Originally Posted by
mams99
What this makes me realize is that I need to 1. find a really good bike mechanic who is willing to experiment the bike and 2. learn all of this myself. The latter is not going to happen most likely - The cost of that for one bike would be more than paying someone to do it.
And finding a bike mechanic who has the time and knowhow is not easy. It's not cost effective for them to tinker on one bike for long and that is completely understandable. I need to find a local hobbyist I can trust!
A bike mechanic at a large shop is someone that replaces parts and adjusts them after they figure out what part needed to be replaced. Very few shops cater to touring, thus very few shops have expertise in low gearing. And mechanics are very unlikely to install something on your bike that the specifications do not call for.
A bike shop mechanic that is asked to go outside the norms of what that shop typically does will be fearful that a week later a very angry customer will come in and complain. The best way in their mind to avoid that is to stay within industry norms and only install new parts that are the same or similar specification to what was on the bike before.
I hope you find what you want, but it may take some time. You might get lucky at a small shop to find a mechanic that is quite knowledgeable, but sometimes you find ones that pretend to be knowledgeable too.