Fuji touring bike for $700, but found touring bikes that cost over twice as much?
 

I found a Fuji touring bike at Performance Bike for $700.00, and I've heard good things about it. It has standard brakes though, but it's only $700. There's the Novara Randonee that I saw at REI for $1,200.

But I found a Trek 520, and the Surly Long Haul Trucker, which is apparently the bee's knees. They come with standard brakes, with the option for disc brakes for $100 to $200 more. I found a local shop that sells the Long Haul Trucker with disc brake for $1,550. What's so special about the Long Haul Trucker, that sets it apart from the others?

I'd have a $700 Fuji touring bike in my hands in only a couple months. A $1,550 Long Haul Trucker would take awhile longer. I plan on putting thousands of miles on the bike, so I want a bike that will hold up. Do the expensive touring bikes make a big difference? What about the disc brakes option?

Personally I like the Fuji better than the LHT. I'd suggest trying both to see which one you like. Disc brakes are OK, but not necessary. Especially if money is tight at all I wouldn't hesitate to choose the Fuji out of all the bikes you listed.

If you plan to load it super heavy the LHT might start to shine a bit more.

BTW "thousands of miles" doesn't really equate to high mileage. It may equate to one long or maybe long-ish tour. Any decent bike ought to last at least tens of thousands of miles if not hundreds of thousands.

I got my Disc Trucker on black Friday of last year for $950.00. I do like the looks of the Fuji and it is 3-4 lbs lighter than the surly. Ride both.

The fuji touring is a fine bike and a very solid deal.

I did the same thing. I have recently bought the Fuji. I haven't taken it out for it's first tour yet - starting in about a week - but I liked it enough on paper to buy it. And it looks pretty good so far.

http://bicycletouringpro.com/blog/fuji-touring-review/

Surly Long Haul Trucker - Touring Bicycle Review - Surly LHT

The LHT seems better suited for heavier touring (which is needed for long-distance, solo traveling) where-as the Fuji seems perfectly suited for light-medium loads. The LHT has a cult following for a reason, but I saw some good reviews for the Fuji. $1,550 seems a little steep for a LHT to me. A few months ago I got 10% off ($1,200) by getting last years model in a color that wouldn't have been my first choice. Then again, $700 for a Fuji is a damn good deal.

Fuji Touring Bicycle Review | Bicycle Touring Pro

Surly Long Haul Trucker - Touring Bicycle Review - Surly LHT

The LHT seems better suited for heavier touring (which is needed for long-distance, solo traveling) where-as the Fuji seems perfectly suited for light-medium loads. The LHT has a cult following for a reason, but I saw some good reviews for the Fuji. $1,550 seems a little steep for a LHT to me. A few months ago I got 10% off ($1,200) by getting last years model in a color that wouldn't have been my first choice. Then again, $700 for a Fuji is a damn good deal.

What would be considered a heavy-load compared to a medium-load?

I occasionally ride my niece's bike when I visit, it has disc. But my bikes are rim brake and I see no advantage to disc.

And so the debate begins...

Everyone has their own definition of light vs heavy loads. Some people base it on items/style while others base it on weight. In terms of items/style, light would be credit card/supported touring. You are carrying the basic essentials such as extra clothes, toiletries, a patch kit/multi tool, water and snacks. This style assumes you're sleeping in motels and eating your main meals in restaurants or you have a support van carrying the rest of your gear. Heavy is a solo/self-supported tour. You bring everything you will need for various weather, road, maintenance, and entertainment condition you may encounter for the foreseeable future. Medium is somewhere in between. Usually sorter tours or ones with multiple people so that heavier/communal items , such as tents and spare parts, aren't on a single bike. It also depends on the road conditions.

Go for the Fuji - you won't be sorry and at that price you almost have to buy it. :)

I'm totally convinced on the Fuji. And looking at pics of people's loaded Fuji's, it's more than capable of handling a self supported tour.

I have to disagree that heavier touring is "needed for long-distance, solo traveling". I have gone coast to coast with both medium heavy and ultralight setups and was quite happy and comfortable in both cases. I carried the same stuff I would have packed for a short trip in both cases.

When it comes down to it I really do not find that the length of a trip has much or really even any impact on how much stuff I pack.

The Fuji Touring is okay but they have a frame change over previous models that isn't necessarily to the good. The current model has 440mm stays which are on the very short side. Short stays cause two problems which can be annoying or even unnerving.

On the annoying side, short stays mean you can hit your bags with your heel with even moderate sized feet. If you have larger feet, expect to clip your bags on every crank revolution. It gets old very fast.

You can move the load further back but the bike already puts the load further back. This puts more of the load behind the axle which can have a pretty severe effect on the steering. It can make "the tail wag the dog", especially on curvy downhills. The "free" rack is a good rack but it's not likely to be that stiff. Most aluminum strut racks aren't. That further exacerbates the tail wag. This can be fixed by going to a rack like a Tubus but you are still stuck with the short stays.

The LHT has 460mm stays which puts more of the load over the axle and moves them back away from your feet. With a 460mm stay, you can have "herring boxes without topses" for shoes and never worry about clipping even the largest of rear bags. The handling of the bike will also be more stable.

I started a thread on this a while ago. The REI randonee is pretty nicely spec'd for the price and REI is a really solid company to deal with which stands behind its product. Honestly if I were looking for a new touring bike, that's what I would get. Nothing against Surly or Soma but the randonee ticks all my boxes for less dough. It has well thought out gearing, good quality wheels (I really like the mavic touring rims), good quality tires (schwalbe marathon), and generally good quality well thought out parts. Heck I even like the saddle and I think the flat fork crown looks pretty sweet.

Wait, I think I may have just talked myself into adding a new bike to my stable . . . . :crash:

I've ridden a Fuji touring bike over 25,000 miles so far -- twice as far as I rode the original frame before it broke and was replaced under warranty. Both are/were older models with threaded stems.

Fuji makes a good bike and is an excellent value. It's my go-to commuting and weekend rides bike.

The only problem with the as-delivered bike is the wheels, which is common to most mass production bikes. Unless you're very light and carry little to no load, you'll want to tension and stress-relieve the wheels.

You may want to replace the OEM brake pads with salmon Kool-Stops when they wear out. The stock brakes stop fine, but the pads tend to trap stuff and you'll need to dig the gravel out of the pads before it scores the rims.

I've also got a Randonee. It carries heavier loads a little better than the Fuji. FWIW, my common definition of a heavy load is 25 miles home from the orchard with a bushel of apples -- if it's only half a bushel, the Fuji is fine. And yes, I'm looking forward to Labor Day when the orchard is open weekends!

I commute w/ panniers on a bike w/ 440mm chainstays and I have size 12 dogs.

With a cheap non-adjustable pannier, heel clipping was a problem. I've since upgraded to Ortliebs and 1200 miles later, have had zero issues with heel strike.

I came across the Fuji as well this past week, while looking for a bike for a family member. It does look like a tremendous deal for a sport-tourer/commuter/utility/med-duty touring bike.

I wouldn't sweat the lack of disk brakes for a second. Millions of collective miles have been logged over the past few decades on bikes without disk brakes - a heck of a lot more than have been logged with disc brakes.

Frame + parts = Bike ... NB: you can change anything you want with something you like better .

The Fuji is an excellent touring bike value and maybe one of the two or three best for the money. Fuji has been making a touring model for decades and I personally wouldn't hesitate to take it anywhere. For $700 it's a steel.

No pun intended?

I wear 14s. My current bike that gets loaded panniers is an old Schwinn 11.8 that is basically a sport-tourer. It has 44cm chainstays. I have to set my bags back to not clip them, but I have yet to come across a time when I felt it was unsafe or unstable. Admittedly, I haven't done it while flying down a switchbacking mountain decent.
I can get out of my saddle and pedal. I can spin. I can mash to catch up. The bike feels just fine with loaded bags(and other stuff) on it, even with the bags pushed far back and on short chainstays.

2mm is bout 3/4 of an inch, or the difference between size 12 and size 14 feet. But only 3/4 of a foot's length affects if heel strike will happen or not. Mathematically speaking, ((14 x 3/4) / 3/4) + 44*y = for many applications of touring, 44cm chainstays will work for people smaller than Sasquatch.

You meant 20 mm (or 2 cm) is about 3/4" right?

I agree that 440 mm stays can work fine for most people, especially if they aren't using huge panniers. I found them fine with room to spare with my size 12 feet.

Gee, "I don't get no respect"

and as to the chain length thingy, though I wear a size 10, even shorter 430mm have never given me any problems

I was looking at the Fuji about a year ago, in the end I decided on the DT. (built it myself) The thing that worried me was the wheel set. I'd heard a couple of stories about broken spokes. I looked at what it would cost to put a good wheel set on the Fuji and it brought it to the price of a DT.