I ride to class and back every day. 3 miles round trip.
It’s all paved street, but some of it gets covered with hard ice, and it’s never plowed.
Can I spike my 28"X1.75 tire and still have it be okay for riding on the plowed paved asphalt and concrete? I was thinking just short spikes on the sides of the tire or something. Opinions/advice?
Ironically enough (SF hasn’t gotten snow that sticks in centuries) I’ve done this with one of my unicycles. It works fine, however you may be concerned aobu those spikes catching on your jeans or pants. Gawd they’re nasty.
I’ve ridden black ice before, and if it’s not that common, why don’t you just nget used to riding it (read, walk). It is ridable, but I don’t think spikes would be worth it.
I wouldn’t bother spikeing the tire it’s not worth it beyond the novelty.
Dave
You can buy studded road tyres, continental Nordic Spike, nokian do one too, I think schwalbe do.
Joe
(my experience is only on 2.3"+, and Coker tires)
have you tried riding on the ice yet? you will find that you have an incredible amount of control on the ice as you are able to really control yourself well using alot of extra ‘body language’
90 degree turns on ice sidewalks are even do-able, as you are able to keep your weight over the wheel much more so than a bike.
unicycling in the ice and snow is even easier than walking through it
really lower your air pressure for even greater control (low enough that you wouldn’t want to hop on it, if needed, like for on skidoo trails)
to your point…spikes (I screwwed screws outwards on my mountainbike which worked fine) would help on the ice, or even on wooden stunts, but I wouldn’t bother with them (they would be great for wooden stunts though)
On a bike, the nokian studded tires are ok for paved roads without any ice.
Thanks for the responses.
Yeah, I’ve ridden on ice before, and I’ve been riding on ice the last week, and it’s not good stuff.
I might try it with thumbtacks (push-pins) on the sides angled so they don’t immediately break off. Would be a cheap experiment and reversible (unlike big screw holes.)
the sides aren’t your problem, do it on the main wearing part of the tire
pushpins would bend and become useless immediately i think
you’d be better off with chains or some kind of wire. Maybe coathangers wrapped around the entire wheel…
can’t argue with $55cdn!
I find that a unicycle works surprisingly well on ice. I’ve ridden mine a few times when it was almost too slippery to walk, certainly too bad to ride a bike safely, and it handled almost normally. This was on my muni with 3" DH tyre, but the ice was too hard for the knobbles to dig in. It also seems to grip well on wet wooden bridges that are lethal on a bike. The only reason I can think of is that all the weight is on one tyre and steering movements are much more subtle than on a bike.
I crashed twice today on ice. Definately gotta do something. 
Could you possibly improve technique? I agree mostly with what has been said, if I keep my weight centered on the wheel, and dont slouch forward or lean excessively into turns, riding on ice isnt much different than normal.
Not at the speeds I ride. 
28" wheel with 89mm cranks, and I’m always late everywhere I’m going.
I should probably add that mostly I just want to do it for the coolness factor. No class after tomorrow, and I need something to occupy my time. 
i agree thats the way to go.
I think this depends a lot on what surface is under the ice and how ‘icy’ the ice is. Whilst usually the ice is cool to ride over, there are a few places on my commute where you just can’t ride if there’s ice. One of them is on the side of a hill and tilted down the hill, side on to the path, over a completely smooth surface and gets black ice, which you can hardly see and sends you sliding the moment you ride onto it. There are some places where a bit of ice is fine, you just keep the coker going smooth and don’t mess with it.
The surface we play hockey on is a bit sketchy if it ices up, we’ve had one or two times when we couldn’t even mount, let alone ride on it.
Incidentally, I’ve been told that ice is in some ways worst in places with relatively mild climates, because it gets warm in the day and melts the snow and then freezes up in the evening into a really thin and slick sheetof ice, which is exactly when a studded tyre would be nice.
The nasty thing about ice is that whilst it’s fine 9 times out of 10, the 10% of times when you lose it, you fall really fast and suddenly and it hurts lots. If you put your feet down you’re likely to slip on your feet too.
Joe
the screws in the tire idea is easy and cheep. i have done it with decent results for the time and effort required. definitely use the bolt cutters and make em’ short tho. aalso dont be afraid of putting screws in the tire then removing them later, they dont affect the tire any. i have a gazz 2.6 i have used for over 2 years that was studded. all that happens is the tread wears slightly faster but barely noticableexcept each tread has a little hole in it.
that was my option. just get a nice chain for snow for a bike tyre
Chase