MinnMan

Do you store your bike indoors or outdoors at work?

And in the winter?

Normally, I lock my bicycle to bike racks outside the building where I work. As I work on a university campus, there are tons of other bicycles there. I have a good lock and the commuter isn't really eye-candy, so theft is not a problem. However, I have had items (spare tube) pilfered from a saddle bag, and I stopped leaving anything in it.

It's getting cold here in Minnesota (8°F) this morning, and I would like to put bar mitts on to keep my hands from freezing. (the commute is short - maybe 10-15 minutes, so they aren't 100% necessary......yet). But I think the bar mitts may be tempting targets for petty theft.

There is a place where I could store my bike inside. On the other hand, it's not the kind of place that would be so great for an iced-up bike that would then proceed to produce a horrible puddle.

What's your general solution for these challenges?

rumrunn6

when I commuted year 'round; in the winter, the bike went in my basement overnight & at work, my boss let me keep it inside, near the loading dock. I put big sheets of cardboard under it, so it could drip dry, while I worked

pdlamb

I'm lucky enough to have a shelter over the outside bike rack. Keeps the rain off -- we don't get much snow here.

I thought you were going to be asking about an unheated garage or bringing it inside when you got home. She Who Must Be Obeyed would be most wroth with me if I even tried to bring it in, so that's an even easier answer.

MinnMan

I don't have an issue with winter bike storage at home. My bikes get stored in an unfinished portion of my basement, with a century-old concrete floor for which "clean" and "dirty"are not really distinguishable.

The place at work where I could bring the bike inside is actually a research laboratory, but there is a corner that isn't used for much where I could stow the bike. Probably I could put down a bunch of cardboard there or something, but it would get pretty gross fast if we had a snowy winter.

Also, I don't think it would be so great to get the bike to that lab - down corridors and in an elevator, shedding snow/ice as I go.

I'd much rather leave the bike outside - I'm not worried about the effect of the elements on the bike - but I'm afraid that those bar mitts might disappear out there.

Removing the bar mitts when I arrive and putting them back on each afternoon seems like a non-starter. If it's cold enough for me to want bar mitts, then it's too cold for me to be out there fussing while my hands are freezing.

BobbyG

MinnMan At the old job I parked in a part of the warehouse where leaving a puddle was not an issue.

At the new job I put down a 6x2 foot synthetic rug...under $20 at Wal-Mart. No muss and no smell last winter. So far so good this winter...but to be fair, it's very dry here in Colorado Springs.



I remember reading here years ago about an apartment-dweller who used a plastic mat with a lip to contain the melted water.

MinnMan

(Snarky comment before my authentic response: your bike looks way too clean to be relevant to this discussion).

No, actually, thanks. buying a good mat might be part of the solution. It doesn't help some of the issues (i.e., shedding wet dirty stuff between the outside door and the upstairs lab), but it helps some.

BobbyG

Sorry...I will try harder.
Then there was this ride to work...

Brett A

I don't bring a snow-covered bike indoors unless I know it will be in long enough to completely dry. Thawing and re-freezing can cause problems with mechanical functions.

Korina

Have you tried shaking off some of the snow? On wet rides I'll pick up the bike a few inches and drop it, causing water and mud to splatter the ground. Doing that a few times before you go in might help.

ericoseveins

Man, would someone really steal those? I guess students will steal anything but it feels sort of like stealing someone's used underwear. Maybe even ickier! Re: security, if they're going to stay on the bike through the winter, would it make sense to just put a couple of stitches through the Velcro tabs? Or if they need to come off every now and then through the winter, maybe install some metal eyelet grommets through the neoprene in each mitt so you can run a little cable loop through the mitts and something more rigorously secured?

RidingMatthew

I bring my bike indoors at work in the parking deck under the building that is where the bike rack is. I bring my bike in my garage when home.

I take my lights and Garmin off the bike while at work to keep them from wandering off. I put them in an old pencil pouch.