Studded snow tyres (home made)

Made mine on Friday night, ready for Sat AM ride:

Pair of old 2.1 Panaracer Trailblasters, 200x15mm + 75x12mm screws, and way too much spare time 😀 I lined them with about four layers of gaffer tape, but after about four hours of riding, one pinch-flatted. On inspection, almost every central screw-head had 'burst' through the tape and marked/pinched the tube to some extent. One obviously pinched it all the way through. Reckon some additional DPM, an old (extra) inner tube, or a strip of non-descript, tough, flexible plastic would make them perfect.

They were alarmingly effective, and dealt especially well with compacted snow on steep tarmac climbs. Also good at picking up leaf-litter 😀

Puffer's going to be deadly with all these James Bond knives-on-my-wheels set ups!

They make my Snow Studs look like children's toys…

Cheers, al.

Well, after a ride this morning where the farm roads are sheet ice, I found the limit of the Snow Studs – there's no centre studs and even with the pressure right down there wasn't much grip. So, I've put together some minimal DIY jobs anticipating the same at Puffer. Conti Gravity 2.3 tyres.

I marked the knobs with red marker pre-fitting, so they're easy to spot in the pictures below! I taped a screw to the drill and bore through from the outside-in onto a block of wood first, then from the inside-out through the holes. Clipped right down with Park wire cutters. Lined with Slime tyre liners.

I'll have a ride later but they seem good. I've no intention of going fast on these, so I'm not bothered about the lack of side-spikes. Only 22 per tyre, I'll probably double that if my test ride's encouraging.

Cheers, al.

Had a blast again on my jolly jobbers tonight, again outstanding grip on the ice, looking forward to the puffer with hopefully minimum falls and the smug smile that my ice tyres only cost me two boxes of No 6 1/2" screws 😆

You know , I dont really come on here very often . But get this .
I also remembered a mag article from , I reckon 20 yrs ago , about ice riding on frozen lakes . It was Joe breeze . Anyway , i forget the details , but they had panhead sheetmetal screws through the studs, I do remember that much .
So ,after 20 yrs of praying daily for suitable conditions here in the frozen north , on saturday I also screwed some self tappers into an old set of tyres . To keep it real and true as I could to the article I dug out my flourescent legwarmers , and not only used a 20 yr old pair of tyres , but also a 2o odd yr old old bike . The screws were new . Sue me .
If you was to redirect your internet browser device to youtube, a popular video hosting site , and search for 'spikeybike1' , 2 , 3 ,4 5 … etc . You could view the result of my endeavors .
I should point out that it took me in the region of 4 hrs to stud my tyres . And I'm a construction worker .
thankyou .

it took about 2.5 hours to put a total of 96 screws into each of mine and cut them to the desired length with a dremmel.

Now I've doubled the number of screws they do grip rather well.

muddyfox courier

………I should point out that it took me in the region of 4 hrs to stud my tyres . And I'm a construction worker .

that's where the problem lies 😀
how many cups of tea did you have in that 4 hours!

😆

I was out tonite again just for a final fettle with the bike before the puffer and still amazed with the grip,

5hrs work, 2 old tyres, 2 old inner tubes as liners, 2 boxes of screws and gaffer tape.

Big smiles if this works for the puffer 😉

OK , well , I'm booking 4 hrs to the job .
It didnt actually take 4 hrs .
We'll call it a day .
Saturday's time and half. So that's 12 hrs then.
In fact I didnt actually stud the tyres at all , what I did was use a special contractors only grip snow compound on the treads .
it's only available to the trade . You've gotta be qualified an all that .
Yea .
And then there was the scaffolding .
It's all special order stuff .
Have you got yer PASMA ? CSCS ?
I can't let you on site.
Rules is rules .
I'm not making this up as I go along .
I'll see if I can squeeze you in around April , May .
This is not gonna be easy .
I can see a few problems .
I'll need a payment up front for the materials.
Did you use an RSJ up there,Mr fawlty ?
2X4 eh ? ….
Hmm ,( rubs chin) ,punctuation around those last two words. That'll cost yer .No ,
I drink coffee

You may poke fun at my construction workers moral code.
However.
Reading a number of posts it seems one or two have been predrilling their knobs before screwing with less than perfect results.
Oh dear oh dear.
A construction worker ( such as myself ) ,would not bother with any knob pre-drill japes and would simply use a self drill screw and ram it sraight through using a professional quality , hi torque , battery drill from the likes of Hilti.
Or maybe De walt .
All the best deals are on Hilti at the minute though, it seems .
It' all Black and Decker inside the casing . I digress.

His screws ( he would be male ), would not therefore push back into the tyre as the thread would bite strong into his knob ,and would find their own thread as he forced them manfully ,wilfully ,ramming them homo.
I am also ,as a construction worker of many years experience , deeply saddened at the total lack of double entendres in this thread.
I'm thinking words such
as 'stud ' , 'screw ' , 'screwing', 'knob', 'knobs','drilling ' ,and of course 'fisting ' could have been used to much comedic effect.
Yours etc etc
Arthur Wellesley ,Duke of Wellington Construction Co

I've just finished one and half way through the second. 60 odd in each tyre. with a old inner tube halfed and a good inner tube placed inside it to stop pinch flats. It;s nearly done but I wouldn't do it again. I dont have the patience!!

Just me or do none of you lot actually enjoy getting sideways?

Wish I had opened this sooner.

Just me or do none of you lot actually enjoy getting sideways?

Welcome back GW, we've missed you. 🙂

I don't mind a bit of sideways action, but there's a difference between 'a bit' and not being able to make any progress on a ride.

I opted for the chains route as I run tubeless and couldn't be faffed with a major tyre change-over. Has worked fine so far…

Chains: Any good on ice? I reckon no good at all, but it would be good to be wrong on that.

al.

Just re read this and I am off to the garage………………….

Funny you should say that…

I dont get alot of black ice here on the coast but do get ice as in puddles white in colour and frozen thaw thats ridged on the roads and i get by on the Surly pugsley fine with its 4″ tyres…but thats cause the footprint is about 10″ by 5″ at 5 psi…
if you pedal smoothly it just cruises over…
http://www.flickr.com/photos/coastkid71/5223145029/in/set-72157625354108987/
if we got alot of ice esp black ice then full Nokian Spikes would be ordered up for the 29er…
Riders in Alaska get several winters out them so £50 each for them isnt too bad, problem is conditions change here so quick 😮

I ride chains especially for especially for ice, a chain every other spoke bed on my 29er. The chains are in good nick after 100 miles on unsalted cycle paths.

muddyfox courier wrote:

“Reading a number of posts it seems one or two have been predrilling their knobs before screwing with less than perfect results.
Oh dear oh dear.
A construction worker ( such as myself ) ,would not bother with any knob pre-drill japes and would simply use a self drill screw and ram it sraight through using a professional quality , hi torque , battery drill from the likes of Hilti.”

The point of the pilot hole is that it means you’re guaranteed to get the screw in the right place- you can drill from the outside through the knob, easy. Makes no difference to the end results other than getting all the screws in the right place.

I’ve done 2, one more succesful than the other. One with pop rivets- which has the plus side of not threatening the inner tube, and looking good, and not lacerating your hands, but has the downside of not being all that good. And the other just with the simple screws approach which works very well indeed. I went out of my way to find some horrible ice to ride over on my commute today Very pleased. Took me at most 2 hours, cost me £2, plus sacrificing some old tyres.

I might redo it with mud tyres though, just for better snow and snowmelt manners.

As this thread has been resurrected I thought I’d comment that the tyres I made last winter are getting more successful use still with no punctures.

I have an opinion to express though. I disagree with pre-drilling holes, because the drill will cut lots of threads in the tyre carcass. I put the screw through from the outside first, remove and then screw from the inside, using the (barely perceptible) hole left from the first stage as a guide. That way the tyre structure is less harmed, as the sharp point of the screw pushes through between threads. You also get the screw were you want it.Even if it takes ages, I think that is best.

N

put the screw through from the outside first, remove and then screw from the inside, using the (barely perceptible) hole left from the first stage as a guide.

That’s what I did.

12mm screws, dremmeled to points down and lined it with an old inner tube. Had a cycle up and down the snow covered street loads of grip, its all ready for tomorrows am ride.
😀

Anyone tried this tubeless with Stans liquid or similar – eliminating the tube would seem to be quite benificial – no pinching, no extra layers required to protect from screw heads, lighter, etc – or am I missing something obvious??

I doubt there’s any difference to the impact on the carcass between sticking a screw through it or a 1mm drill bit.

I’m going to have a crack at tubeless with mine but tbh I’m not expecting much from it, I’ve a feeling the holes will constantly reopen. We’ll see though.

Anyone tried the cable tie method

Well the screw method didn’t work for me.
“I put the screw through from the outside first, removed and then screwed from the inside, using the (barely perceptible) hole left from the first stage as a guide. That way the tyre structure was less harmed, as the sharp point of the screw pushed through between threads. I also got the screws were I wanted them. Even if it took ages, I thought that was best”.

I used and angle grinder to reduce the length of protruding screw to approx. 5mm. I lined the tyre with an old tube. I inflated to 40 psi.

It lasted 40 mins of road and very bumpy frozen lumpy snowy/ icy cycletrack. So I thought I’d got a pinch puncture- the next tube lasted approx. 20 mins of smooth road riding. The nice guys in the pub let me change the tyre in the bar (Big Respect to The Red Lion, Llandybie) and it lasted a similar amount of time. Sitting fixing tubes in with a pint of Winter Hog Ale in front of me I could see the imprint of the screw head on the inner tube by the puncture.

I used No.8 screws, ground down. Panaracer FireXC tyre, with the screws through the knobs.
Where did I go wrong? I’m a big bloke mind you, 105kg at the moment.

Im going to grind the screws very short, maybe only 2- 3 mm and remove the middle ones perhaps.

I made mine with the pre-drill and screws technique last year. I used a pair of michelin ATs and used tubless solution on stans Flow rims. They inflated a treat and worked just like a regular tubeless setup. They held air fine despite having approx 100 screws in each tyre.

I cut my screws down to about 2mm – most of the ready to buy ones don’t use tall spikes.

Some of these home made ice tyres seem a lot of work to avoid paying for a set of Ice Spikers.

But it’s more fun to brew your own 🙂

Just made a pair using an old Conti Explorer for the front, with 3 rows of 23 screws, central and one on each edge, then a Conti Edge for the rear with 2 rows of 22 screws offset and off-centre in the paddles. Seem to work a treat thought I’ve only been fooling around in the yard as yet. On the compacted tractor tracks they are fantastic and seem to be pretty good in the deeper stuff upto about 30cm. I’ve got innertubes full of stans and another tube to cover the heads. No pilot holes, just a bit of hit and hope which took about an hour and a half.
Lets see how they do heading up the hill in an hour or so!

Neil

I guess about 2 hours to make and fit my own. It doesn’t really strike me as ‘alot of work’ and its not exactly technically difficult.

Infact, its not due to thaw here until xmas day, so I should go an put them on for my commute.

Just spent an hour with battery drill an old Tioga XC pro and 80x12mm screws – job done – looks out side and 8″ of fresh soft stuff- pooh – now where is that Pugsley thread? 🙂