if you were gonna' build a touring bike on the cheap, what brand/model of older bikes would you keep an eye out for? i sometimes find old bikes in the dumpster, but have no idea which are worth keeping to build up into a good touring bike...

if you have a suggestion, i'd appreciate if you'd include WHY you think it's a good one...i'm trying to learn what exactly makes for an ideal touring bike...

thanks.

I would look for an old Trek 5,6,720. Good luck finding one cheap, but if you do... I still like my LHT. Took it out for my shakedown 54 mile loop, and at the midway coffeshop stop, it had a bunch of the racer types checking it out. Which is funny because there was carbon fiber this and that galore there. I think it was the sage green coupled with the honey brooks, noodle bars and general retro, but new look of the bike.

i mean OLD old...say 70s to early 80s...that is, if they made good touring bikes back then??? the kinds of bikes that people throw out or sell for $40...

i read something somewhere about a particular 1970s schwinn that's supposed to be good...can't remember where, can't remember which, though...

i'm assuming these older frames can be outfitted with modern components, right? can't imagine why not, but figured i'd ask...

I toured in Europe back in the 50's and 60's and you may find those old bikes around cheap but you will have difficulties with modern groupos. Back then I used 3 speed derailleurs first and then 5 speed. Modern mountain bike wheels are 135 mm and even road wheels are 130 mm. Cantilever brakes were more or less unheard of so you would have to use centre pulls which may not fit. All English frames were designed for 27" wheels but 700C would work as well, albeit with a bigger gap. Unless you came across a purpose built tourer you would have difficulty fitting racks.

You might do better to consider an old mountain bike. My 15 year old Diamond Back has no suspension, a long wheelbase, steel frame, with rack fittings that I got for free - it was going to the dump. I refurbished it with new wheels and tires, drop h/b, barcons and an old Brooks Professional and it worked very well on a ride from Whitefish, Montana to Las Vegas without a problem.

Brian.

Like mentioned above, convert an old steel rigid mountain bike from the late 80's to early 90's. They make ideal tourers with braze-ons and long wheelbases. Regardless of the components, if you find the perfect frame, grab it, strip the frame, and work from there.

Lots of great touring & sport touring frames made from about '75-'85. Not sure what your budget is, but look for a quality frame with Reynolds 531 tubes (or Columbus SL, Vitus,...) & forged drop-outs like Campagnolo. You can usually find something you like from that period on eBay if you look for a few weeks. Decent frames go as cheaply as $50, but expect to go $150-$250 for a nice frame. As far as brands, it's a tough one to call... Nearly everyone offered a touring frame at that time. Some Motobécane frames go for low $$... The Moto Grand Record makes a nice sport tourer, and it's a pretty frame. If you want something with braze-ons for racks & several water bottles, Woodrup comes to mind. They made a "Giro Sport" model ideal for lightly loaded touring. You might want to study some vintage catalogs from the late '70s -mid '80s here:

https://bulgier.net/pics/bike/Catalogs/

Good luck with your search! That period of late '70s to early '80s was rich with beautifully made frames that should suit your purpose well.

Schwinn Voyager for my vote. I bought a good condition '84 a some years back. Though a little too big for me, I loved the ride and the handling. I had the fork brake-pivots moved to use 700c wheels and switched to STI. I wound up spending about $1200 on the bike eventually. It was a great bike for me to learn how to ride on the street and for longer distances.

I don't tour and wanted to get more sporty, so last April I built up a Ti cyclocross/Rondonneur bike using about $700 of the parts I put into the Voyager. However, I'm tempted to resurrect the voyager; I kind of miss it.

Al

I have maney miles and memories on a voyageur, it is 23 in. and the toe overlap is geting to be a problem for this old man. I would love to no what the stand over hight is on a 25 in. frame. So I could pine awy for one, if I could fit it to stand over and have toe clirance.

Mine's a 23". I never did have a toe overlap problem when I was riding it (size 12 shoes), but I was a little nervous about it. My new bike has more than adequate toe clearance because the seat tube angle is 73 degrees vice 72 for the Voyager. The more forward seating relative to the bottom bracket due the larger angle also puts me in a better pedalling position for my "leg geometry". The difference is very noticeable; I don't think I could ever go back to 72 now that I think about it.

Al

I've only toured on a couple of different bikes. I had an '82 Specialized Expedition that I put several thousand miles on. Excellent tourer. May be a little hard to find now. Specialized also made a Sequoia in the early to mid 80s for light touring. Any of the above mentioned in earlier replies would work out great as a commuter/tourer. As mentioned above, the only drawback would be the older components. I still ride a Raleigh with friction shifters! You have to love it!!

If it has a sticker that says "Reynolds 531" and rack braze-ons, you've probably got a winner.

Of course, that's just a very general rule-of-thumb, and it will rule out a lot of viable alternatives but it's easy to remember.

I just bought an old Trek 620 on ebay for $149. It needs some work and modernization, but it'll still come in significantly cheaper than a new bike and still be quite nice. I'll spend under $500 and have a very nice tourer with new parts where it counts.

If you want to go the dumpster or ebay route, you =must= be willing to do some wrenching or bike shop costs will really hurt.

Issues with an old bike and modern parts are things like rear triangle spacing and wheel sizes. All of these issues have solutions, but you'll need to do some research.

The Schwinn you're probably thinking of is the Voyageur. It would be a good find.

Is there anything technically wrong with just bending the stays to accomodate a differend width wheel? The steel frame should be resilient enough, might crack the paint a little but it should work. It's a ghetto solution but it wouldn't bother me if I got a solid bike for cheap.

You can do this with two major caveats:
1) The bike MUST be steel.
2) You SHOULD ensure that the frame alignment stays straight.

Because of #2 above, I'd suggest having your LBS do it.

"i mean OLD old...say 70s to early 80s...that is, if they made good touring bikes back then??? the kinds of bikes that people throw out or sell for $40..."

As mentioned in other posts to this thread, during the late 70's-early 80's "sport-tourers" were pretty much the standard road bike there for awhile: Reynolds steel frames, lugged, braze-on's for front and rear racks, long chainstays, and the downside- 27" wheel base.

These are the bikes that are being thrown away/sold dirt cheap nowadays. Many were Japanese brands, like Nishiki, Shogun, and others. I converted my Shogun Cromoly 500 '83 ($30) for fully loaded touring, but at a significant cost, many times more than the bike was worth, but I love it, so who cares? The good part about these bikes is that they love to be loaded, and are extremely durable with next to no flexing when loaded 75 pounds +.

If you wish to convert an old cheap bike, the entire drive train will need to be replaced, likely, as well as many other components that are too worn down to rely on in the middle of nowhere. The other problem is that 27" wheelbases are on their way out, and finding 27's in, say, Outer Mongolia when your tire blows out is pretty much impossible. Not too bad for touring the States though.

I've got a related question. Say you are rescuing an abandoned frame you just stumble across. What's the best way to judge the frame size? What are the measuring points anyway? Top tube to bottom bracket maybe?

If you get an old steel frame with decent tubing such as 531 don't worry about the stay spacing as it can be cold set safely to fit modern hubs. Sheldon brown has a good how-to on this.

When I upgraded my'84 Voyager, I went to 700c wheels and 9-speed cassette (and STI). The fork brake pivots had to be moved and the seat+chain stays rebent; simple jobs for a frame builder with tools. My lbs is owned by a guy who used to build frames. He did the work for free (including repainting the fork after it was "torched") because he did some of the upgrades.

Al

I had considered getting by bike "hacked" in order to fit 700's, and then I considered all the money that i had put into this bike that had originally cost me $30, the equivalent of one of the "cheap" Bruce Gordons, and I thought to myself that maybe, for long-distance int'l touring, I should just hang up my Shogun and fork over the cash for a new one. Still, I do love it, and am more than a little reluctant to retire it yet, so maybe a hack job is in order. Thanks.

If you cn find yoursel a dawes galaxy, Reynolds 531.....jump on it. I rode one in the early 80 half way across the states, before I ran out of time then had to get back to work. A very comfortable bike.

Apart from the Dawes, other great British makes from that period- Bob Jackson, Mercian, Roberts, Witcomb- would make a tremendous dumpster/Ebay pick-up. Good tubing and relaxed angles, beautifully made and often with neat custom touches..............