Having not found a suitable bike in my price range, I'm diving in to building an expedition, adventure touring bike on my own. I've never done this. I have some knowledge, but the intricacies of parts choices are somewhat beyond me. I plan to use this as my only transportation in the USA, a fair amount of dirt road touring in the southwest, some general mountain biking and an upcoming LONG adventure tour through Central Asia. So I want a third world burly tourer. 26 inch wheels are a must, so is steel, a comfortable ride and a front shock. I plan to use front and rear racks.
What follows is my knowledge and choices after LOTS of internet research. I'd heavily appreciate comments, revisions, etc
I'm leaning hard towards the On-One Inbred Frame, Not Sliding Dropout model. It's $355 shipped. Long top tube is good, but I wonder if the chain stay is long enough for my heels to not hit my panniers. I hope to use Avid BB7 brakes, and have the option of adding cheap v-brakes if something goes wrong while on tour. Will it be possible to have V-brakes and a rear rack at the same time? As far as I can tell, the rack will need to attach to the V-brake bosses.. I've seen two Inbreds set up as tourers online, so it seems like an OK choice.
I'll be using trekking bars. The Kalloy and Nashbar ones are about the same price, the Modolo Yuma's are double the price. Any reason to go one over the other? I haven't figured out what stem I want, but I figure that it'll have a lot of rise to it.
Brakes.... Avid BB7s with 160mm rotors
Brake levers... Seems like I can go with any mountain bike lever and that it's not a big choice.
Headset... Cane Creek S-3 headset gets good and bad reviews, seems fine with me. You can see the trend that I don't have the budget for ultra nice stuff like Chris King, Paul Hubs, etc
Shifters... Here my knowledge fails me. Shimano 9spd Bar End shifters would be durable and allow for friction shifting mode, but require the addition of Paul Thumbies which gets expensive. Also, they wouldn't be “fast” for mountain biking at home. Other options? Some SRAM Attack Shortys? Are they durable? XT or LX shifters?
On the subject... Is it true that some Deore LX components are beefier and heavier, though functionally the same as XT? If so, I'd like that.
I figure I'll got with Shimano XT of:
- Hubs: there are so many choices here. I know that I need disk brake compatible ones, and for the front I think that I need a wider one that will work with a front shock. Is that true? I want 36 spoke wheels, but I can't seem to find an XT front hub, that's 36h and disk compatible.
- Rear Derailleur: again, there are too many things I don't know. Short arm, long? Etc, etc? Seems like upgrading to XT is the way to go here though.
And for Shimano Deore LX:
- Crank: most votes seem to go for 44/32/22, but I also see advice for 46/34/24 and 48/34/26. How do these combine with my cassette choice? I figure I want to be able to pedal up steep stuff with a heavy load, but also be able to ride down steep stuff while pedaling that load. And I now that most of the time I'll be in the middle rings. In terms of arm length, I have read “18.5% of the distance from the top of the femur to the floor in bare feet should be the crank length. You can find the top of the femur pretty easily. It's 5" to 6" below your hip bone, and moves rearward when you raise your knee.” but haven't figured out what that means for me yet. Help? I buy a Bottom Bracket based on what my Crankset requires right? Shimano UN-53 or 54?
- Front Derailleur
- Cassette: 11-32t or 11-34t???
And the rest of the wheels:
- Velocity Dyad seems like a good mix of weight and cost at $60. And they'll be able to take v-brakes even though I plan to use Disks. Better than Sun Rhyno Lites, only $25 but 100 grams more, Mavic XM719 ($75/each) or Rigida Sputniks.
- DT Swiss 2.0 Double Butted Spokes ( a box of 100) with alloy nipples
- probably Schwable Marathon XR, slow on pavement, good on dirt.
Racks:
- Old Man Mountain Front Rack – Sherpa $110 good with suspension and disks. And it'll fit more cleanly if I get a fork that has bosses on it.
- For the rear, I was thinking of a Tubus Cargo. I think it'll fit, but will it fit if I'm using V-Brakes?
Panniers:
- I'm pretty much decided on big Lone Peaks. Front, back and Handle bar.
Fork:
- I want a front shock, both for recreation at home, but also to take out some of the bumps on my trips. I know that it'll be a weight penalty and perhaps a point of failure. To minimize this I've learned to look for coil springs, no air cartridge. A lockout and hopefully mount points for both Disk and Rim brakes. Marzocchi gets recommend. I believe that my frame can take 3-5 inch forks. This piece becomes scary expensive and difficult to spec. It seems like I have very rare and specific requirements. Any specific recommendations?
Seatpost:
- I haven't done much consideration. I've heard that Race Face ones have a good seat clamp. What length range am I looking at? I know this will depend on my specific setup, but does a 300mm post seem right or should I be looking at the 400mm one from On-One?
The Inbred only has bosses for 1 water bottle. What's a way to securely add more cages, or do I need to bring it to a frame builder and have bosses added (how much does such business cost?)
Whoa, OK. I'm in my final research stage before I buy. So I'll probably have a lot more questions and be able to post pictures before too long! THANKS.
