Busch & Mueller 6 Dynamo
I have ridden the Biria in the snow several times now, and also at night. The Nokian tires work fine, even on packed snow or ice patches. The bottle generator that was supplied with the bike - a Basta or similar brand - had slippage problems in rain or snow. The stock generator didn't have a way to adjust its tension against the tire, and the driven wheel was serrated plastic.
I swapped out the stock generator with a Busch and Mueller Dymotec 6, which I had installed on another bike. The Dymotec 6 has a small knob near the base that allows one to tighten the tension when riding in rain, which works well. The standard Dymotec wheel has a notched rubber "tire", and this can be replaced with a wire wheel for use in rain or snow (shown in picture above). The wire wheel works passably well, but can still slip when the tire becomes encrusted with ice. Also, it is visibly wearing away at the tire sidewall after a few nighttime trips. Dymotec 6's have become much more expensive since I bought mine - I suspect because of the weak dollar (Busch & Mueller is a German company).
The ideal solution to night-time winter riding would be a Shimano generator hub built into the front wheel. 
posted by JustinH @ 2/12/2005 06:01:00 PM
2 Comments:
Yes!!! basta is crap for dynamo's i had one as well. Now i have a huge dynamo like yours it's brilliant.
The S6's are supposed to have even less friction than the 6, which already seems pretty good. The S6, though, is about $100...for that much, one might as well get a wheel built around a hub dynamo for $125-175 or so.
Are hub dynamos uncommon over there? Most people here use battery lights, if they use lights at all.
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