And why do I seem want them so much more?



I have flats, cages and clips. I'm planning on a set of John's pedals, the most sinister of all.

If beartraps are supposed to work so much better than platforms, why are they so scary?

Is it the way they look? Just opening up discussion. I realize a good set of concaved dowel pin platforms probably work as well as anything, I just thought this subject might carry, with it, some potential for humor.

I wish I had pics of my shins when I was a kid using beartrap pedals.
I think platforms work just as good. But what do I know I just got back on a bike 5 months ago
from a 21yr hiatus.

remember your shin guards

Ouch! lol. Great shot!

I had both flat and traps......I can attest that platforms are just as scary... I was in Michigan for the 1984 Waterford National and was there 10 minutes, it was raining and I slipped a pedal wearing shorts and ended up taking a nice gash in the shin, which got me 12 stitches - Shimano DX pedals.....then went to the Trog cages which I sharpened before every race..never slipped a pedal with those bad boys!

DX (and all imitators) are THE WORST PEDAL EVER, when wet. Why I don't know, but as great as they are dry, they're that awful when wet. Beartraps will work wet or dry.

I've put in meat flaps from beartraps, platforms not so much.

Look up some Brooklyn Machine Works plats for the scariest pedal ever

is that the one they call the shinburger?

Nice bike!!! ha ha ha

Shredders,grinders, tenderizers.....

I used both BITD and every cut from a slipped peddle with the bear trap cages (which I used to file sharper) left no scars, but the I have a million little round scars on my shins from the DX pedals. Those things were like little puncture wound holes with bruises from the pedal part.

Yes, the beartrap pedals can leave a nice set of scratches on your leg, should you slip them. However, they have better grip over platform pedals. I found the rectangular beartrap pedals gave me better grip than the round ones. The last pair that I bought were made by Mongoose (my daughter is currently using them). I rarely slipped those.

Elvis, that pedal looks like a reconfigured meat tenderizer.

Chicks dig pedal scars. Wear them proudly.

Ride On,
Scott84

GR8, its ironically called the meat tenderizer pedal. Personally, I think DX hurt more when they slammed your shin but I rolled round beartraps way more than the classic DX pedal. I concur that square beartraps are better..for me anyway.

I never really bought a pair of platform pedals BITD. I probably could have gotten used to them, but I didn't like them, because once you initially place your foot on the pedal, it seems gluedI had to actually lift my foot off the pedal. If I had MKS pedals or Suntour pedals, then it had many small teeth, and I could make micro changes in foot position on the pedal.

There's always room for improvement with pedals. Last summer I got some new Time ATAC pedals for my road bike. The design has a raised part behind the clip. This actually caused foot pain for a while, because of mounting and dismounting the bike. Bottom line is 2 pedals are one of the few places the body/clothes make contact to the bike, which is very critical for riding the bike. BITD I used MKS and Suntour, but there was certainly room for improvement.

The meat grinder side of bear traps never bothered me at all.

It was the Ankle Buster part that kept me from ever owning them. If you were a jumper, and liked to do foot removal tricks, the round cages with broad flat sides, were a sure bet for a broken ankle when landing on the edge.

I never broke an ankle, so I guess I'd still do it over the same.

The DX has more mass to back up a shin hit (which made you say; "Shin hit!" bitd...) so the puncture wounds were awesome. Just spin one fast and stick your shin into it. Rotational mass alone was/is enough to cause pain. When you slip a pedal, your foot usually snaps off it at the speed of sound, and spins it at about 439 RPMs, and then your shin stops the rotation in .0038 seconds, along with some down force, for added good measure.

Cages are much lighter, so it's more of a meat grinding threat.

Big air, no footer, land on the edge of a DX...no problem, pedal snaps flat, go do it again. ...(Round) Bear trap? Broken ankle, go to the ER, quit riding for the rest of the summer.

That's why they scared me more anyway.

Good insight, Ted. I never stopped to think about, but it makes sense. I have had a broken foot, but not a broken ankle and that was from a weird foot plant in an oblique depression.

I experimented with can cans bitd and one time I landed flat on my side, on top of the bike. I pounded hard and didn't do too many more can cans after that.

I ran round Suntour beartraps most of the time and had pretty good success. I was a pretty good jumper and got that way using beartraps. My feet stayed on the pedals for the most part, though.

All pedals are prone to munchin, this is the day Rod Byrnes got the name Snakebite...

Good shot, Paul!

Descendents Vans. Very cool!

Many high end road components were adapted to BMX in the early days. Bear trap pedals evolved from road bike pedals that were used for BMX in the early days. They addressed the issues that bastardized road pedals had when used for BMX, primarily small surface area. Bear traps were a great marketing gimmick: round shape, like a trap, inferred your feet would stay put. Sharp teeth also supported this marketing strategy. High-end materials and smooth bearings made them pro-worthy. But as BMX evolved, they're inefficiencies became visible.

For one, the caged pedal became obsolete once Shimano released the DX. DX's stuck like glue and there was less issues with the delicate cages getting bent. DX's were much more durable than anything else at the time.

The round shape really wasn't the best shape for a pedal. I guess they were fine if you had your foot perfectly centered, but anyone who rides BMX knows that never happens. Your feet are always shifting around, and if you have your shoe toward the outside of the pedal, as if your shoe is hanging off the outside of the pedals cage, watch out. Bear traps roll super easy, much easier than anything else out there, and we know what those cages do when that happens. They eat your legs.

There was a time when Hutch pedals were top shelf stuff. I love my originals for what they were, but there is a reason modern BMX pedals look like they do now and not like beartraps.

Those look like the same pedals I've got my bike, except I have blue cages. (Of all the brands they were sold under, Redline seemed to have the nicest shade of blue.) I've always figured they'd do some pretty wicked damage, if I ever slipped them.

It's just hard to find pedals that hold my shoes (Vans forever!) given that I ride with my arch over the spindle.

Very, very well put.

That can ruin a day of riding especially at my age

"Back in my time..."

Here is the pedal technical transition that we went through. This first picture is of Mel Stousenberger at WSA in Orange County, California, Memorial weekend of 1975. (I'm sure some of you remember this time frame. It was just after the 'ice age' receeded)

We did not get many shin gouges with these pedals.



This next picture shows our transition to the 'rat trap' pedal. I walked away from BMX in June of 79 and was still using these pedals. Even with these, I (personally) do not remember any 'nasty' shin scrapes. They did happen, but not as bad as the other pictures in this thread.



I just went out to the garage and took this picture of one of my KKTs. We thought we were being so innovative when we filed points on the round edges at both ends of the pedal. I'm sure they had to help some.

In the first pic I would have been about as old as one of the little blond headed kids to the left. I'm old enough to have had bikes with all of the above pedals, but I am still only just 37.

I don't know about the filed round tips, I'm sure it helped, but having a superhero like you take time to snap pics for this thread is awesome!

More blood please! Lol!

Dude, you were like 3 or 4 in 1975 when that first picture was taken!

MANNNN....

It's a good thing I'm not old.

Yeah, I was actually YOUNGER than those kids. A baby waiting for Star Wars to come out and redefine a generation. Though I didn't know it at the time.

I did, however have a dad cool enough to get his 4 y/o twins the 1976 Farrah Fawcet famous bikini shot t-shirts one short year later.

I wonder if I wore it to the Star Wars opening when I was five? -It's possible

Dennis, you may be no spring chicken, but put it this way. It's going to sure be a tough wait for your BMXA cover Redline when you leave it to me in your will!

I'll put you on the list.

I'd gladly give it up to have you around instead. Plus at least $50.00!

This is why beartraps are scary, a platform can't open you up like this:

Dude, I didn't really mean it! Ouch, that sucks. Did you just do this?

You need some of these square pedals!

I did that back in 2006. I've since switched to DX copies. That little slip bled for over two days and leaked clear stuff for three more after that. Definitely should have gotten it sewn up. The scar is about 2" x 1/4" and doesn't look too bad. It's the top part on the longest cut in that pic, that's where it got me the best, you can kind of see the skin folded over. The rest of it healed up like nothing happened.

oh yes.. i remember all the pedals though not all by name that i had
i had shark bites, bear traps, i think a pair of hutch's, triple traps, jp's....etc etc
they all had the same problem though and the last i counted (about 10 yrs ago) was over 200+ scars from slipped pedals and what not so i bought a pair of dx's (life-changing) and those worked great until some of the pins fell out and i slipped a pedal on them
then i made the best (could've been the worst) decision of my life
i pulled out all of the pegs on the shimano dx's, and drilled them out and put 1/2" self tapping screws in them
THANKFULLY i never slipped a pedal ever again and actually just took them off my bike about 2 months ago
they had been on there since @ 1994 i think
i'll try to post some picks of them soon, looking back though it was the scariest thing i've ever seen on a bike