep up with the hybrid approach, it's better than nothing.
Do you consider having a dedicated bike trailer ? We are using a croozer cargo (135L) for more than a year now. Works fine, easy to fold/unfold, a lot of options to attach to the bike. Very practical.
I commute 10 miles to and from school and work, fenders was the best investment in bike commuting I've made. Also my training bike has fenders. Fenders will keep you drier, warmer, and happier.
"tire wear." E-bike battery weight remains a huge problem as daily driver work. One workaround is the use of Uber or Lyft or some type of "community based logistics system" as there are always Other People Biking and might be simply happening by to pick up odd and ends thus reducing the need for even the bike in the first instance for day to day.
In the alternative is 24/7/365 dedicated "bike as service" delivery which i think United Parcel Service does do using a trike (one tire in front two in the back) to haul heavy and bulky. I would argue this latter is the best approach as "biking as a business" as the roads are already paved and rights of way established.
Great experiment! Thanks for sharing. I've been car free for a long time now...strongly recommend a cargo bike for that final "convenience factor" you mentioned in the retrospective towards the end. I have the Workcycles Kr8 and Fr8 bikes (with aftermarket motors from Bafang, but other folks have recommended great e-bike alternatives in the comments)...with the "box bike" I just load the bags of groceries directly from the shopping cart and roll away. My bike has a cover for the box as well which keeps rain/debris out and prevents my stuff from blowing away. Hope you keep it up!
the biggest issue here (in the city) doing all of my errands by bike is that I have to be constantly mindful that the bike can and probably will be stolen if I don't lock it up very securely in a very safe location. There are literally a lot of places I can't go by bike mainly because I can't safely park the bike. A lot of bikes get stolen in this city.
Yeah, that seems to be a common problem for many people. Wish there was a good solution! We're lucky in that Los Alamos is extremely safe.
I gave up my car about 8 years ago. I used to pull a repurposed Burley kid trailer to do my grocery shopping. It held four bags of groceries perfectly. Then I sold the bike I was using, and the trailer was no longer able to connect to my new bike, so I switched to panniers. I can get an impressive amount of groceries in the panniers. I don’t have an ebike, but I also only live a mile from the grocery store. If I don’t feel like riding my bike to do an errand, I can take the city bus. Mostly, I ride because I can often get someplace faster on my bike than on the bus.
I suggest a bike trailer (Burley CoHo XC or one of the Yak trailers) for your next commute. Packing is so much easier.
I really appreciate the metric numbers on your videos! Thank you 😊
When I do my shopping I use Panniers, and a two wheeled wagon and I do this because I don't drive. I'm in western NY and I can do an entire shopping in one trip with the cargo carrier, and panniers. My main bike is a Gazelle C380+ and the round trip to the grocery store is around 20 miles each way.
I miss my lobster gloves!
They were black/black and I once wore them in a play as Satan.
I scared a few people.
Back in the 90s I lived in Phoenix and ONLY had a bike for 8 years.
I had a rack with a pair of shopper's bags. Once I got the hang of "how much" I could carry it was quite a success.
Hmmm, it's called Winterror riding!! Lol, if you had asked a Canuck from Southern Ontario we could have given you a head start on all those hard learned lessons about winterror riding...
The bike protection, clothing, gear, cleaning is what we deal with every time we go out for a simple winterror ride on the skinnies or Fatties.
By the way, a Wike trailer, normally used for transporting kids is also used for larger volume shopping trips...
Stress less, ride more. Stay safe.
I mean as professional riders, there's got to be a little ebike in your life to make it feel complete, no? Lol. These life challenges are what are making you both very endearing to your viewers! Awesome to see you both setting these couple goals for yourselves not only as personal challenges, but to also incorporate training challenges wherever possible. Stay awesome, Syd/Macky!
It really does help establish some balance 😅
Bravo, that’s the perfect use case for motorbikes!
Those Ortlieb saddle bags are awesome, though. I have them myself.
I personally believe that for anything than large cities, car AND bike are best. You do what is non stressful on bike and everything else with car, which means for my household that we use the car only twice a week to shop groceries and my mom for commuting while I commute my 10km per day on my trusty bike. We do plan to do some more shopping on bikes, by my mom needs her own bike first and I need a bike trailer :D
The burley Travoy is a game changer for grocery shopping.
Great video! Can you touch on any bike theft prevention measures you took while out shopping. A lot of towns are putting in bike lanes, etc., but aren't providing safe bike storage in shopping areas.
Not bicycle really but i lived with just a motorcycle for years. I only had a large back pack and i kept some ratchet straps and rope to tie larger items onto the pillion seat. Definitely had a few weird looks when buying larger items
The coldest temp i got to was -2°c
I just moved to another city. Before i had a car from the company i work at, but wanted to change something. Now i am faster at work by train. So i don't have a car anymore. Next bus stop is like 400m away, a bus to the main station/ centre every 5-10 min. And it only takes 6 min. A small store and a bakery quite close. Bike routes are pretty good aswell. So i can get by pretty good without. Only time where it would be helpful is for bigger stuff, but also that can be done somehow. Most things you can get delivered anyway nowadays.
Burley coho with a cooler bag is a life saver for us. We are a family of seven so the number of groceries is a thing. Also have other bags on husband and big kids bikes 🥴
Not an ad/my own experience, - columbia omni-heat baselayers are super good with -10/-20C cycling with only windproof superlight jacket and pants. You'll be very warm and You don't have to put 3-4 layers in this cold weather
Came across this vid as a recommended one… nice 👍🏽
I’m into my 2nd winter on the ebike, got rid of the auto a few months into lockdown 2020. It’s been enjoyable. As you say, having an auto for the big shopping trips make sense. I might rent a car once a month, and would do that big shop then. But, otherwise, it’s bikepacking bags and delivery for shopping items.
Fenders, yep. A big must for the wet and muddy bits. Oh yea, the speed. In my suburban context, 28mph is a necessity. Having that top end for a heavy bike after a shop is just a leg-saver.
Am also finding it just a good bit more enjoyable to shop lighter. You do feel like you spend more when driving. And in my case, it’s just me. So having a week’s shop in fewer bags works. It has shifted what I buy a bit, but am also exploring some unfamiliar items in ways I had not before.
Best of blessings on your journey with the eBikes. From the look of other vids, seems like it’s added nicely to your lives.
Wow congrats on two years car free! That's rad!
I really enjoy the great (and varied) content. Keep it coming. I've been car-free for nearly three years, although I do plan to buy a car soon due to the fact that my parents are getting too old to drive to visit me and I would like to visit them.
Regarding bicycle commuting, I do work from home and shopping for groceries is the most challenging commute I have, which is not much of a challenge most of the time. It's uphill one mile to the supermarket and a cool downhill home. I use non-motorized bike, a flatbar Salsa Journeyman. I strongly recommend a Wald front basket for quick commutes. With the Wald I can easily pack a carton of 18 eggs, tortillas, dark chocolate, deli meat, cheese (flat foods are your friends!), along with lettuce, bread, other veggies. A nice bungee cargo net holds it all in. With a bike trailer I can carry much, much more. I do save money (and calories) by not buying excessive junk food, just occasional soft drinks. For me, I can alternate hauling a trailer every other time, if I really want. During those cold, sloppy days such as the one in the video, I can opt for delivery. Delivery might be a little pricey but much cheaper than owning a car.
Once I have a car again, I'll likely get a "mega-haul" once a month and use just the Wald basket the other times, but we shall see.
Great video. It would be great if more towns had bike paths where folks do errands using an e-bike.
I know several people that ride everywhere. Lorenzo, he doesn’t have a car. Chuck has a few DUIs going way back he’s ridden for years. They don’t have cheat rules for cars either. They live in a small town but they have to ride Walmart bikes. If more people who need real bikes could get them that would be amazing. Many times those bikes are more than a car.
I've been doing my commute and errands on bike for the past 3 years. If not a bike, it is on foot. It really takes some real planning to make it work, but I am seeing some great health benefits from it. That said, I am ready for a car again.
Also, strange request...but can you link me to the kitchen faucet you have? We need that one in our kitchen!
Yes to buggy.
Facebook market please used baby trailer.
I am a firefighter in Texas and I have a baby trailer that I use to take me gear from station to station. Love it
Another great video 👍👍🍀
Way to go for sticking it out. Great idea to have a hot water wash to de ice the bikes. Thanks for the always interesting content.
I really enjoyed this video because I started bike commuting the 15 miles to work when Diesel hit $5. I live in a fifth wheel trailer and only have the duelie. At $150 a week in fuel I needed to make changes. Hence the biking to work. My biggest issues are first in Texas right now it has been a high of 100+ and low of 79+ for over a month so biking Monday through Friday is not a race especially because I am riding a 1979 Cannondale road bike. It’s fast but my average total time is a little over an hour one way plus or minus with good wind. Luckily I start my ride to work at 4:30 am but the ride home starts at 5 pm. Can you say hot. Another issue is I am in the military so first thing in the morning we do Physical Training (PT) and everyone knows Mondays and run days! I fairly good shape so it is not that bad if it were not for the lack backpack I carry my military gear and laptop to work on Mondays and to home on Fridays. I kind of dread those two days now. Lucky I can show at work but really it do not help but I am right back on my bike going here and there and sweating buckets in my military uniform. Ugh! Something I noticed is my grocery bill increased but I am still saving money. A side note, I was lean before but now I am even more so and my wife is not complaining. On Fridays she bikes to my work near the end of my day and we bike home together. Sometime she bring a backpack to carry my laptop. Anyway thanks again for the video. I like that both of you are active like my wife and I.
July 2020 I **had** to live without a car - someone kindly wrote off my car for me. With two paniers, I could fetch a week's worth of groceries. Still do that occasionally. I think your plan of one or two grocery trips by car per month is quite reasonable as not all items really lend themselves to the bike. You could investigate a trailer (I've no space at home for one) if you wanted to go hardcore (perhaps a sponsor might make one?).
We also don't really want to store a trailer at this point, but I think it would be necessary for going fully car free. For the moment we will probably do the occasional big ship by car and the rest by bike!
I just got a street bike (Flat Bar Gravel) to ride when the trails around here are closed. I have to admit, Like Syd said, I felt like a kid again riding around the neighborhood looking for different routes and just wandering. Of coarse I ride our greenway as well but it's not as interesting as just wandering the streets.