How to determine bike size

How do you determine bike size when it's only identified as man's 26"?
I'm considering buying a comfort bike. My riding will be mostly paved or
pebbled roads/paths and only occasional dirt trails. I don't want to spend
more than $200.
I have a 26" beach cruiser with 6 gears. It'a OK for the street, but feels
too small.
Sporting goods stores identify the frame size and post recommendations based
on your leg size. But many bikes are only identified as 26".
How can you tell the size of those bikes? Is there a place to measure or are
there several measurements?

On Sep 25, 9:39 pm, "William Andersen" wrote:
How do you determine bike size when it's only identified as man's 26"?
I'm considering buying a comfort bike. My riding will be mostly paved or
pebbled roads/paths and only occasional dirt trails. I don't want to spend
more than $200.
I have a 26" beach cruiser with 6 gears. It'a OK for the street, but feels
too small.
Sporting goods stores identify the frame size and post recommendations based
on your leg size. But many bikes are only identified as 26".
How can you tell the size of those bikes? Is there a place to measure or are
there several measurements?

26" is the wheel size, and that's all they're going to tell you. The
most common measurement is seat tube, which is usually measured from
the center of the crank spindle to the top of the seat tube clamp.

These days, though, "effective top tube" length is probably more
important because long seatposts and sloping top tubes make the seat
tube length mean less. Effective top tube is measured from the top of
the TT/Head tube junction to the seatpost, along a level plane.

Because *-marts and department stores won't have these dimensions,
bring a tape measurer and measure them yourself. As long as you're
consistent in how you do it, you can compare to your current bike and
get some meaningful info.

William Andersen wrote:
How do you determine bike size when it's only identified as man's 26"?
I'm considering buying a comfort bike. My riding will be mostly paved or
pebbled roads/paths and only occasional dirt trails. I don't want to spend
more than $200.
I have a 26" beach cruiser with 6 gears. It'a OK for the street, but feels
too small.
Sporting goods stores identify the frame size and post recommendations based
on your leg size. But many bikes are only identified as 26".
How can you tell the size of those bikes? Is there a place to measure or are
there several measurements?




Some big bike shops in my area have used bikes they take in on trades.
If you can do it, my advice would be to go to such a shop and try new
and used bikes until you figure out what size you really need. You may
find a bike on your own for your price, but you could easily make a $200
mistake. I have also rented bikes while on vacation. For me it was
another good way of figuring out whether I might really like a different
type of bike or whether I should start looking for something else.
Sometimes rental places sell their rental bikes in the off season. Good
luck, whatever you do.

On Tue, 25 Sep 2007 21:39:57 -0700, "William Andersen" wrote:

How do you determine bike size when it's only identified as man's 26"?
I'm considering buying a comfort bike. My riding will be mostly paved or
pebbled roads/paths and only occasional dirt trails. I don't want to spend
more than $200.
I have a 26" beach cruiser with 6 gears. It'a OK for the street, but feels
too small.
Sporting goods stores identify the frame size and post recommendations based
on your leg size. But many bikes are only identified as 26".
How can you tell the size of those bikes? Is there a place to measure or are
there several measurements?

If all they say is the wheel size then the bike doesn't have a size or is a "one
size fits all."

You could measure it yourself if you liked, but I'd take the seller at his
example that in the case of that particular bike there's no point. If he
doesn't measure or publish a size for the bike then it isn't worth your or my
trouble.

William Andersen wrote:
How do you determine bike size when it's only identified as man's 26"?
I'm considering buying a comfort bike. My riding will be mostly paved or
pebbled roads/paths and only occasional dirt trails. I don't want to spend
more than $200.
I have a 26" beach cruiser with 6 gears. It'a OK for the street, but feels
too small.
Sporting goods stores identify the frame size and post recommendations based
on your leg size. But many bikes are only identified as 26".
How can you tell the size of those bikes? Is there a place to measure or are
there several measurements?

That's a good question actually.
Specifically, frame size is center of crank to top of frame where the
seat post inserts (variant- crank center to centerline of top tube, real
or imagined)

Less expensive bikes are often sold by wheel size, 20" = 5~7 YO child,
24" = grammar school 'youth', 26" for 'adult'.

Many of those mass market models, both 26" & 700C wheel, offer Gents and
Ladies style frames.

Better mass-market or inexpensive 'bike shop' models are small, medium,
large and higher volume bicycles add in x-small and/or XL and/or 2
sizes in open frame or 'ladies'.

Midrange nicer bikes usually span 48 to 62cm in every other cm (either
48, 50, 52 or 49, 51, 53 etc). That roughly covers about 90% of adults
fairly well given available hardware (posts , stems, bars, etc).

The top models in our industry are done in every cm with a choice of top
tube lengths.

This is not different from clothing. An $8 T shirt is S-M-L but a nice
Italian or British suit is tailored just for you.
--
Andrew Muzi
www.yellowjersey.org
Open every day since 1 April, 1971

"William Andersen" wrote in message
...
How do you determine bike size when it's only identified as man's 26"?
I'm considering buying a comfort bike. My riding will be mostly paved or
pebbled roads/paths and only occasional dirt trails. I don't want to spend
more than $200.
I have a 26" beach cruiser with 6 gears. It'a OK for the street, but feels
too small.
Sporting goods stores identify the frame size and post recommendations
based on your leg size. But many bikes are only identified as 26".
How can you tell the size of those bikes? Is there a place to measure or
are there several measurements?

I know what others have said, but for a $200 bike, none of this will really
matter as it's really hard to know what "feels too small" means and hard to
know what one could hope to accomplish with a "properly fitting" bike where
you don't want to spend any money. The best that you can do is to make sure
that you can raise the seat high enough (so that your legs are almost
straight at the 6 o'clock position on the crank), and that you can
comfortably stand on the ground and still have an inch or more clearance
between the top tube and your crotch. ...given that you want a "comfort
bike" - this probably means that you will also want your handlebars to be
several inches above the seat when adjusted as I mentioned above (completely
opposite to what most serious riders want - bars level with the seat or up
to 4" below - or even sometimes more). ...any more fit than this pretty
much requires a more expensive bike or swapping out parts. Instead of taking
a tape measure, I would take a few allen wrenches to the store and raise the
seat and see what kind of adjustments you're able to do with the bars. If
they can't be placed where they are somewhat tolerable, get a different size
(or better yet, a larger budget).

Jeff


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On Wed, 26 Sep 2007 21:09:39 -0500, "Jeff" wrote:


"William Andersen" wrote in message
...
How do you determine bike size when it's only identified as man's 26"?
I'm considering buying a comfort bike. My riding will be mostly paved or
pebbled roads/paths and only occasional dirt trails. I don't want to spend
more than $200.
I have a 26" beach cruiser with 6 gears. It'a OK for the street, but feels
too small.
Sporting goods stores identify the frame size and post recommendations
based on your leg size. But many bikes are only identified as 26".
How can you tell the size of those bikes? Is there a place to measure or
are there several measurements?

I know what others have said, but for a $200 bike, none of this will really
matter as it's really hard to know what "feels too small" means and hard to
know what one could hope to accomplish with a "properly fitting" bike where
you don't want to spend any money. The best that you can do is to make sure
that you can raise the seat high enough (so that your legs are almost
straight at the 6 o'clock position on the crank), and that you can
comfortably stand on the ground and still have an inch or more clearance
between the top tube and your crotch. ...given that you want a "comfort
bike" - this probably means that you will also want your handlebars to be
several inches above the seat when adjusted as I mentioned above (completely
opposite to what most serious riders want - bars level with the seat or up
to 4" below - or even sometimes more). ...any more fit than this pretty
much requires a more expensive bike or swapping out parts. Instead of taking
a tape measure, I would take a few allen wrenches to the store and raise the
seat and see what kind of adjustments you're able to do with the bars. If
they can't be placed where they are somewhat tolerable, get a different size
(or better yet, a larger budget).

Jeff
Or a set of different bars. Since I passed 45 I'm partial to a "north
road" style bar.

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