Author Topic: Your bikes Cost per Mile (Read 25314 times)

tom_e · « **Reply #50 on:** 13 March, 2009, 03:00:23 pm »

Am I the only one who does this backwards? After some discussion with the wife a few years ago about how much I should spend on bike/s vs how long I should wait first, we agreed on a budget per mile. I can now spend 15p for every mile I do. Covers the clothes, bike tools etc too. Anybody else gone this way?

I think inverting my maths puts the bike itself at about 9p spent per mile at the moment, but I'm guessing at the percentage spent on bike vs clothes and tools.

I do not want to do this calculation for the mountain bike. Ever. Damn thing eats metal for breakfast.

Edit: I've just realised I need to cycle at 38.2mph to earn minimum wage. $:-\$

TheLurker · « **Reply #51 on:** 13 March, 2009, 03:20:31 pm »

After a bit of googling I turned this up...

Running Cost Tables
: Petrol Cars
- The AA

If I've read the table correctly it costs a minimum of 16p a mile, rising to about 26p, to run a petrol powered car with fuel at 87p a litre.

Makes one feel quite a bit better about forking out 10p a mile for the old ποδήλατο.

Adrian · « **Reply #52 on:** 13 March, 2009, 03:30:44 pm »

Quote from: tom_e on 13 March, 2009, 03:00:23 pm

Am I the only one who does this backwards? After some discussion with the wife a few years ago about how much I should spend on bike/s vs how long I should wait first, we agreed on a budget per mile. I can now spend 15p for every mile I do. Covers the clothes, bike tools etc too. Anybody else gone this way?

Similar, in that a few years ago it was agreed that my bike budget could be the same as my wife's horse budget. Unfortunately since the horse died 7-8 years ago I haven't had an increase.

tom_e · « **Reply #53 on:** 13 March, 2009, 03:36:12 pm »

Quote from: TheLurker on 13 March, 2009, 03:20:31 pm

If I've read the table correctly it costs a minimum of 16p a mile, rising to about 26p, to run a petrol powered car with fuel at 87p a litre.

I think that row is the marginal cost per mile. i.e. no tax, insurance, capital, etc, which are in the fixed cost bit of the table at the top. Table at the bottom summarises total pence per mile for various annual mileages, and it's a bit more painful.

If I stopped commuting by bike, we'd have to run a 2nd car, it'd do <5000 miles per year, so something above 57p/mile in that table.

Greenbank · « **Reply #54 on:** 13 March, 2009, 03:41:54 pm »

Quote from: vorsprung on 13 March, 2009, 02:28:57 pm

So um that's 25000/ 2300 = 10.86p a km
or 6.75p a mile

That'll be 17.48p per mile. Miles are longer than kilometers and therefore the cost will be higher per mile than per kilometer.

[EDIT] Infact, you've got the calculation round the wrong way.

£2300/25000km = 9.2pence per km.
£2300/(25000/1.609344) = 14.8pence per mile.

25000/2300 would be 10.86 kilometers per £ spent.

Naggers · « **Reply #55 on:** 13 March, 2009, 04:03:17 pm »

I bet you're all glad I started this

My head is hurting just reading it

Naggers · « **Reply #56 on:** 13 March, 2009, 04:07:40 pm »

Quote from: tom_e on 13 March, 2009, 03:00:23 pm

Am I the only one who does this backwards? After some discussion with the wife a few years ago about how much I should spend on bike/s vs how long I should wait first, we agreed on a budget per mile. I can now spend 15p for every mile I do. Covers the clothes, bike tools etc too. Anybody else gone this way?

I used to do something similar. I could justify new kit or upgrades with the money I saved on Station carparking.

PaulF · « **Reply #57 on:** 13 March, 2009, 04:12:48 pm »

Well my bikes running at about £11/mile at the moment. I've not had it 2 weeks yet

Greenbank · « **Reply #58 on:** 13 March, 2009, 04:22:24 pm »

Quote from: tom_e on 13 March, 2009, 03:00:23 pm

Am I the only one who does this backwards? After some discussion with the wife a few years ago about how much I should spend on bike/s vs how long I should wait first, we agreed on a budget per mile. I can now spend 15p for every mile I do. Covers the clothes, bike tools etc too. Anybody else gone this way?

Hmm. I thought that was a high figure (for my situation) until I worked it out for my details:-

My train ticket (no travelcard, just Putney -> Waterloo) would be £600 a year. My commute is 8 miles each way.

£600 / (16 miles * 226 work days a year) = 16.6p per mile.

I've spent £1200 on the bike and bits (not including clothes or general tools) in 2 years. So I'm roughly sticking to this, but then it's also done 4000 miles of Audaxes which has a non-zero contribution to the wear and tear.

But then I also got the train about 100 times last year, at £4 a pop, so that's £400 of that £600 a year bike bits budget gone. I hope to keep it under 50 train journeys this year (eeek, 25 already so far this year!).

rogerzilla · « **Reply #59 on:** 13 March, 2009, 06:54:09 pm »

My commuting bike costs about 3p per mile in oil, brake pads and tyres, which I found surprisingly high. Factor in a chain every 1500 miles, a sprocket every 4500 miles, a set of new mudguards every time they crack and fall off, and a new rear rim every 3000 miles and it might nudge 5p per mile.

Hot Flatus · « **Reply #60 on:** 13 March, 2009, 07:43:15 pm »

Quote from: rogerzilla on 13 March, 2009, 06:54:09 pm

Factor in a chain every 1500 miles

Yeah, but thats only about £15 every 20 years

arabella · « **Reply #61 on:** 17 March, 2009, 11:32:23 am »

fixed - about 3p/km
skip bike - less than that
small bike - £2.50/km
loaned out bike (vtt) - less than 2p/km
corky - about 10p/km
noname - about 50p
tandem - probably similar

The higher cost/km relates to more recent purchses = less time to get in km and higher initial cost.

I suspect I have underestimated on tandem, corky and noname, though even if I double it still sounds not too bad

tiermat · « **Reply #62 on:** 17 March, 2009, 11:38:19 am »

Spot the difference:

Old Claud Butler Roubaix: (((cost new (£450) - sold for (£200)) + servicing (£250) + wheels (£80)/miles (7500)) = £580/7500 = 7.73p/mile
New Ridley Triton T: (cost new (£1290)/miles(200)) = £6.45 /mile!!!!!!!!!!!

TheLurker · « **Reply #63 on:** 28 January, 2010, 12:07:01 pm »

Just worked mine out for this year (a Lurker's cycling year runs start February - end January). An improvement on last year at 85p per 10 miles over 4,500 miles set against the 08/09 figure of 96p per 10 miles over the same distance. That includes clothes and tools as well as consumables like tyres, brake blocks and oil.

I could have kept the cost down by not having the LBS service the cranky old grid, but as the service included a new bottom bracket and middle chain ring I might have spent more on tools and or getting the LBS to fix everything after I'd stuffed it up.

For comparison the cage cost me somewhere around about 1.64 per 10 miles (petrol, service, MOT, insurance, VED &tc) for the year over 10,000 miles which tallies with the lower end of some mileage rates I've seen for car cost/mile.

mrcharly-YHT · « **Reply #64 on:** 28 January, 2010, 12:25:27 pm »

The ribble is working out at about 7p per mile. Not bad.

alexb · « **Reply #65 on:** 28 January, 2010, 01:10:11 pm »

Cost (total with all mods). ~£750
Ave kilometrage per week ~ 150
so far, 9 weeks usage 1350km
55p/km (or have I made a fool of myself with the maths?!)

More telling is comparison against public transport costs
9 weeks travel (public transport) at daily travelcard rate £387
at weekly rate £271.80
at monthly rate £232 (approx)

A yearly season for the same route costs
£1208
My pay back point should come in at about 7 months assuming usualy usage of tyres etc.

Greenbank · « **Reply #66 on:** 28 January, 2010, 01:18:25 pm »

I wouldn't be surprised if the extra food needed to provide the extra 500kcal (given that I'm not running a deficit to lose weight) is more expensive than the bike per mile.

*thinks*

£2 for 500kcal is a reasonable estimate of some total of food/drink consumed a day (£10 for 2500kcal = a day's food). That 500kcal is expended in 15 miles, so that's 13p per mile for the extra food.

GruB · « **Reply #67 on:** 28 January, 2010, 10:25:04 pm »

Since discovering the therapeutic benefits of Assos, I am not going to even begin to contemplate the bike costs per miles as I will undoubtedly still have thousands and thousands of miles to go until I begin to even creep towards breaking even.

Wendy · « **Reply #68 on:** 28 January, 2010, 10:25:55 pm »

Quote from: Grub on 28 January, 2010, 10:25:04 pm

Since discovering the therapeutic benefits of Assos, I am not going to even begin to contemplate the bike costs per miles as I will undoubtedly still have thousands and thousands of miles to go until I begin to even creep towards breaking even.

Not to mention carbon fibre tailboxes, HED and Planet X wheels, and all sorts of other very expensive malarky.

GruB · « **Reply #69 on:** 28 January, 2010, 10:28:36 pm »

Exposure lights.
Lumicycle lights.
Hope bits and bobs i.e. ceramic bottom brackets

fred the great · « **Reply #70 on:** 29 January, 2010, 08:35:53 am »

Most people seem to be forgetting their bikes' residual value, annual depreciation allowance, loan interest if applicable, investment interest and of course bike replacement, i.e. an increased purchase price!

Major additions like new wheels would increase Capital costs whilst tyres and smaller bits and pieces would be mostly down to running costs.

Then if you want to cost it correctly, you should employ an Accountant

TheLurker · « **Reply #71 on:** 29 January, 2010, 08:43:48 am »

Quote from: marbeaux on 29 January, 2010, 08:35:53 am

Most people seem to be forgetting their bikes' residual value, <bean counter waffle deleted>
Then if you want to cost it correctly, you should employ an Accountant

Stop touting for trade*.

For the sake of this reply TheLurker assumes marbeaux is a bean-counter and offers (heartfelt) apologies in advance if this is not the case. If it is not then it is evident that marbeaux has had sanity threatening levels of exposure to bean-counters and should seek immediate medical and psychiatric advice.

fred the great · « **Reply #72 on:** 29 January, 2010, 10:52:55 am »

Fail

mrcharly-YHT · « **Reply #73 on:** 29 January, 2010, 11:05:04 am »

I believe Marbeaux is a project manager (cue the monkey joke).

Wendy · « **Reply #74 on:** 29 January, 2010, 11:08:58 am »

Quote from: marbeaux on 29 January, 2010, 08:35:53 am

Most people seem to be forgetting their bikes' residual value, annual depreciation allowance, loan interest if applicable, investment interest and of course bike replacement, i.e. an increased purchase price!

Major additions like new wheels would increase Capital costs whilst tyres and smaller bits and pieces would be mostly down to running costs.

Then if you want to cost it correctly, you should employ an Accountant

Errrr.... no. I just don't want to talk about the full cost per mile.