cycledreams

Hi everyone,
I am new to posting in the forums, however ive tooled around the site just looking for a few days now. My wife an I have recently gotten into Mountain biking and we absolutely love it. I do have a question though regarding bicycle touring. I would like to keep my MTB what it is.. and get a dedicated Touring bicycle as I get 4 weeks a year of vacation versus my wife's 2 weeks. In short I am looking for something that can handle a Bob trailer with no weight on the actual bike other than a handle bar bag and myself on it. I am leaning more to the road bike style of bike and have searched CL and Ebay and found pretty good deals on bike's I am intrested in but the problem is, road bike's dont have fender's? lol. Ive seen somewhere before that there need's to be eye holes for fender's to fit? or maybe I miss understood this? If I found a road bike that I was intrested in would a bike shop be able to put fender's and maybe a rear rack on regardless of the bicycle make/style? are there any special concern's or dimension's that I should be aware of in order to make the little bit bigger tire's/wheels fit? okay thats all I have for now, all advise would be appreciated!
Thanks,
chris

cyclintom

Modern road bikes don't have the clearances necessary to put on conventional fenders.

If you're touring in good weather it doesn't matter and if you're touring in bad weather without fenders you just stop riding.

But touring bikes are designed in part for sufficient clearances to install fenders. If you know what size bike you ride you can easily get a decent touring bike off of ebay.

Try going over to https://www.rivendellbicycles.com/ and reading some of the stuff. Be sure to take it all with a grain of salt. Remember that they're trying to sell an attitude almost as much as a product.

DavidARayJaxNC

Where at in Eastern NC are you from?

knobster

I disagree. There are some road bikes that work fine with conventional fenders and larger tires. I have a Trek Pilot 5.0 that has the eyelets and enough clearance to fit 700x35's and fenders. I wouldn't pull a trailer it though. Don't get anything with carbon fiber chain and seat stays if you're going to pull a trailer. Personally, if I was going to buy a new bike, I'd get something like the Bianchi Velopi. As cyclintom suggested, look on EBay. I picked my '93 Trek 520 road bike up for $250. I like riding it more than the road bike.

Cyclesafe

Your least expensive alternative is to use the mountain bike you have with the trailer. You can make your bike more road friendly by using slicks and by installing bar ends for increasing hand positions. Sure, you won't be going so fast downhill, but you'll save a ton of money.

I used a carbon road bike and BOB trailer 3600 miles without mishap from San Diego to St Augustine. Part of the appeal of a BOB is that it can be used with any bike.

As far as fenders go, the only ones that work well have full coverage and mudflaps. I don't know whether anyone has actually chosen a bike solely based on whether you can fit fenders....

tacomee

Ah, I wouldn't have a bike that wouldn't fit fenders! But it rains an awful lot here in the Pacific NW, USA.

I'd second looking at a Bianchi Volepi-- it's pretty cheap and can handle lots of different taskes. You'll love it!

Also-- Beware buying any bike you can't test ride.

markf

There are fenders that are meant to fit road bikes with limited clearances and no eyelets (SKS Raceblades, for example), and there are ways to improvise fender and rack attachments if your bike doesn't have eyelets, but basically if you're going to tour you'll probably be happier with a touring bike that was designed to take fenders and racks.

hopperja

Surly CrossCheck. Plenty of room and mounts for fenders and racks. It was that or the Volpe for me and I went with the Surly for a whole number of reasons, including:
1- better paint, based on what I could find about both bikes online
2- cheaper (I found it at edinabike.com a few months ago for $725 w/ s/h)
3- better spokes (DT) vs. no-name on the Volpe. Better spokes tensioned properly on a true wheel = longer lasting wheelset
4- the Volpe has brifters. I've read numerous times online that bar end shifters are more reliable, more robust, and are easier to work on if something does happen to them; they also have a friction mode.

Good luck!

NoReg

You can use cutom fenders to mount on some bikes that won't take regular fenders, usually the constriction point is the fork, the cutom fender simple starts and stops on either side with a bracket that ties into the brake holes. There are similar dodges for the rear wheel. There was a thread a few months ago I posted pictures on. Another thing that osmetimes works is juts cutting the fenders a little to allow them to ride higher.

Personally though I prefer a proper touring bike and paniers. If you are just using the road bike for tooling around at speed, and the main signature use is two weeks of touring a year, I would buy a touring bike. You won't notice the difference when not touring, and you will when touring. Everyone has their own preferences, but generally I think that is what you would find. You will find the touring bike feels like a race car compared to a rigid MTB set up with 2" tires. Also after doing some long tours I feel pretty bonded to the touring style of bike.

MichaelW

Look for a road sport bike which is light and speedy but has adaquate clearance for 28mm tyres + fenders.
Soma, Gunnar, Surly all do nice models at a good price.
Idependant Fabrications do a superb Club Racer.

cycledreams

Greenville.. Nice to see someone half-way local on the board!

cycledreams

Thanks for the information.. what makes the trek 5.0 unfavorable for pulling a trailer?

cycledreams

Thanks for the great information you all! Im sorry about the triple post, but i could not figure out how to post it all in one post? anyways some good information, most are leaning towards a "touring" bike for touring, which makes sense to me. I was just curious if it was possible to get a "road bike" with minimal modifications to pull a BoB trailer 2 or 3 weeks out of the year, and the rest of the year i could have somewhat of a "road bike" without all the extra's. I am leaning towards a touring bike now that Ive had some insight into this. On another note, I saw alot of the loaded rig pictures on the forum, and notice some pull trailers with no pannier's and some run panniers and rack's with no trailer's. Is this a personal preference? I think I want to try the trailer so I can unhook it and leave it in the tent, or motel room while I sight-see, or make errand run's. Again thanks for the idea's!
chris

knobster

Well, I'm going against what another poster said above, but I've read over and over again that it's unadvisable to pull a trailer with a carbon fiber frame. Personally, not sure why, but I'd rather be safe than sorry.

knobster

I think it is a personal preference. Some people love trailers where others hate them. Same with paniers. Trailers do change the handling on the bike some so that is one thing against it, but you can easily remove it and take the bike off-road. This would be good if you used your MTB. Personally, I've got my road bike up for sale on Craigslist because I really like riding the touring bike. I'm not a speed demon (avg. 17-18mph) so it's not necessary to burn up the road on a fancy road bike. I like the touring bike because it's tough and very comfortable. Probably much like your MTB. Many, many people like using MTB's for touring, but it might be more fun on a good touring bike like the LHT, 520, Bianchi, etc...

vik 

Stopping in bad weather only works if you have someplace to stop and if you don't have multiple days of rain. Unless you live someplace virtually rainless I'd make sure your bike could mount fenders and I'd use them.

Cyclist0094

you are close to Raleigh/Durham. There is are several REI stores there that sells their brand of Touring bike the Novara Randonee. perfect bike for eastern Carolina IMO. tow trailers, do day trips, the tires are wide enough that the heat cracks in the road don't beat you to death. and you can put fenders on it.
https://www.rei.com/online/store/Prod...cat=REI_SEARCH

stores around RDU https://www.rei.com/online/FindStores...=NC&radius=900