Originally Posted by
Sharpy96
. Have you any experience of custom builds?, I feel that I could benefit from doing one + they have the Surly LHT frames for a decent price online, the only thing that puts me off is my lack of experience in building a bike from scratch..
Thanks
I have had custom frames built specifically for me and built many frames up from parts. The reason I did it, was that I enjoyed fiddling, had a collection of parts and accumulated a sufficient number of tools. What I started with was a couple of low and mid priced brand new bikes over three years, accumulated tools, the first bike was sold to help pay for the second and the second had half the parts to build up the third. After that things kind of exploded when I started touring and racing.
My $.02 as a long time cyclist and past owner of a bike shop is that buying retail parts for a retail production frame is as useful as going into a shop and saying "I'll take this bike and give you 50% more for it and another $250 for specialized tools to rebuild it"
take advantage of the complete package, load it up and ride it around for a few days from your arrival city to make sure it's all together, check back with the shop to give the bike a go over then off you go.