Bob W wrote: > If it's anything like tyre pressures then it's probably good for 440lb > [1]. > > As I understand things, to decide the maximum tyre pressure they > inflate them until they burst. They then declare the maximum pressure > to be half the bursting pressure. > > [1] Caveat: I am not a test engineer. Any attempt to exceed the stated > maximum is at your own risk. Don't sue me - I haven't any money.
Some time ago I was asked how to find out what weight a cycle would take by two of my friends, who were overweight. They were both tall and suspected they may have to lose weight first. As cycling is low impact exercise on joints, I thought it made sense for them to cycle as soon as possible, especially as you see improvement quickly. I lost 30Kg myself in 2010 by adding cycling for an hour or to my day for six months and cutting out snacks. Oddly enough, it was really difficult to find that information, although you could find just about anything else out! One or two manufacturers do hide the details in the fine print of the specifications, and this is my rough guide from Summer 2011. Most good quality metal frames (Reynolds 501 and above with the exception of 753) will have a top end weight of 125Kg. Many metal framed mountain bikes are about the same, but don't expect to do anything other than normal easy cycling at the top limit. I didn't look at carbon, as the frames were not being included in suitable cycles for the task. Many cargo bikes take 150Kg (and in fact my friends bought two of these - I think the Kona Ute?), but all the weights are all in, so for the cargo bike that's the rider, shopping and anything else you may be carrying. This is just a FWIW posting, but there are lots of very overweight folk in society which decide to use cycling to lose weight (a good thing should they so choose to do lose weight that way), but are often sold unsuitable cycles for the job. I would have thought there was a market for stronger cycles, or at least the information about any weight limit should be up front in big print. A catastrophic frame failure on the go is never going to be a good thing. However, my 'research' as such is 4 years old and I hope the industry has moved on. Malcolm -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List [email protected] http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
