djb

Maven, interesting bars, very shallow arent they? Flared too, are you happy with them? That swallow doesnt look new, guess you like it or you wouldnt have it on.

MTBMaven

Love the bars! They are On One Midge. I have been using them on my main road bike for over a year. I ported them over to the touring bike and have just ordered another Midge for my road bike. I went with a white bar in 31.8 to better suit that bike's equipment and color scheme.

By Swallow I take it you mean my Brooks. It's actually a "butchered" B-17. It's nice but I like my Selle AnAntomica much more.

djb

On One Midge...shall remember that name, may try those sometime.

re the B17, boy you really did a number on it! I love my B17 and so far it is very comfortable, but hey, they are only bike seats, so whatever works.

Medic Zero

Not fully loaded, and not touring for another couple of weeks.

Trying out a shopping experiment. I have all these different military surplus rubberized bags kicking around and a bunch of milsurp leather straps. It turns out they all fit inside each other and make a nice little bundle that I clipped a shoulder strap to. Sometimes it rides bungeed to the rear deck, and sometimes I unfasten it and toss it in my Basil, although it is a little heavy for that. My Chrome Metropolis is so huge that the bundle of bags still leaves a fair amount of usable space and is comfortable to wear.

When not in use it is a more compact and centered load than another empty pannier. On a trip like today to a bike shop and a thrift store and not sure what all I was going to have to portage home the flexibility of adding one, two or three bags was nice. Under the one alongside the wheel is actually another rubber bag a little smaller than that one.



The bike is in transition at the moment. Fenders are off while I change the hardware on them, front rack is off temporarily and I'm not sure about the Gatorskins yet. I love them commuting to work, but find them a little limiting and think I would prefer a nice 1.5, maybe Schwalbe Marathons if they come in that size for bike camping and short tours. Everyone seems to regard those highly, although I like Continentals.

Vintagetourer

This is a link to pics and specs of my Thorn Sherpa loaded and ready to go on a week-long tour from Canberra to Sydney Australia.

https://www.crazyguyonabike.com/doc/p...id=188575&v=9y

Konasutra

Here is a pic of my Kona Sutra loaded and ready for Ragbrai !

ossie

My Specialized Tricross on my recent Girona (Spain) to the UK tour. This photo was taken at the French / Spanish border in the Pyrenees.

cbike

Hi MTBMayen, could you post a close and/or give a description of how you mounted the light on the front rack. I'm curious. BTW, any specific reasons why you didn't use rear panniers as well?

zoltani

Holy lotta seatpost bikeman!

bagxlee

Here's my setup. I'm just getting into touring. I've commute by bicycle every day but have always used my track bike + Chrome messenger bag to get from point A to B.

Anyway, I've been looking into doing some touring this fall. I don't have a ton of extra cash, so I'm just converting an old Viscount that my dad gave me. It's not the greatest to ride, but it does the job. I'd rather save money for the actual tour and make sure I love it before I put a ton of money towards a legit setup.

Anyway, here's my '73(?) Viscount (Not too loaded):

Mailman

Hey first post, found this forum while looking for people to ride RAGBRAI with or maybe do a ride across the country. Here is my bike loaded up biking out to the start of RAGBRAI last year.

djb

greetings ossie to this forum. Have a good rest of trip, sounds like a neat route, enjoy.

I too have a Tricross, but havent toured on it fully loaded, but like it a lot as a nice fast versatile bike.

I see you put V brakes on it. Your triple looks like a regular road triple 50/39/30 ish, did you put a larger rear cassette on it to get the gearing down? Mine has a 11-32 cassette and if I were to be loaded and going where it is steep, I have thought of putting a 26 tooth granny to get lower gearing, and/or a 12-34 cassette.

How do you find the bike handles with all the stuff on it? I've an old steel touring bike that I know is more noodley than the tricross, so even while the Tricross is not a true true touring bike, I have always figured that it would be fine loaded up. The stock rear wheel at 32 spokes might not be up to it, but Im light so I might be able to get away with it if I dont overdo rear and total weight.

Ive toured in the Pyrenees and in France quite a bit, so again, enjoy the route you are doing and return to Blighty (my grandparents were from the south, Worthing)

cheers, adios et salut.

ossie

Many thanks, I finished the tour last Wednesday, 761 miles in 10 days and 29000 feet of climbing. More a blast through France than a tour

Its the 2008 version and in the UK it came with V brakes. I have upgraded them to Avid single digit fives. The bike is my commuting bike but I have done 3 tours on it. The triple is indeed a regular road triple 30/39/50 upgraded from the stock version, the cassette is standard 9 speed. I certainly used that granny gear but coped fine with the set up!

I changed the stem to a specialized comp at 24 degrees and have my Brooks Team pro on there.

I have found it handles better when loaded with 4 panniers rather than 2, my total weight of panniers and tent was 20 kg or 44 pounds.

Reference the rear wheel you mention. The original wasnt up to the job and I suffered broken spokes on a previous tour so I replaced it with a 36 spoke Mavic open pro. As I said I use the bike for commuting so still wanted something light. I did have problems however. For this tour I purchased some Schwalbe Marathon 308's 28mm to replace my 25mm Bontragers. I suffered 3 blow outs. Still open to debate but these tyres went on to easily and in my opinion were too big for the rim despite the rim stating it could take 28mm!

My intention is to build a Surly LHT when funds allow. The Tricross is a decent all rounder but in truth I really want something more solid for touring. It did a job for me and I will continue to use it for commuting and the odd light tour.

cheers

djb

ossie, thanks for the heads up on the 36 spoker. I too have a Brooks on mine and the stock stem suits me fine at its highest angle position (one of those multi angle ones from Spec.) and in fact this frame fits me better than any other bike I have had and is quite comfortable for multi day long rides.
Your 44 lbs is about what I always used to tour with so I would look into a 36 spoke wheel for a real trip. As for your tires, I have always toured on 28s with luckily enough never one flat in five tours, some up to about a month long. Lucky I guess, but shows that 28s can work fine if one is careful of weight and road conditions. Yes, that does sound fishy with your rims and 28s, who knows.

as for a LHT, yes of course it and other bikes are more solid, for me this bike is a good compromise for the roads I ride on, with the flexibility of changing rear cassettes and tires to make it reasonably fast, while still able to put 32's or 35's if you are going to be on gravel and dirt a lot. As you say though, my bikes life is for the most part doing what you say, commuting and light trips.

oh and yes, your trip was quite a dash! 120 klicks per day I figure and all that altitude.

cheers again and good tourer building.

kyussmondo

This is my rig for my upcoming LEJOG in August.


Claud Butler Regent Touring Bike - Fully Loaded by kyussmondo Full Bike


Handlebars by kyussmondo


Ortlieb Front Roller Plus panniers by kyussmondo


Schwalbe Tyres by kyussmondo


The Orliebs cost me a small fortune but they are really well built, 100% waterproof, fit really well and should last me for a long time. The bike works great as well and was reasonably priced compared to the more expensive tourers. The only thing I wished it had was a slightly smaller ring on the front chain set to make steep hills a bit easier!

A GPS cover for my iPhone that attaches to the bar bag is currently in the mail, which is how I navigate currently in case you were wondering why there was no map or GPS attached! The Ortlieb GPS cover was quite cheap. I am sure if it had iPhone in the name then they would double the price of the cover!

twerney

Looks like my Safari, except drop bars. I have the same pannier set up? How is that seat height? I am having behind the knee issues and i think it is from my seat being too low. I don't seem to get the pain from my Fuji tri bike. Are you happy with the Ortliebs? easy too install? thanks

Drop2Flat

Cool bike man, what handlebar is that?

swix

Loaded up my Jamis Nova and went on a weekend trip. funnnn

X-LinkedRider

Wow, We have some seriously nice rigs in here this year. Great build MTBMaven. Nice jamis, without some weight in the front you will notice the weirdness in the weight displacement going up hills. Looks like you are very lightly packed and have conserved a lot of weight. I am interested in what you have packed and how long you plan on being on the road at any given time.

SparkyGA

Perhapes one of most home brew bikes on the forum.... I built this lovely girl from a used bike store in Siem Reap Cambodia, and used it to get across the country. Spent a total of about $10 USD outfitting the bike with a back rack, flashlight, water bottle holder and several rice bags. Worked great! Gave it to some locals in Laos when I was done with it.

zoltani

That Kona looks a couple sizes to small for him, but what do I know about how he feels on the bike?

djb

neat story, I took the liberty of quickly making your memory stand out better.
cheers

electrik

Yup, the sutra has a lot of stand-over... but it's easier to get on and off that way when there are bags over the back. Honestly though that is a crazy amount of seat-post, somebody must have long legs compared to their arms.

swix

thanks, this was actually just a 3 day weekend trip so i had all i needed (plus some fireworks and ya front bags/rack are next on the list as the weight was awkward. I also realized that while my 39/53 crank is workable, a triple would be nice..

bike00

Here is my rig at Hayes State Park in southern Michigan while on a week long tour of Michigan's Irish Hills, NE Indiana, and NW Ohio.