I know this isn’t so uncommon especially on compact frames with 700c wheels but how much toe overlap is too much? unsafe?
You will only encounter this problem when you are going very slow. This only happens a lot on cyclocross and mountain bikes, and when starting off from a stop. Otherwise one will never turn the handlebars that much. All of my bikes have this feature. A few times I have scrubbed off speed I didn’t want to in a cyclocross race but it did not cause me any handling problems.
I guess I was looking for a number, like 2cm?
I just got a custom bike (bought the bike shoes from the fitter) and there is at least a 2 INCH overlap. From the looks of it, it’s probably more accurately called arch overlap.
Is this on your time trial bike? You will only be going that slow when starting and stopping and tooling around the parking lot. It’s a lot more trouble on a cyclocross bike on a technical trail and it’s never caused me to fall, just to get pissed at myself for forgetting the problem was there.
Seems to me that it does not matter if you have too much overlap - its whether it is there at all. Either your toe will hit or it won’t…why would it matter if it was 1 mm or 5 inches?
I test rode a small Lucero/700c and was bothered that I had toe overlap as I did a u-turn going uphill. I was worried about that…couple weeks later I realized that I had toe overlap on my road bike after riding it for 3 years! I never realized that my toes overlapped on my road bike.
I do think it would be ideal to not have it…but that being said I don’t think its a big issue but you can hit your toes if you turn tightly at slow speeds while trying to pedal and you may fall - likely not a bad fall but any fall can be bad…
Dave
With my size 12/47 feets I always have overlap. You can design a frame without overlap, but there may be some compromise. Like everyone has mentioned learn to know it is there and deal with it. I like that better than to design a bike around a minimal problem and have a pig for a ride 99% of the time.
Because this is more like arch overlap, I can’t turn the bike more than 10 degrees (very wide turn) before it touches my foot… I don’t think I can turn the corner of a regular street.
Also, my foot begins to overlap the wheel not just at 3 oclock, say, but at 2-4 oclock…know what I mean?
BTW, it’s a road bike, Gunnar brand.
When one is going fast, one actually is countersteering and not steering. If you are going fast and steering - you are not turning as fast as you could.
If you are going that slow on a road bike, you are not going very fast.
Do you have any other bikes? Try turning on them and staying aware of where your handlebars are. If you have any speed at all you will crash because your front tire is skidding before you have the handlebars turned that sharply.