Bicycle clips as bindings?

Hello! So I am relatively new to the mountain boarding community and I have been DIYing a board.

I love to tinker around despite my small budget to do so and I haven’t been able to spend the money for a good pair of MBS bindings. So, I went for some velcro ones from Alibaba, long story short, they aren’t ideal and I have been looking for a new cheap DIY solution that is more reliable than what I have.

Recently I have been looking at new types of already made bindings that I might be able to find in thrift stores or garage sales and the such that is similar to a binding. Like Snowboarding boots, ski shoes, rollerblades, and most recently bike clips.

I was recently given these two pairs of bike shoes that clip into the pedals of your bike so you don’t slip off

and while I don’t have high hopes for these since they come off by twisting, I was wondering what the capabilities of these could be and maybe I can just wear these shoes while I ride?

Has anyone else tried using bicycle clips as bindings?

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This is a pretty wacky idea, I love it. I’ll be interested to hear how it turns out.

One problem I see right off the bat is foot fatigue caused by standing on the clips for an extended period of time. On a bike, most of your weight is usually supported by the seat, and you are only pushing down with the balls of your feet to pedal. On an esk8, you are standing your full weight on the board, and balancing your heel-side and toe-side pressure is very important.

I can see these clips getting in the way of that, and being very uncomfortable to stand on for a long period of time.

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Maybe make a riser that the clips sit in so your foot is supported by a level or concave surface?

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It’s a really novel idea but I notice that people struggle to walk in these things so I’d be surprised if they’d be comfortable enough to handle riding even short distances.

I’d love for you to check though :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

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Interesting idea, but even with bindings on I feel like I do micro adjustments with my feet and that would be something to get used to with the clips

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I had this idea long time ago but didn’t like the idea of using them on anything but proper off-road - kept on thinking they would release me at run off speeds but I’m pretty likely to hurt myself slipping on the soles … I ended up not trying it :joy:

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I was afraid of this as well but the shoes that I received actually have hard bottoms to support the entire foot while pedaling. I am hoping that they will help in balancing the weight through my feet. But if it doesn’t work as expected (probably going to be the case for the pair on the left):

I’ll probably try this if the hard bottoms aren’t enough. and I don’t know if you can see it in the photo, but the pair on the right actually has the clip sunken into the shoe (I heard it was the more expensive pair)

That is a concern of mine as well. I’ve had to do many adjustments because the velcro straps I have now just aren’t good quality and so my feet slide around.
But I am hoping that with these bike shoes I’ll be able to lock my feet into a good position consistently and with the bike shoes being meant to hold your feet tight, hopefully my feet won’t slide around inside the shoe while riding either (changing the feet positioning)

My next concern though is that the bike pedal part is going to be screwed into my board, meaning that if I don’t get the positioning right, I will have to drill/screw in a new hole, which I obviously will only be able to do so many times before ruining the board.

I will definitely update you on this!

This is my biggest concern as well.

With a quick search, these pedals dismount by twisting the heel away from the bike. This is fine for bikes which usually the feet only point forward, but for e-skate, the feet are already sideways and if I hit a bump and it makes my feet go towards the back of the board (sideways on the pedal) I will unhinge.

So, I am really hoping to find a way to add a lock of some sort, like a blocker beside my shoe, or even modify a key into a place where it will only unlock if I have the key removed.

I didn’t even consider getting ejected under heavy breaking :joy:

I doubt very much the angles would match.

I used to love toe clips and straps on my mountain bike - there has to be a cheap binding in there somewhere, some half toe clips look ideal for longboard use

Dremel off a little and screw to deck , I’m very tempted to try some

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I like the simplicity of that toe clip, but it may require a very tight shoe.

What if the user wears a boot/tall shoe?
This clip would hold onto the shoe, but if the toes are free within the shoe, it might defeat the purpose of a toe clip. I’d be nervous having room to float my feet up within my shoe before any resistance.
image

Could be nice for a longboard though where you don’t lean your entire weight to turn.

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I think the bicycle clips are designed to solve an entirely different problem, keep the pedal at the right position under your foot and allow to pull onto the pedal as much as you push on it.
For MTB, you want to hold your foot in place, but also increase the leverage you have on the board either when leaning heelside or toeside. That would put the connecting mechanism more in the center of the foot, instead of towards the toes like in biking. Bit more like snowboard bindings really, when you don’t ever want the heel to lift off the board when leaning toeside.

I feel like step in snowboard bindings would be better suited for this task.

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I was worried about the positioning of the clips but the clip is installed onto a rigid piece of plastic that is built into the shoe and I cannot bend it at all. Hopefully, this will help with distributing the weight throughout the shoe.

I definitely agree that biking clips are designed to solve the up and down stroke of pedals which may not work, but aren’t we just pulling or pushing the board to turn? I am wondering about the possibility of positioning the clips in a suitable way for it to be basically a bike pedal.

Although I am concerned about the angular force on the pedals when we pull on them, but since the pedals rotate in a circular manner, there is bound to be a decent bit of angular force in some way to push or pull the pedal.
Is this enough to hold me? No idea, guess I’ll have to find out!

I also agree that snowboard bindings would be much better for this use case, but they are at least 100$ or more for the bootstraps, and since I live in Florida, I doubt I will have any luck finding any in a thrift store, that’s why I was wondering of the possibility of using Bike clips as a substitute, mostly because I just got some for free but also because biking Clips are cheaper.

This is all just a big guess though!

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For reference, what was it that you didn’t like with your existing bindings? Could you post a pic of them?

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There are bike shoes that are like regular shoes. They’re for urban riding. They would probably work better than regular biking shoes. If you could recess the peddle-clip into your deck, You might be talking.

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My existing bindings are these velcro straps

I don’t like these straps because

  • they move while riding to the point of sometimes coming completely loose on a hard turn.
  • the dirtier they get the worse the velcro is.
  • These only hold my feet well if I make them smaller than my shoe and wedge my foot in
  • I cannot reliably just sit my foot in and crank it down

This is why I was looking for new bindings. (Also because my board is a little small in width, but that is an issue I plan to solve in the future)

I believe I have a pair, I think they have kevlar under the rubber sole of the shoe, but just like you mentioned the clip is seated a little within the shoe.

Shimano designed K2 clickers for Snow-boarding. If a parallel product that was designed for Esk8 were made that would be sick.

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After a quick search, these K2 clickers look really interesting! Could it be possible to DIY a version?

Following this idea, if we could add a couple of well-placed metal clips that could be an idea worth exploring


(this is a photo from their website)