I live in the middle east and deal with a lot of sand which bike do you feel would be better for the conditions.

Thanks
Dirty

I, too, would love to hear some side-by-side comparisons. Part of me thinks that if fat is good, fatter must be better, but another part of me thinks that the Pugsley might be more versatile over all because it seems like there are only a handful of conditions under which an increasingly fatter tire would provide an increasingly better ride (and even then only up to a point). I would think that sand would be one of those cases. But even then I would think the question might be: Are you going to ride primarily on sand, frequently on sand, or occasionally on sand?

That said, I would guess that you'd be more fat tire experience in the mountain biking section. And since the Moonlander only just hit the market, it might be a while before we hear any significant amount of feedback on it.

Head over to mtbr.com forums and then the Fatbike sub-forum. I'm looking for a fatbike myself and have been spending lots of time on that forum for the past 4 months. Lots of discussions on all the various fatbikes, Moonleander & Pugs included. Currently I'm hooked on the 907 fatbikes, just waiting for them to be back in stock in my size.

https://forums.mtbr.com/fat-bikes/

sand,,,fatbike with belt drive?

On snow, my experience that the slightly wider tires (20% or so) help as conditions deteriorate. Conditions are marginal to begin with, so "help" and "deteriorating conditions" are relative, but I can say that there is a slight advantage. Is it 20%? Maybe, but not much more than that.

Build rather than buy perhaps? FWIW ..
Humboldt Kinetic sculpture racers started using ATV wheels.
Dan Hanebrink used to make his extreme terrain big bikes with those..
wonder if he still does, belt drive X 2,

the disc mount on Rohloff hubs is the same 4 bolt pattern for a chainring,
and people have already used that function as a jackshaft drive , outside of a wheel.
[Belt cog instead of chainring , then ]

The Arcata-Eureka folks back in the 90's, also used
a strapped together set of 5 rims, the fattest tire in the center ,
to only ride on it, being a larger diameter.. on pavement was also used.


yea a belt drive would be better, still have abrasives all around you
and so washing down the sand , from the cog wheels, cleaning he bike,
will still be very wise maintenance..

I have a Pug for four years with 2x9 gearing and the front derailleur (Sramx9 Group) made contact with the outer knobs on my Endomorphs. Sliding the rear wheel back and using Karate Monkey spacers solved the issue.

My point: Even though Surly swears everything fits and works properly on the Moonlander, I pretty much figured 4.0 was the biggest tire that could accommodate a rear cassette because my Pug was REAL tight. If in fact the new 4.5 tires don't have chainline/contact issues - the bigger the better for dry sand. Go Moonlander.

A Mr. Wirly Offset Double crank also helps or a spacer on the BB of other cranks to shift the chainline out.

Surly says the Moonlander requires using the outer 2 rings of a triple, and possibly not using the innermost cogs on a cassette... if I were going to build a Moonlander, I would want to use either an IGH or a cassette/IGH combo to clear the rear tires.

OK. I forgot about that fix. Can you get a small enough chainring on the middle of the triple spider? I am using a "pounder" crank arm (double) on my Pug. It has two small inner chainrings and a bash guard where the outer ring would be on a triple. In deep dry sand, you are going to need some teeny gear choices up front.

Remember, the tall tires (virtual 29er) simulates taller gearing already. To overcome the tall tires, you need even smaller gearing. In other words, one tire rotation moves you farther down the path with a Pugsley by several inches as compared to a standard 26" ATB tire while using the exact same gear combo. Even with only two small chainrings, I can ramp my Pug up to 20ph before running out of gearing on the tall end of the range. My lowest gear is well lower than 1:1

These types of bikes will get you into areas where other bikes cannot go. If you take advantage of this capability, you will find yourself happily riding terrain with NO TRAIL because no one else can bike, sometimes even walk, in those areas. My point: You gonna need some really low gearing or you gonna be pushing/carrying more than riding. Just make certain that the Surly fix accommodates the gearing you must have. I just don't know those details.

I stick by my advice. If the Moonlander actually works with the gearing you NEED - bigger is always better on dry sand. No question.

Oh, man!
It wasn't enough to humiliate triathletes with a road bike, so now you're doing it with a Pug?
That is so cruel.

They offset the Moonlanders 28mm vs. 10mm on the Pugsly. Same old concept, just more of it. Pass the butter.