Originally Posted by babysaph
Othere than places to attach bags what is the difference in a mtn bike frame vs touring frame for building a touring bike. I have the mtn bike frame and was wanting to do a build for touring.
weight, strength, durability, wheel width, tire weight. I tour on a converted mountain bike and love it! I use a nonstandard(from a touring point of view) tire as well! 26X1.95 Geax Evolution. It's a heavy tire, but virtually indestructible! I have yet to have a flat since I made the switch!
Drawbacks: If you use flatbars, even with bar ends you run into two problems.
1) Hand position, or the limited number of them
2) Aerodynamics, but this can be addressed with aerobars added to the flats. You will experience other problems with the aero's though, less control, etc, so it's a tradeoff!
I'd recommend a rigid fork, weight issues there, rigid steel fork is a lot lighter!
If you use a mountainbike frame I'd strongly recommend a 90's model mountainbike! here's mine, from my last ride! Pardon the pic resolution, it's from a cellphone camera! I also included a clear copy. It's a cheap frame, but I've put several thousand miles on this frankenstein and I'm pretty happy with it!