I’ve been experimenting with various bells over the last few years. I haven’t had a bell on my bike for about 12+ years prior to that, and never really needed one until Covid. It seemed that Covid unearthed a whole new generation of walkers, runners and dog walkers… that now use a lot of the paths that they never did pre 2020!
In my ‘bike stuff’ drawer in the garage I’ve pulled out the ones I could find without digging too deep. The pink flower one is / was my daughters - honest! The others were either purchased, or came free with bikes. I’ve tried them all though.
The first few are generic bells. Basically pull lever, let it go, and they ding. I think everyone has probably tried one of these or similar. The pink one seems more mechanical and I bet if I opened it up, it’d have some sort of gear type mechanism inside.
I’ve spent a lot of effort (and money) making my cockpit as simple / clean as possible… wireless shifters, wireless dropper, and for symmetry sake - my Garmin mount is in the centre. I don’t want a big bulky bell messing it up.
The next bell in the line is a slight twist on the regular bell. Mine is a non branded one from eBay that cost about £3.50 (or 3 for £10 in my case). It’s a knockoff of a “Knog Oi Classic” bell. It’s small and neat, and fits nicely in the space between my brakes and grips. It’s barely visible. Same method as the others, pull the lever back and let it go - and it dings. Quite loud and effective given its tiny size. I’ve actually broken 2 of these already… but I bet if I’d bought the proper Knog one, that wouldn’t be an issue.
Anyway… what I find with ANY bell is that you startle the runner / walker / dog when you ‘ding’ it. I’ve had people jump a mile, and even some get quite aggressive. If I don’t ding and go past them, then they also take offence and sometimes shout… “have you never heard of a bell?” they shout. Can’t win!
Before bells, I would generally pull the rear brake on and do a little skid on approach (which would also make them shit themselves…) but it didn’t cause the same offence as dinging a bell. I think people think that the cyclist thinks (a lot of thinking) they’re entitled and have priority - so dinging a bell winds a lot of them up.
My next purchase was a Timber bell… and I went with the bolt on one. As soon as you enter a populated area, you flick the switch and the bell dings itself with every bump / or rocking motion of the bike. You can also make it ding harder / louder by pumping your forks if you feel the need! Basically, the whole time you’re riding the trail you hear ding ding ding ding… and to be honest, after a while you forget about it. I wear earbuds when riding, which numb it a little… but I have the volume so low, it doesn’t make much difference.
What I found with the Timber bell is that the walkers / runners / dogs etc are much more responsive to it. They hear you coming from way back, and make an effort to get out of the way. No startled bunnies standing in the way… they actually react before you reach them. I’ve had various people stop me and offer their thanks, and comment on what a good idea it was.
Sounds good right?!
What I then realised is that even when you switch the Timber bell off, a big hit on your bike can still make it ‘ding’. It’s also not the nicest looking thing on my bars. The one I have required me to remove brakes / gears / grips from the bar and slide it on… so it was a bit of a pain if I wanted to remove it. I also had an unfortunate incident with my previous bike - when I came off, the bars turned, and the Timber bell (which I had up near the stem) scraped my headtube.
A lot of my riding is trail centres where there are no runners / walkers etc… so a bell is unnecessary. Part of me wished I’d bought the removable one… but at £35 it seemed an expensive mistake.
Back into eBay, and I found the knock off version of Timber - for about £11.50. 4 weeks it took to come from China, and when I got it - it was broken. The plastic next to where the rubber band clips in has come away. Looks like a broken clip. It still works, but it looks a bit… errr… broken? It’s also another example of “buy cheap, pay dear”.
Thankfully, I contacted the seller and they offered a refund without any hassle, and said just to keep it.
You can see it has some stuck on squishy foam for the bars, and it came with 2 different sized rubber bands for fitting.
It works exactly like the Timber bell, but just feels like a cheap knockoff. The on off switch feels like it has less bite, the foam looks naff like someone’s cut a bit of draught excluder with a Stanley knife and stuck it on with doubles sided tape, and the rubber bands feel like they’ll have a limited lifespan.
That brings me to my latest purchase - the Timber V4 quick release.
Same functionality of my original Timber bell, but I can simply unhook it and take it off the bars when I don’t need it. If I’m riding straight from my house and know I’m going to be on paths where I encounter people / dogs… then I clip the bell on. If I’m going to a trail centre, then I leave it at home. It has 3 different rubber inserts to cope with all sizes of bars - which need to be screwed into place. It’s just feels much better quality than the knockoff one.
What I’ve noticed today, is that the V4 ‘bolt on’ Timber bell now has a hinged clasp - so could be fitted by just removing the screw rather than having to slide it along the bars like my one.
It’s also easier to adjust on the trail than the bolt on. There’s a correct angle for the bell, so that it rings even when on flat. A few degrees off vertical helps.
It ties in quite well when pushed against the stem... and because you only need to "switch it" on and off on rare occasion, it doesn't matter than you need to take your hand off the bars to do it. It can also be removed in about 5 seconds for the rides when it's not needed.
The downside to ANY bell is that a lot of the people doing their activities in the woods / trails have earbuds or headphones on, and no matter how loud you ding… they can’t hear you. I’ve seen me shouting ‘excuse me’ almost at the top of my voice when a guy walking on a narrow path in front had big noise cancelling headphones on… so loud that I could hear his music above mine!
I crept along behind him for a few minutes before he had that ‘there’s someone behind me’ feeling and looked round - then apologised profusely! Even if I’d had an air horn, I don’t think he’d have heard me!
So there we have it. My roundup of some bells! My recommendation is a Timber bell based on the reactions from other forest path users. If you want to spend the minimum time slowing down to get past people, the Timber bell is the way to go. As you approach, they’ve already pulled their extending dog leads in, and moved into the side of the path… or the groups 4 wide who think they’re walking the yellow brick road have got down to single file! You could ding, ding, ding a manual bell as you approach instead, but the Timber bell lets you carry on care free. It does mean you spend half your ride saying ‘thank you’… but at least I’m not slowing down!
I would also recommend buying the genuine article rather than a cheap clone - whether Timber or Knog or any others out there. They’re expensive for a reason. They’ve had proper R&D, QC, and probably come with a warranty and will likely last a lot longer than the original.
Disclaimer… this is MY opinion, and MY experiences… and yours might be different
In my ‘bike stuff’ drawer in the garage I’ve pulled out the ones I could find without digging too deep. The pink flower one is / was my daughters - honest! The others were either purchased, or came free with bikes. I’ve tried them all though.
The first few are generic bells. Basically pull lever, let it go, and they ding. I think everyone has probably tried one of these or similar. The pink one seems more mechanical and I bet if I opened it up, it’d have some sort of gear type mechanism inside.
I’ve spent a lot of effort (and money) making my cockpit as simple / clean as possible… wireless shifters, wireless dropper, and for symmetry sake - my Garmin mount is in the centre. I don’t want a big bulky bell messing it up.
The next bell in the line is a slight twist on the regular bell. Mine is a non branded one from eBay that cost about £3.50 (or 3 for £10 in my case). It’s a knockoff of a “Knog Oi Classic” bell. It’s small and neat, and fits nicely in the space between my brakes and grips. It’s barely visible. Same method as the others, pull the lever back and let it go - and it dings. Quite loud and effective given its tiny size. I’ve actually broken 2 of these already… but I bet if I’d bought the proper Knog one, that wouldn’t be an issue.
Anyway… what I find with ANY bell is that you startle the runner / walker / dog when you ‘ding’ it. I’ve had people jump a mile, and even some get quite aggressive. If I don’t ding and go past them, then they also take offence and sometimes shout… “have you never heard of a bell?” they shout. Can’t win!
Before bells, I would generally pull the rear brake on and do a little skid on approach (which would also make them shit themselves…) but it didn’t cause the same offence as dinging a bell. I think people think that the cyclist thinks (a lot of thinking) they’re entitled and have priority - so dinging a bell winds a lot of them up.
My next purchase was a Timber bell… and I went with the bolt on one. As soon as you enter a populated area, you flick the switch and the bell dings itself with every bump / or rocking motion of the bike. You can also make it ding harder / louder by pumping your forks if you feel the need! Basically, the whole time you’re riding the trail you hear ding ding ding ding… and to be honest, after a while you forget about it. I wear earbuds when riding, which numb it a little… but I have the volume so low, it doesn’t make much difference.
What I found with the Timber bell is that the walkers / runners / dogs etc are much more responsive to it. They hear you coming from way back, and make an effort to get out of the way. No startled bunnies standing in the way… they actually react before you reach them. I’ve had various people stop me and offer their thanks, and comment on what a good idea it was.
Sounds good right?!
What I then realised is that even when you switch the Timber bell off, a big hit on your bike can still make it ‘ding’. It’s also not the nicest looking thing on my bars. The one I have required me to remove brakes / gears / grips from the bar and slide it on… so it was a bit of a pain if I wanted to remove it. I also had an unfortunate incident with my previous bike - when I came off, the bars turned, and the Timber bell (which I had up near the stem) scraped my headtube.
A lot of my riding is trail centres where there are no runners / walkers etc… so a bell is unnecessary. Part of me wished I’d bought the removable one… but at £35 it seemed an expensive mistake.
Back into eBay, and I found the knock off version of Timber - for about £11.50. 4 weeks it took to come from China, and when I got it - it was broken. The plastic next to where the rubber band clips in has come away. Looks like a broken clip. It still works, but it looks a bit… errr… broken? It’s also another example of “buy cheap, pay dear”.
Thankfully, I contacted the seller and they offered a refund without any hassle, and said just to keep it.
You can see it has some stuck on squishy foam for the bars, and it came with 2 different sized rubber bands for fitting.
It works exactly like the Timber bell, but just feels like a cheap knockoff. The on off switch feels like it has less bite, the foam looks naff like someone’s cut a bit of draught excluder with a Stanley knife and stuck it on with doubles sided tape, and the rubber bands feel like they’ll have a limited lifespan.
That brings me to my latest purchase - the Timber V4 quick release.
Same functionality of my original Timber bell, but I can simply unhook it and take it off the bars when I don’t need it. If I’m riding straight from my house and know I’m going to be on paths where I encounter people / dogs… then I clip the bell on. If I’m going to a trail centre, then I leave it at home. It has 3 different rubber inserts to cope with all sizes of bars - which need to be screwed into place. It’s just feels much better quality than the knockoff one.
What I’ve noticed today, is that the V4 ‘bolt on’ Timber bell now has a hinged clasp - so could be fitted by just removing the screw rather than having to slide it along the bars like my one.
It’s also easier to adjust on the trail than the bolt on. There’s a correct angle for the bell, so that it rings even when on flat. A few degrees off vertical helps.
It ties in quite well when pushed against the stem... and because you only need to "switch it" on and off on rare occasion, it doesn't matter than you need to take your hand off the bars to do it. It can also be removed in about 5 seconds for the rides when it's not needed.
The downside to ANY bell is that a lot of the people doing their activities in the woods / trails have earbuds or headphones on, and no matter how loud you ding… they can’t hear you. I’ve seen me shouting ‘excuse me’ almost at the top of my voice when a guy walking on a narrow path in front had big noise cancelling headphones on… so loud that I could hear his music above mine!
I crept along behind him for a few minutes before he had that ‘there’s someone behind me’ feeling and looked round - then apologised profusely! Even if I’d had an air horn, I don’t think he’d have heard me!
So there we have it. My roundup of some bells! My recommendation is a Timber bell based on the reactions from other forest path users. If you want to spend the minimum time slowing down to get past people, the Timber bell is the way to go. As you approach, they’ve already pulled their extending dog leads in, and moved into the side of the path… or the groups 4 wide who think they’re walking the yellow brick road have got down to single file! You could ding, ding, ding a manual bell as you approach instead, but the Timber bell lets you carry on care free. It does mean you spend half your ride saying ‘thank you’… but at least I’m not slowing down!
I would also recommend buying the genuine article rather than a cheap clone - whether Timber or Knog or any others out there. They’re expensive for a reason. They’ve had proper R&D, QC, and probably come with a warranty and will likely last a lot longer than the original.
Disclaimer… this is MY opinion, and MY experiences… and yours might be different
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is best folk just say on your right or left and Ski on past , maybe we should try that 
. If it's wide and I can go on grass I give a wide berth and say nothing.
interesting. 
