Bells, bells, the musical tool, the more you ring, the more they move,
 

the more they move the easier you pass, so ring your bell at every a$$.

Hi. My bike got some bling today. Sorry, no gold teeth or jewelry. But I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night.

Seriously, though, I finally got a bell. I've done the "on your left" announcement for years. I am hoping this helps both my voice out from not yelling anymore and I can give numerous warnings with people making their decisions on how to react before I get to them. If the dog walker with 6 dogs goes left I can go right. Not sure how it will work out, but we'll see.

I am hoping this is loud enough. Lion Bell Works with the 24-26mm clamp I read reviews and did some searching before I ordered this one (from Amazon, factory shipped - took about a week and a half to get to the US - was pretty surprised actually, estimate was out to July some time). I will say, it has a very nice sound to it! I'm glad I got it.

The mounting location is on the side of my dummy bar. It may be hard to grasp from looking at the pictures, but the spring actuator is operable with my thumb when on the right side drop. Other than that I can reach down and flick it just as easy.

https://cimg8.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...eaf5cebf24.jpg


https://cimg9.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...d9d4f978a8.jpg

I have a bell on most of my bikes. I like them. But, sometimes if you are riding along, ring the bell to let a pedestrian know you are approaching, sometimes the pedestrian will turn their head to look back and when they do that they turn their body and walk into your path. Thus, I always try to ring it about three seconds before I get to them so I have time to hit the brakes.

Lots of runners and some bikers are zoned out listening to tunes, you ring the bell and think they heard you, but suddenly they veer in front of you to miss a twig on the trail or something like that because they had their ears plugged up with electronics.

And, one time riding along on a bike path, three riders slowly riding abreast in front of me taking up the whole trail. I ring my bell about five or six times, by now I have slowed to their pace and am close enough to hear them talking, one of them says - it is the strangest thing, but suddenly I think I hear an ice cream truck.

I even have one on my folding bike.

https://cimg8.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...f821182dc6.jpg

I'll see what happens and go from there.

I agree, though, with people going every which way and needing a pretty far in advance warning - if they hear you.

I've used the "coming up behind you on the left" yelling/booming announcement while cruising 13-15mph on a trail and can tell I startle some people. I guess theres not much of a way around that. If they are paying attention to anything else and you jog their attention sharply off of it - either with a vocal announcement, bell, horn, what have you - then that's their problem. I'd say getting their attention to alert them of your presence is the best thing you can do - their reaction to it isn't your problem.

There are some other neat bell styles/designs out there. Spurcycle makes a nice one (a genuine one, not knock-off Rock Brothers). As does Crane.

It seems a lot of the note-worthy "classic" bells are are old-school and no longer produced.

AirZound airhorn.

I use the horn for cars and a bell for pedestrians. But if I get no response after a couple of tries, the horn is next.

Also, I sometimes use the horn first from a greater distance to give peds and others more time to move, or be aware of me.

Former mup standard line: "Passing on your left!"

New line: "Sir, I really can't tell which side you're on!"

More and more, I am giving a double toot of my Airzound from a moderate distance (so I can react to their reactions).

I use a bell but many with headphones dont hear it. I dont understand being out and not wanting to hear nature.

Bells can be particularly important in some countries.

I was touring in India and everything on the roads seemed to make noise. Large horns from trucks/buses, beeps from cars, small toots from motorcycles. So my bell fit right in.

Unfortunately, one night my bell was stolen. Normally I could take my bicycle to my room in the most inexpensive hotels or the more expensive hotels. The difficulty was with the lower budget where they had enough to have a security. After much arguing, I eventually acquiesced at one such hotel. Unfortunately, I forgot to remove the bell from my bicycle and after a two-night stay it was missing. I noticed within a kilometer of leaving the hotel and felt without for the rest of the trip.

I don't have a bell, but I can whistle pretty loud. For some reason, people jump out of the way when they hear my whistle. It is good to keep things clear, but I often feel embarrassed for giving them such a start.

I used a whistle on a cord around my neck riding in traffic in Ho Chi Minh city and it was a lifesaver, also seemingly very humorous to the dense flowing sea of motorbike drivers.

Currently I've got some variant of this on each of my bikes. Man, these were a lot cheaper when they launched via crowfunding!

My main bikepacking gravel bike has a dropper actuator inside the left brifter. Would love to have a bell that mounts inside the right brifter, so I wouldn't have to take the right hand off the brake to ring the bell. I've taken a couple passes at mounting a Oi or Incredibell there, couldn't get it work with bar tape and not in the way of the regular hand positions, returned them. Still looking

Bells on most bikes, used for polite notification. I have a good yell for serious and urgent alerts.

I have a knog oi mounted on my stem. It looks nice and sounds good but isnt very loud. I hope I'm not hijacking this thread but I'm really curious on how the bag is mounted in both pictures. Is it just a second stem put in place of spacers? Thanks

The handlebar bag or the small round nylon pouch?

The handlebar bag is on a "dummy bar". You are correct - there is a second stem there that the "dummy bar" is attached to. Nothing fancy.

The caveat to this set up is that the steer tube was intentionally left very long when I bought the bike. Then lots of spacers were added to make up the difference. That was specifically done for having the room to do that 2nd stem/dummy bar addition, however I also gained a lot of adjustability for the main handlebars also that I found earlier in my distance riding that I was able to tweak.

Bike shops usually want to adjust the bars to your "fit" then cut off the rest and cap it, maybe put a spacer or two on the top, and call it good. When they do that you have no room to play with things later - no metal left on the steer tube to use. So the only way to get the metal is to think ahead and not let the bike shop cut off the steer tube any shorter. Or, build your own bike.

The dummy bar is 1" PVC painted black. The bar bag is an Ortleib Ultimate 6 Plus with the regular mount that uses the cable lock system.

If you can fit it, I highly recommend the 2nd stem and dummy bar. It gives me a ton more freedom on the handlebar for my hands. The only thing on the bar now is my bike computer. If you notice in the 2nd picture on the ground is an adjustable wrench and a U-bolt RAM mount. That RAM mount was where the bell is and is what I normally mount my phone with - in an X-grip holder with a few wraps of string around it so the phone doesn't bounce out. I'll probably put it on the other side. For now I just toss the phone in the bag.

The small black nylon pouch is a large can of pepper spray in a belt holster. The holster is zip tied on to the steer tube over top the spacers.

This is a touring forum.
I hardly see how not yelling "hello" in advance of the one in one hundredth chance you actually pass someone would not suffice into alerting them in advance.
A bell? .......just one more thing I've got to buy.

Anyone who lives in an area where a bicycle bell is effective is very fortunate. I'd love to be able to use a bell effectively when riding on the rial-trails around here. Unfortunately, for whatever reason, when I ring the bell on my bicycle most people stop and look up into the sky if they hear the bell. What? Do they think I'm ET or Mary Poppins? LOL I could use a much louder horn and have considered it but a lot of the people on these rail-trails are bird watchers or game watchers. We have a lot of deer around here and they'll browse just off the trail. I don't want to spook those critters and ruin other people's enjoyment of the day.

I find that a good loud shouted YO! (as heard in films with U.S.A. western cavalry i.e. "Froward, YO!" gets people's attention better than the bell does.

Cheers

Yup, second stem. KC8QVO described it pretty well.

I am assuming you would use a stem sized for 26mm handlebars, not 31.8mm. If you go to a hardware store and ask for a short piece of PVC pipe, it is not 1 inch. Nominal 3/4 inch pipe size is 1.050 inches outside diameter (or 26.67mm), so you would be buying 3/4 inch pipe. I used PVC pipe on one bike, cut down some handlebars that I was not using on a couple other bikes.

If in doubt bring the stem to the store with you to check sizing.

I like the second stem as it lowers the bar bag. More photos of my bikes and second stem setups at this post
https://www.bikeforums.net/19930025-post28.html

Thank you all for the reply! I think I'll have just enough room for another stem . And in my very large junk box there is several handle bars i can cut down. I use the ortlieb ultimate 6 too and an out front mount for my garmin edge. I have the out front mount on backward so it didnt get in the way of opening the bar bag. I think a dummy bar will be a perfect solution. I'm really surprised with all the books on touring I read I never came across it untill now. Thanks again

I honestly do not remember where I first heard of a second stem, but I am sure it was over a decade ago. But at that time I was still using an older style handleber bag that had the steel frame supporting a fabric bag, a design that was common during the prior millennium.

If you have insufficient steerer tubing length for a stem that might be too tall, this option only consumes one inch of steerer tube. (But their web site says 27mm.)
https://www.sjscycles.co.uk/accessor...-222-mm-0-deg/

i used that on the bike in the photo. In this case I had plenty of spare steerer tube, but I wanted an option shorter than most stems are and i was already ordering from that website so adding this did not cost too much more.

https://cimg8.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...3e199c91c3.jpg

The Grip Bell , Brass, on the left, R'off grip-shifter on the right..

http://www.cyclofiend.com/working/im...-6P1010011.jpg

Excellent info. I didn't know such a device existed.

When I was shopping for bikes one of my riding partners has the same size LHT (few years earlier model year, not disk) and did the 2nd stem mod. I went trying several different bikes at different stores but didn't find anything I liked any better than the LHT style. The only change up from the guys bike I test rode is mine has disk brakes. Since his bike was set up that way the point was made about the tall steer tube so as to allow room for it from the start. Of course, if you aren't thinking ahead the option in the above link would be the next best thing.

I am not sure if the 2nd stem or this would be better, but I have been very happy with the set up on my bike. As I mentioned before - it gives a lot of freedom to the main handlebar with it not bogged down with accessories.

On second stem vs the Thorn Accessory T Bar, I do not think one is always better than the other, just different and in some situations one may be preferable. Since I use both on different bikes, my comparison is that the Thorn consumes less steerer tube length and is available with distance out front as short as 55mm. Second stem, you have lots of choices of stems, including adjustable ones and ones with more drop from a steeper angle. And of course if you are in USA, the Thorn option has a shipping cost from UK.

And of course if your size frame has a shorter head tube you might not have the wheel clearance you need to use either. In my case I am fortunate to have a tall enough size bike frame that I can lower my handlebar bag with a second stem and also fit a fork crown mounted headlamp under it on most of my bikes. Have a bit more clearance on the 26 inc wheel bikes than on 700c.

Some people have bought the Thorn option because the diameter is the same as a mountain bike, a Rohloff shifter can be installed on it. But that is a special case for those that have a twist grip shifter that is sized for a mountain bike handlebar diameter.

Thorn makes some longer ones too, some people might be interested in that, but I try to keep my handlebar bag as close to the steering axis as possible for handling purposes so I only cited the 55mm one.

The " bring bring" bell, probably the the cheapest bell that you can buy, is magical. For some reason ,, when you sound the Bell, pedestrians and cyclists universally know that a bicycle is approaching them from the rear. In most cases with my interactions with pedestrians, most of them don't even look back, they just move.

No screaming, no mixed signals, just easy coexistence.

I also use a Thorn accessory bar from SJS Cycles on my Ogre.
Bought back in 2012, I no longer remember which size I've got, and thought perhaps a link specifically for the Thorn versions might be useful for followers of this thread
https://www.sjscycles.co.uk/accessor...s/?brand=thorn

True. Here in the SE USA, bicycling on a MUP shared with walkers and dogs will generally prove to you that bike bells are highly ineffective in their intended purpose. A shouted warning works better, if pedestrians can hear it. Many can hear the bell chimes and shouted warnings and simply choose to ignore them. The best solution I've found is to not ride on MUPs unless there is no alternative.

Timing can obviate the bike bell. Most MUP pedestrians are casual weekend walkers and they usually walk 2-4 abreast, ignore warnings and block the path. However, I have found MUPs to be almost completely empty on weekdays before 2PM, and at these times they can be a joy to bicycle, with no bells or shouts required.

I too avoid the rail-trails here as much as possible. One trail is becoming pretty narrow due to plant growth encroaching from either side. In sections it's almost too narrow for even one bicycle.

I'm lucky though because a nice country road runs pretty close to either of the rial-trails I used to frequent. I don't know how busy those trails are now. I don't think I've been on either of them yet this year.

Cheers

I have a couple of Crane Suzu bells that work nicely, I hadn't heard of Lion bells but I see they are well-regarded. Past few days I've been riding an older bike with no bell & on crowded MUPs it gets a bit tiresome to verbally announce so often. I often try to ride on roads vs the MUP but for the MUP I think a bell is more pleasant if not fool-proof. With all the noobs around, I try not to pass too fast (I'm not riding that fast anyway usually) & give max clearance (ie not passing 3+ wide). Lately with so many little kids esp on the path I think it's nice to be patient & if one wants to to do fast fitness rides then stay on the road. Actually frequent slowing/re-accelerating can be good training but many riders don't want to slow down.