While riding your bike in freezing weather can be extremely enjoyable, it can also be a challenge. Not only do you have to figure out how to keep your hands and feet warm, but you also need to make sure that whatever you have in your water bottle doesn’t turn into a solid block of ice before you get home. This is not really a problem on short rides when the ambient temperature is just a little below freezing—a regular bicycle water bottle with double-wall construction is usually good enough for rides like this. However, the colder it gets outside the faster your water bottle is going to freeze. The problem is not confined to your water freezing—before that happens the valve on your water bottle is probably going to freeze shut, so even if you have 18 ounces of liquid in your bottle you still won’t be able to get a drink. One solution to this problem is to use a Klean Kanteen Wide Mouth Insulated Water Bottle instead of the water bottle you use during the warmer months.
Klean Kanteen Wide Mouth Insulated Water Bottle
The Klean Kanteen Wide Mouth Insulated Water Bottle is a 100% food-grade stainless steel bottle with high performance vacuum insulation. The folks at Klean Kanteen claim this bottle with insulate hot beverages for up to six hours, and iced drinks up to twenty-four hours. The six-hour time frame for hot beverages is accurate if the bottle is stored at room temperature, but outside in near zero degree weather it is not going to last that long. However, if will keep you liquids drinkable for at least four hours. Since this is a wide mouth bottle you never have to worry about a small valve freezing shut in the winter. However, you will need to stop your bike in order take off the cap and get a drink (that’s not uncommon in winter cycling).
Klean Kanteen Bottles With A Composite Cage
The Klean Kanteen bottle will fit in most bicycle water bottle cages. However, these bottles are a bit wider than normal bicycle water bottles, and if your water bottle cage is made of aluminum it will scratch the Klean Kanteen bottle to pieces in no time at all. To keep from scratching my bottles I replaced the aluminum bottle cages on my winter bikes with a flexible composite cage (I used the Bontrager RL Cage). Since most composite cages have a small “lip” to keep the water bottle in place, I took a Dremel tool and removed the “lip” so the bottle would slide in easier.
The 20-ounce Klean Kanteen Wide Mouth Insulated Water Bottle retails for $28 and is available in several colors, including Black, White, Wild Raspberry, Blue, Gray and Brushed Stainless. This product comes with a lifetime warranty (see the Klean Kanteen Website for complete details).
Casie
December 24, 2012 at 9:22 AM
Those are nice!
All Seasons Cyclist
December 24, 2012 at 11:23 AM
They made me happy — I hate drinking cold beverages when I am already cold.
Joy
December 24, 2012 at 11:46 AM
Wide mouth is the only way to go. Happy holidays!
All Seasons Cyclist
December 24, 2012 at 11:47 AM
It works for me! I guess on a longer ride I could also take some chicken soup with me! Merry Christmas to you and yours!
Wild Juggler
December 24, 2012 at 4:38 PM
Good review. I have 2 of these, but I have used it more during the summer to keep beverages cold, than during the winter. It did a good job of keeping beverages cool during the summer for a few hours, though its main drawback is it is heavier than non-insulated Klean Kanteens of the same size.
All Seasons Cyclist
December 24, 2012 at 5:39 PM
I have never used these in the summer due to their weight. In the winter a few extra ounces doesn’t matter since I’m not moving all that fast in the snow anyway.
cindy9er
December 24, 2012 at 9:41 PM
I am intrigued…I would very much enjoy a coffee on a fun, cold day ride! Thanks for the link!
All Seasons Cyclist
December 24, 2012 at 9:48 PM
A warm drink on a cold day sure beats trying to force down a slushie when you are already freezing!
adventurepdx
December 25, 2012 at 1:48 AM
I have one of these, but use it as my coffee mug. Hydro Flask is another company that is offering food-grade stainless steel insulated water bottles.
And I would recommend the Klean Kanteen composite water bottle cages, as they won’t scratch and they’re designed to hold Klean Kanteen bottles (at least the “regular” sized ones) so no modifications needed.
All Seasons Cyclist
December 25, 2012 at 7:49 PM
Thanks for mentioning the Klean Kanteen water bottle cage — I had missed it!
dimmodd
December 25, 2012 at 2:27 AM
Nice stuff. Did you compare with Nineteen13 One-Hand Vacuum Mug http://goo.gl/E8MNQ
All Seasons Cyclist
December 25, 2012 at 12:09 PM
Sorry, but that is a new product to me — hadn’t seen one before.
Urban Rider
December 26, 2012 at 11:02 PM
That looks like a good bottle. Stanley usually makes good products.
GothicHeartsandBatWings
December 25, 2012 at 10:21 PM
This would do wonders! It insulates (both hot and cold) drinks.
All Seasons Cyclist
December 25, 2012 at 10:22 PM
Haven’t used it int he summer yet — but if next summer is as hot as last summer I will have to break these bottles out — I hate warm hydration drinks!
GothicHeartsandBatWings
December 25, 2012 at 10:26 PM
I know. I hate them too! Especially in the hot Floridian Summer heat.
Urban Rider
December 26, 2012 at 11:00 PM
Your post reminded me of the time I went up the mountain for freestyle ski lessons. I put my water pack with the drinking tube down on the ground…while we did some lessons…of course by the time I got back to it feeling as dry as could be after the exercise….the tube was frozen. I couldn’t get a sip. LOL….An insulated bottle would be perfect for times like that.
All Seasons Cyclist
December 27, 2012 at 12:11 PM
Things like that used to happen to me as well! I used to have bottle freeze up all the time — and a few times after I riding in freezing rain I couldn’t even get the bottle out of the water bottle cage!
samlowephoto
December 29, 2012 at 4:55 PM
…and they’re so danged pretty!
All Seasons Cyclist
December 29, 2012 at 10:26 PM
After I’ve been playing in the mud for a while they don’t look as good — but they clean up real easy!
chestercycling
September 15, 2016 at 3:17 PM
I’ve been using Klean Kanteens on the bike for a while now, although I mostly use them for cold drinks in hot weather, rather than hot drinks in cold weather. With regards to the weight of them, I don’t see it as significant compared to the weight of the water itself. But then I’ve never been that concerned with weight savings on the bike, I figure that after a short while any boost I’d get from losing some weight from my set-up would be compensated for by a proportional weakening of my physique.