This is FatBike Alaska

Fat biking in the Northland! FIRST POST



Here you will find information, resources, photos links to one of the hottest and fastest growing sports in Alaska! FATBIKING

With the upsurge of 'off-the-shelf' products designed specifically for fat tired bicycles the sport continues to grow in Alaska, where off-trail riding is the norm. These industry developments have opened up a whole new realm of biking possibilities for the masses - riding potentials that were only available to skilled mechanics, racing and elite adventurers in the past!

Fatbikes have opened up a new realm of biking here in the Northland...here we go!

Any inquiries directed at this page or other fatbiking information should be emailed to: fatbike.alaska(at)yahoo.com

Blog comments are welcomed...

FatBack is Wired Gadget

Alaskan Snow Bike Rolls Into Sunny California

By Leander Kahney April 18, 2009 | 4:03:41 PM

MONTEREY, Calif. -- Alaskan biker Greg Matyas' Fatback snow bike has huge fat tires and a unique banana-shaped top tube that slopes down in the middle.

The tires are designed for snow and so is the top tube: it slopes to stop you whacking your privates when you step off the pedals and sink into the snow.

"It's saved me many times," Matyas laughed.

Matyas got a lot of admiring looks and 'Cool!' comments as he rode his Fatback bike around the Sea Otter bike show.

Based in Anchorage, Alaska, Matyas custom builds Fatback bikes for customers, some of them who ride on soft sand as well as snow. The bikes start at about $3,000.

"You air down a little bit and it rides better than a full suspension bike," says Matyas, who rides his bike in Alaska year round.

"It's way more fun than staring at the TV," he says. "We have underground race series all year long. After the races, we hang hot around the fire like a bunch of homeless guys with $4,000 bikes. There's a magic to being out in 30 below."

Photos by Jim Merithew/Wired.com

Rabbit Gear Calculator

Tom Kunicki has a calculator with specific features useful for fixed-gear and singlespeed riders; fast and convenient:



Link to the front page of the Rabbit calculator
http://software.bareknucklebrigade.com/


The Standard - Sheldon Brown's gear calculator:
http://www.sheldonbrown.com/gears/

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SS Gearing Discussion:
http://forums.mtbr.com/showthread.php?t=471175

Find the Magic Number for Snowbiking Fatbikes:
http://forums.mtbr.com/showthread.php?t=265028&highlight=winter+ss+gear
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Grease Guarding Surly New Hub

We like the Surly new hubs...they are simple, fairly well made, cost effective and with lots of layup options.

Have built up a number of wheelsets for winter fatbikes using the Surly hubs (w/ Large Marge rims as well as Speedway 70s and 100s). Out of the box and prior to use, we're upgrading the hub with 1) Phil Wood Spec'd bearings and 2) Morningstar Soup / Grease for winter conditions. On a recent rebuild we took it a step further by modifying the hubs and making them grease-able in situ.

Quick, fyi, description: Break the hub down as usual. Prior to reinstall of the bearings we drill a small thru-hole in the body of the hub. The hole is tappered and located dead center on the hub body. Its easier to do this before the wheels are laced-up. Important to clean all shavings and metal filings from the hub; esp the axle cavity. We just black tape the hub to cover the hole.

We remove the seals on each Phil cassette bearing and clean with a good degreaser and repack with Paul Morningstar's Soup. Replace ONLY the outboard seal on the bearing

The hub is then reassembled.

Before adjusting and tightening the endcap, with a small greasegun you can now inject more Morningstar Soup into the center of the hub body. Once the cavity is filled (doesn't take much as the axle fills most of the body void) force / pressure will move grease down through the hub, across the bearings and out the outboard seals...purging the bearing of any unwanteds while refreshing the grease.

Works well on the Surly Hubs. Same concept is applied to Phil Bottom brackets and the platform pedals we use!

[Grease Gurard is a TradeMark of WTB...we DO use some legacy WTB GG hubs, all our bikes have WTB GG headsets and some riders are using the WTB GG pedals]

Martin