Originally Posted by craign04
lots of bike shops rent travel cases, you could check into that and USA cycling has vouchers for free bike freight with air travel.
Right. I just talked to my LBS about this: it's $50 to rent a case for a week. They also do packing in a bike box ($30) but not shipping -- apparently UPS, despite shipping between manufacturers and bike shops doesn't trust John Q. Public to know how to pack, and so some of the local UPS places (not all) won't take them. The implicit suggestion was to pack in either box or hard case and take on the flight. They noted that a bike should travel upright as opposed to on its side and the airlines honor this better than UPS, but I'm more concerned that the Sampsonite Gorilla doesn't decide to pratice his hook shot with it.
I have shipped musical instruments via FedEx with success (so far!)
I would definitely insure for full value (plus I recall that you put some "sweat equity" into that bike)