Maelochs

Quoting this just because I like it .... Direct and honest writing.

Bicycle Buddhism ..... pedaling to inner peace.

plumberroy

For years I rode second hand bikes usually that I fixed up. Just could afford a better bike. Finally got where I could get what I wanted so I was on a Surly kick . Bought a Steamroller built up a LHT and bought a Cross Check. Rest up current bikes bought just because I like them and can. I'm fighting N+1 right now I am seeing an old steel Raleigh C-30 listed last one I had I had to do a lot of work on but it ended up being a great bike. I wish I had not sold it when I got my Surly bikes

wheelreason

Perfect!...

base2 

Serial Monogamy may well be the appropriate term. Even if I am Poly with my bike love.

I seem to get 6-7,000 miles out of a bike. Then it goes on the hook to be incrementally improved with some lighter, fancier, premium component ad infinitum. I'll ride it twice & say "Yep. That was an improvement." Then put it right back on the hook and return to the most recent addition.

All my bikes work & are in tip-top shape. Each one is fit for purpose. Road racing, Monster-Cross, touring/commuting, utility/errands...etc. I just like the collection. Each is an example of the best solution I could come up with to a particular end.

My hobby could probably be best stated as "Premium bike parts acquisition." But I do make an effort to ensure each gets a few hundred miles per year...Enough to evaluate what part to buy next.

Part of the joy is in the hunt. The suspense is in the waiting. The challenge is selection of which component is "best." Then figuring out a timetable and budget to make that happen. The scale is in terms of years for some things. If my hobby was limited to only riding bikes...I think I'd get pretty bored pretty quickly

RCMoeur 

In my teens and early 20s, I went through a lot of bikes - a couple 1-speed coaster brake bikes, a rickety 3-speed, the indestructible Schwinn Varsity, the Centurion Super Elite that was my first "real" bike, several broken Hypercycles...

But starting in 1982-83 or so, that slowed down and I started hanging onto what I had. I've owned my Raleigh Pro since 1982, my Rans recumbent since 1983 (it just turned 40), my chrome Schwinn since 1992, and so on. I may change components and setups periodically (or not), but I'm much less likely to divest a "first string" bike - so they've accumulated. I do have several decent "second team" bikes that are entirely functional but with which I don't have the same bond - all of them are great, but may someday go home with another person for which they're more suited.

I try to ride all of my "first string" bikes (see Richard C. Moeur - Bike Stuff) at least once per month, and the backup bikes each a couple times per year. Some bikes such as "Boingy Green" the dual-suspension mountain bike are optimized for one purpose, and don't do well for other tasks, while the Bike Friday is great for when I need a folder, and the recumbent is comfy in street clothes. Other bikes do occupy similar niches in terms of speed, weight, and carrying capacity, but are optimized in other ways. For example, my fancy aluminum-frame cruiser and my taped-up commuting cruiser have nearly-identical carrying capacity, lighting, and travel speeds (the aluminum one being faster), but I'll choose one over another based on distance, security of parking at the destination, etc. And my big-basket chrome cruiser is much less fast, but great for yard sales, rides to the store, and bombing around the neighborhood. The Nashbar aluminum cruiser is "first among equals" and usually gets the most miles in a year, but often doesn't have the longest one-day mileage (those are on the racer and alumispeedy). The tandem is another story - its speed typically depends on how motivated the APU is, but since I have no one in that role at the moment (wife has bad knees and son's uninterested), it's hung up UFN.

So I tossed together this profoundly unscientific chart roughly showing how all the primary bikes somewhat relate to one another in terms of speed vs. capacity. It's a start.

Maelochs

^ You get winning marks for innovative names, regardless.

genejockey 

I've got 10 bikes (well, 9 bikes, plus 3 frames, 2 forks, and a box of parts to make a 10th, really). Each of my bikes has something that makes it unique - in my eyes, anyway. Every time I ride one of them that I haven't been on in a while, I find myself thinking, "Oh, yeah! THAT'S why I have this bike!" I put hundreds of miles on even the least ridden bike.

Since I got the Litespeed, and especially in its v.3.0 form, I keep being drawn back to it. This has reduced the number of miles the other bikes get, by a lot. The least ridden bike saw less than 50 miles all year. The Litespeed and the Canyon account for at least 3000 of the 5000 miles I rode last year. None of the others got more than about 600 miles. It's not that I don't love riding them. It's just that when I want to go for a ride, the Litespeed is the bike I think of first.

mschwett 

An interesting variety of responses ! The most common seems to be, perhaps, wider riding conditions/terrain/situations than I personally prefer, so, a wider range of bikes. It does seem that most bikes get ridden far less than each of mine, so all the relatively frequent maintenance issues (chains, pads, rotors, tires, cassettes) are spread out over way more time. And finally, I appreciate that sometimes things are just nice to have, to look at, to tinker with, and perhaps if i had more space and time I’d have a lot more bikes. But i know they’d all be really, really similar, which goes back to the first point about terrain type and riding purpose.

i realize I’m also the same about cars, having driven the same two seater for ages until the arrival of a child forced the purchase of a car with a backseat. It’s not that i didn’t think trucks or jeeps or big cruiser sedans weren’t cool, it’s that i preferred small and light and fast most of the time, so i drove small and light and fast all the time.

David_Harris

I have one bike. The family has one bike per rider, but most of them get ridden a couple of times a year except mine, which gets ridden almost every day. We also have one car per driver - maybe if I hadn’t helped that situation happen, the bikes would get ridden more.

Leinster

I probably don’t need BOTH cargo bikes, but the Yuba is a nicer bike to ride than the Rad, but the Rad has e-assist so is needed for school pickups etc.
I think any self-respecting roadie really ought to have a spare bike in case the one breaks down, or has a flat when you’re due at the group ride. And maybe a 3rd that just gets left hooked up to the trainer.
And there’s nothing wrong with also having a hardtail.

I’ve ridden all my bikes at some point in the last 3-6 months, usually for a perfectly good reason.

BobbyG

I mostly commute, so I have limited route variety. Being able to rotate among 6 bikes helps keep things fresh and interesting. After obtaining my third bike, I noticed the wear and tear on each bike going down.

I don't ride more often, but during the 18 months I worked from home, buying a 4th bike, a used project bike, kept me interested in riding as I fixed it up and modified it.

Trav1s

I have two primary bikes - a nice aluminum hybrid and a vintage hardtale mountain bike, both of which have a purpose. They get most of my time. I have a build under way but I’m not sure will it fit in the landscape but likely a gravel bike to explore the backroads of eastern Ohio.

I have multiple projects that are being updated to sell. I’d like to make a bit of money on a flip but that’s not my primary goal. These are projects to show tangible progress in my life to offset the electronic paper pushing I do for a living. I have one rehome fail that will serve as my “around town” runner with racks - a Trek 730 curb find.

CrimsonEclipse

Main bike (off road): does the heavy lifting
Backup (off road): Rides like meh so it encourages me to fix the main bike faster
MUP bike: with friends who no longer hit the trails
Foul weather bike: I need a cycling hit... NOW. and I don't care that everything is going to get trashed/submerged/gritified.
Something different: Use it occasionally, seemed like a good idea at the time.

Robert C

I ride my e-bike to work.
I have a very slow bike that I ride to lodge meetings and around the neighbourhood
I ride my trike, or conventional recumbent, for longer weekend rides

seypat

The reason I have a lot of bikes is I have a yearly tradition. I ride this event every year.(I couldn't make it last year) Every year, I find an old steel C & V bike, rehab it, and ride that event on it. It only gets a shakedown ride to make sure everything works, some years the day before the event. I've even done stuff like new bar tape in the hotel the night before. It's the ultimate blind test ride to get to know the bike. Never been disappointed yet. Grins the whole ride while feeling out the bikes. Since I missed last year, last year's bike is this year's bike. The cycle continues. I've descended that mountain a couple of time on a early 70's bike with Mafac Racer centerpulls......in the rain. As long as you have enough gearing to get up the hills, it's all good. Exciting stuff!

https://www.ymcacva.org/storming-thunder-ridge

nathand

Glad I'm not the only one in this situation. I have an Xtracycle Edgerunner without a motor which worked fine for a year or two, and then the kids got big enough - and started having activities far enough away - that I needed a motor so I bought another Xtracycle (a Swoop). I've only ridden the EdgeRunner once or twice since I got the Swoop, but there doesn't seem to be much of a market for a motor-less cargo bike these days so I haven't tried to sell it. Maybe I'll put a motor on it eventually. It was helpful the one time we took the kids bike-camping (on an island, with a ferry trip) - my partner took the Swoop, I took the EdgeRunner, and between the two we had enough cargo capacity for all the gear.
I think I'd have fewer bikes if I had a smaller garage - or a larger car (although a minivan is looking really appealing these days). Lots of my neighbors have bike hanging from the ceilings of their garages and I used to swear I'd never let the garage get so crowded that I needed to do that. Of course, there's now 2 bikes hanging from the ceiling in my garage, and I'm trying to figure out where I can put hooks for one or two more.

Leinster

You went camping on Angel Island? Sounds awesome! The ferry connections are too far from here in Napa, last time we tried to take the kids’ bikes to the island we were told that because striders don’t have brakes, they weren’t allowed.

When my LBS had to close a while back I bought a couple of their display racks, so we can stack some of our bikes up in the garage. The 2 cargo bikes still take up by far the most space, though.

nathand

Yes! For one night, last March during the kids spring break (easier to get a reservation not during a weekend). Sorry to be off-topic from the original post, but here's a pair of photos of the cargo bikes loaded up.

RB1-luvr

14 bikes, lots of overlap. I only ride about 2500 miles per year, so none get a lot of use per year. If I find a new bike and like it a lot, it'll get 650 miles the first year.

Leinster

No need to apologise, I think this is part-answering the OP question!

How did you get the bikes to the boat? Do you live near the ferry?

nathand

Yes - we're a mostly-flat 3.5 mile ride from the ferry building. I don't have any way to transport the cargo bikes by car.

Wildwood 

I want to ride them all!

zandoval 

I have 3 bikes I ride on a regular basis rotating them as the conditions and weather demands. But when the family is over all the bikes are out of the stable and on the road. Sometimes even the Wall Hanger!... Ha

Oddly the favored one is a late 1960's Puch/Ted Williams step through set up as a sleeper from the parts bin.

Eric F 

I have a total of 7 bikes. 3 of them - road, gravel, MTB - get ridden regularly, all year long. 1 road bike lives on my trainer, and gets used 1-2x per week during fall and winter, but much less so during times of the year when there is evening daylight. My singlespeed MTB was my only MTB for a while, but these days it gets ridden infrequently. 2 older road bikes have significant sentimental value, and will not get sold, but rarely get ridden.

I have a gravel frameset that was replaced with something newer recently. I have plans to rebuild it into a full bike and sell it. It was a good bike, but served its purpose for me. I could build it into a really nice townie bike, but don't have a realistic way for it to be useful for the way I ride bikes, and the places I go.

3alarmer 

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...I have 20 pairs of boxer shorts, and I can only wear one pair at a time. I don't get the point of this thread ?