There's a plate on the left side of the Big Dummy frame, near the rear wheel, for a standard kickstand. I can't see myself needing more than that.

Also, xtracycle claims that wideloaders can serve as a kind of kickstand. Might depend on how you're securing your cargo though.
I can't see why extra chain length would affect shifting. The derailers are still right next to the gears.

If anything, it helps by allowing more cross-chaining. Since the chain is longer, the cross-chaining angle is shallower by about half.

oops

How do you lock this bike up securely with the least amount of locks?

Anyone have locked up images of this bike?

How does the Xtracycle handle hills? I live in a hilly area. If I go downtown ~60-70mins one way it's all downhill but when I return I'm faced with about a short ~40 degree hill, a long ~1km 30 degree hill, ~5km long ~30 degree hill, short ~30 degree hill, and lastly the short hill on my street.

The hills make for a good workout in my area and the area is lovely but when carry a load on the returns especially at night I always take the main roads for safety then the 10-12km isolated (yet mostly flat) wooded trails which I don't find safe at night unless I was riding with more then one person.

Thanks Alan...it isn't a Rohloff but the price is right.

Did you go with the 32 or 36 hole version?

Are the supplied shift cables long enough for the xtracycle or did you have to come up with something different?

Use these on the front and rear wheels, as well as the saddle.

Then use whatever lock you want, and hope no one runs off with all the loot you are carrying around in the bags.

Xtracycle has a topic on this in their forums. You should be able to lock this bike up like any other bike (e.g. u-lock on back, cable lock up front).

They mention that if you are worried about the panniers getting stolen, you could screw them to the frame, but they also mention they haven't gotten any reports of the panniers getting stolen......yet (no one must have an xtracycle in NYC).

In terms of the hills question, it all depends on the gearing. If you are maxing out your granny gears on your non-xtracycle bike, you'll probably have problems with a loaded xtracycle, and would probably want to change your gearing set up. If you have a couple to spare (as in the beautiful 34t), that you never use at all, you should be fine.

The bike really won't care what kind of hill you are riding.
You're body might. And you can select your gearing to be very low.

I ride our loaded Bakfiets (100 lb+) up an 8% grade here in town. I have the 8spd Nexus geared very low - and I'm not attempting to set any speed records.

Chris I'm trying to get my head wrapped around the BD sizing. From Surly's website the effective TT on a 54cm CC is 22" and the the effective TT on a 20" BD is 24.2" I'm surprised the reach is less on your BD than it is on your CC.

I was confused on the sizing as well. I'm more of a Road bike person, so Mountain bike sizing just confuses me in general.

I wasn't expecting it to work out that well, I thought for sure I would be using Trekking bars.

The stem and bars are the same ones that were on the CC before I moved them over. One factor to consider is that I'm using a Brooks saddle, which has lots of wiggle room on the rails. I bet if I put the bikes side by side the saddle on the Big Dummy would be moved up quite a bit while the Cross Check saddle would be pushed most of the way back on the rails. I'll check that when I get home tomorrow.

36

You need tandem cables.

I think it's actually a more appropriate hub for a work bike than the Rohloff. Not to say the Rohloff is not a piece of engineering perfection, but with the NuVinci's heft I subjectively think it is more capable of handling heavy loads than the Rohloff. And given it's price I'm willing to overload my bike where I was more hesitant with the Rohloff.

And no other hub I've had other than the Rohloff feels as nice as the NuVinci.

Side note:
I cracked a SA-8 and the SRAM 5 and SRAM 7 could not handle the torque of my Giant causing them to constantly slip gears.

Had no problems with the Rohloff, I just did not want to risk killing it.

When I saw the Xtracycle on line two years ago, I emailed a friend that I'd seen something that was, fortunately, too pricey to be tempting. My first impression from their website was that it was something for Californians with too much discretionary income to purchase and feel green with.

I spent more time on the website, and asked my bike shop guy about 'em and he said he'd be glad to put one togehter for me. I had a few emails with Laughter Medicine. I took a deep breath on a Friday at 2:00 CA time, January 6, and called 'em... and got a priceless answering machine message telling me they were like, taking a few days off at the end of the year and I could reach Kipchoge at x number, somebody else at y number, and I could reach Laughter telepathically.

I gathered my siblings 'round after 'business hours' so they could hear the message... but a live person answered
then

I got one of the things and had it put on my Giant Nutra hybrid. Waited for buyer's remorse.

There are now a dozen of the things in this college town. At least for *me* with my often painful incompetence dealing in things like how to pack things on bikes (if there's a way to put something on backwards and/or upside down, I will do both), this thing is completely awesome. I can bring everything in the world with me everywhere. It's like having the back seat of a car on the bike.

Oh, and it's a great place to mount a Christmas tree...

... and it also announces with its very presence that this is a bicycle somebody bought on purpose - not because they were waiting to afford a car, but because they wanted a good vehicle for getting around and doing things.

I can't really speak to locking issues - I lock it up as I would my bike, but where I park thigns haven't been swiped. I find it handles very easily and the long wheel base and the drum Y& disc brakes make this utter weenie really happy riding in sloppy conditions. I've taken it up 15% grade hills on occasion, but 'round here overpasses are the main grade challenge.
It was something very different from anythign I"ve experienced with a bicycle... so speculation about it with regular bikes as a reference is of limited value. Ya gotta ride one... and even then, it's only 'til I lived with one that I really got to know its nature. WHen I started waking up and hearing horrible weather reports and the bike said "that's okay, we can go!" ... welp, I sold my car last May just because my brother needed it and I haven't missed it. (I have a few other steeds in the stable, too.)

I got my 18" Big Dummy yesterday. The TT is fairly close to my mtn bike so I think the fit will be great with some Titec H-bars.....