Winterise your bike
Winter is tough on you and your bike so here are our tips for making it smoothly through to spring
CrudRoadracerBike
Winter is a testing time not only for your motivation but for your bike and equipment too. Bicycles really don't like all the water, grit and gunk that comes their way during the winter, but you can help out by using the best equipment and following a simple maintenance routine. Get things right and you'll be riding smoothly and safely through until spring.
Mudguards
Okay, so they’re not the most stylish or, dare we say it, fashionable thing you can stick on a bicycle but if you want to stay dry then keeping the surface water off your butt and lower legs/feet will make a huge difference to your comfort and enjoyment. What 'guards you fit depends on your bike. If you have mounts and have the space and clearance you could fit traditional full-length mudguards like SKS Chromoplastics. If your frame doesn't have mounts, don't worry, there are lots of mudguards that will clip on to any bike, like Crud’s excellent Race Guards.
Winter tyres
Punctures are easily the most annoying thing about cycling through the winter. All that rain and wind conspires to move stones, flint and glass around the road and means that there’s generally a far higher risk of flatting in the bad weather. So swap your race rubber for a pair of tyres that have some sort of puncture resistance in the form of a breaker belt sandwiched underneath the tread. Here’s our pick of the best.
Saddle pack carrying maintenance essentials
That last thing you want to do on a ride is to have a mechanical and not be able to sort it out. We always make sure we have a saddle bag packed with a spare tube, a few patches, tyre levers if the tyres demand it, and a quality multi-tool with a chain breaker. We carry a quick link or chain pin as well. By putting everything in a saddle pack you can simply leave it on the bike for the whole winter and it will always be there if and when you need it, and it beats stuffing your pockets, saving them for really important stuff like food and money for a coffee/cake/pint.
Frame pump
A good pump is a necessity at any time of the year. For the winter we take the traditional frame pump because when you’re standing by the roadside in the rain there’s nothing worse than furiously beating away at a tiddly space-saver minipump. A frame pump gives you a long stroke and will inflate a tyre to 100 psi in no time at all. If you can’t manage a frame pump, at least ensure you’ve invested in a high-quality pump that you’ve tested properly before hitting the road.
Lights
Even if you’re not planning to ride in the dark, it can be very gloomy on some grey, overcast days. So we’d recommend always riding with a set of lights, even if they’re small single LED blinker lights, for the reassurance of being able to put them on if it doesn’t turn out to be the blue sky day you'd hoped for. And sometimes, even with the best intentions, you might find yourself racing home before the sun sets. We’ve all been there and know what it’s like. It's best to play safe and get some lights on your bike throughout the winter.
Regular cleaning
I finished a ride the other day and actually had a tidemark along the down tube. There was even a bit of driftwood in the muck. Yes, riding through the winter clearly places a lot of stress on all the moving components so you’ll need to embrace a regular cleaning and servicing schedule. Ideally ,you should give your bike a very thorough clean straight after a mucky ride to prevent rust setting in. A bucket, some soapy water and a sponge/brush will do for a basic clean. There are plenty of specialised cleaning products on the market that will make cleaning your bike easier.
Keep it lubed
Even if you don’t wash your bike regularly, you’re going to need to keep the drivetrain will lubed. Hear that squeaky chain? That’s not a good sound; you don’t want to be hearing it. Buy a good-quality bicycle lube and use it. Wet lubes are good because they last ages, but can attract muck and grit to the chain and need more thorough cleaning. Dry lubes might not seem the obvious choice in the winter but a good one can work well and has the benefit of keeping your chain clean. On the down side, it does need much more regular application and can be more fussy to apply in the first place.
Check that chain
If you’re riding a load of miles in the winter, it’s good to keep an eye on the chain wear. A chain will slowly stretch over time as the components wear out. A chain checker tool is reasonable cheap and could save you a lot of money in the long run. If you leave a chain to wear unchecked, the chain rings, cassette and jockey wheels will wear out and and eventually you’ll have to replace the whole transmission. Costly!
However, if you change the chain regularly, you can extend the life of the transmission hugely. Some people will fit a new chain every three months if they’re do lots of miles. A new chain - and it doesn’t need to be a posh one - is a small price to pay compared to a Dura-Ace cassette, for example.
Inspect tyres and brake pads regularly
The brake pads will take a beating through the winter and wear out much faster. Everytime you wash your bike, pay particular attention to the pads and replace them before they get too worn. It’s also worth checking the tyres for holes, cuts, gashes and flint/glass lodged in the tyre.
Nice advice. I gave a class recently about preparing for winter and tyres were one thing of the things I talked about. Mostly it's best to have good condition tyres so you don't get punctures when it's really cold or grim weather. Before it snows, check the inside of your tyres for anything poking through. 
Very timely, just took the razor to a set of Crud Raceguards so as they fit properly under my lovely-but-silly Italian fork.
Mudguards.
Quite how you can recommend Crud Race Guards or indeed any Crud mud guards is beyond me.
I cannot understand why people bother with them. They are shockingly bad. Flimsy, ill fitting, crappy construction and worst of all they are made to be temporary.
In other words they're not built to last. They are shite.
You're better off spending £500 on a winter bike with proper guards that you can train on, commute on and pop to the shops on, in any weather without getting a wet arse. Oh and the guards will fit perfectly and not move a millimetre and rub on your tyres when the crappy attachments work loose like on a Crud !
Frame pump?! FRAME PUMP?!? Rule 30 
http://www.velominati.com/the-rules/
The International Ned Boulting Fan Club, @INBFC
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ACF-50. Get some.
To slo to live, to slo to die! ::-}
May also be worth looking at some wet weather specific brake pads - bog standard pads can be terrible in the rain.
@Brummie.. £20 on Cruds or £500 on a bike? Really? They do fine.
jaunty angle: bikes and communications
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I hear you.......
I just hate them, they are rubbish.
Prepare your bike for winter? Wash it and put it indoors and get the winter bike out. Training on a bike and only having one bike is like wearing one shoe....
My winter bike is a Dolan Prefissio bought for buttons with an 8 year old Choris group set at the end of it's life. I have so little regard for it it is covered in stickers - but the mudguards are solid grandad numbers filed so they do not scrape and the back mudguard has a section of another reject crud guard glued on it - so even in heavy rain the rider behind gets no spray. Club rules...
You need a pig of a winter bike. An undesirable workhorse that's only dignity is to work you through the dark months. You have to work hard on the crap bike. It repays you in full when spring comes and in the last week of April you bring out the light, fast, beautiful summer bike. That's the pay off. You need 2 bikes.
MercuryOne
Can anyone recommend some decent winter/wet weather brake pads?
Swissstop green
Swiss stop green are good all-rounders, decent wet braking and long lasting
I am not a club rider or a racer , just a 'fast' commuter. I just ride my sabbath September with mudguards all year round. I hold my own on strava round here.
40 years old and still can't face the thought off mudguards. Man up
Quite how you can recommend Crud Race Guards or indeed any Crud mud guards is beyond me.I cannot understand why people bother with them. They are shockingly bad. Flimsy, ill fitting, crappy construction and worst of all they are made to be temporary.
In other words they're not built to last. They are shite.
But do you like them?
Totally agree with Brummie. I put some Crud guards on an old Vitus Duralinox frame for use as a winter bike for my wife. The front one shattered on the second ride after a twig got caught between the tyre and the guard. Binned at the next cafe.
Thought it was just bad luck, bought another pair. Rear smashed up after only a few rides when she upended the bike to wheel it through a door, rear guard caught the floor and promptly snapped in two. Rubbish. I've spoken to quite a few other people who've had similar problems with them.
I wrote to Crud with suggestions for improvements. They do ask for feedback. I made perfectly sound suggestions (I have a bike trade background and have done technical articles for the cycling press) which they ignored completely, and just got all defensive.
I say get a winter bike and fit some Esge guards - my latest have lasted five years and counting, thousands of miles including the odd tour where they really get bashed around. The pull out stays mean that I've had twigs up there, but the guards just accomodate them and don't fall apart. Over the last thirty years I've only got through about three pairs.
if you don't have clearance for full 'guards i can recommend these: http://road.cc/content/review/50952-sks-raceblade-long-mudguards
'Quite how you can recommend Crud Race Guards or indeed any mud guards is beyond me.'
FTFY. It's only a bit of water.
I've been using Kool-Stop dual and salmon.
jaunty angle: bikes and communications
http://ragtag.wordpress.com
What are "brake-pads"? They are them thingies what you put on motor vehicles. We bikies use brake-blocks, and describe them as such. Is it one of "THE RULES"? No, but I humbly suggest it ought to be. Make it so.
Also, I agree with MercuryOne....get a winter hack-bike, and stop messin' about, innit.
P.R.
PhilRuss
Brummie,
I use Crud Racers Mk2 and think they work really well - even toured with them, though can be a fiddle to set up.
As for brake pads - Swiss stop - def the best last longtime, work well wet or dry and do not generate that black grudge.
Si
Is anyone using Portland Design Works Full Metal Fenders?
I use Cruds on my commuter/winter bike and they are fine. A fiddle to set up, yes, but they do the job for only a couple of hundred grams. And you can pull them off in a moment for summer.
I agree with bikeylikey about Crud's 'defensive' tone: I wrote to them because one of the special releasable zip ties was missing from the pack and was told 'it couldn't possibly be missing because my own daughter packs them'. They wanted me to send stamps to pay for one to be sent!
That is crap, but the guards are ok.
Cruds and Raceblades are no replacement for a frame with mudguard eyes and proper length guards...
Ive tried them both for years and Ive now given in...proper winter bike project underway...
At least two sets of my cruds are somewhere in the warwickshire countryside...
Reading with much pleasure Brummie comments YES they are SHITE! Now the really funny bit....get yersself a "MODERN" Raleigh Clubman...No REALLY! GREAT winter trainer/commuter ok they're a little on the expensive side for a second bike BUT it'll last a lifetime nice to ride and as a winter alternative to the full carbon summer job I can't fault mine!.....and the mudguards are superb(?)..
Dave Arnot.
Brake-pads, brake blocks or rubber bits for stopping who cares what you say as long as you get the message across. RULES f*** the RULES
Well having been riding in a monsoon today, I appreciate the comments about brake pads. It is a bit disconcerting when you come down a hill and squeezing the brakes has no effect!
Edgeley
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