kardar2

Hello,
I am 47 years old and I want to go on a tour west to East coast (Trans America) I commute to work about 31 mi round trip this is my stat:


I am looking at buying a new bike my this is my options

https://surlybikes.com/bikes/ogre
https://https://www.jamisbikes.com/usa...roraelite.html
https://www.trekbikes.com/us/en/bikes...ring/520/520/#

I am really leaning toward the Surly MTB. Cause I like MTB more than a road bike and I can put fenders on it for a commuter. I live in Redding Ca. and have a a lot of MTB Trails to ride. But I know most of you take road bikes. so I would like your thoughts on it. I do realize the bike is heavier and bulkier than a road bike. but I weigh #200 lbs. I really like the disc brakes I will never go back to rim brakes if I can help it. I don't do clip in shoes I tried them and I do not like being tied in. I am strictly a platform kinda guy.
So I am looking at about 70 days on the road. do any of you have a formula of how much money one would need to have for a trip. like $2,000.00 for plane ticket home. how much does it cost to ship your bike home and how would you go about doing that. BOX or Create ? do you like figure a two tubes a week and a tire a week? then do you add 10% on top of what you figure? I got the whole thing about taking extra parts..... but do you account for big parts such as a new cassette.... thanks for the thoughts and advise. Karl Atkins

jamawani 

Many of these questions have been addressed either here or at CrazyGuyonaBike.

I have toured close to 100,000 miles on a mountain bike and would never go back to a tourer.
I like going anywhere on any road surface - plus I like the sturdiness.
Plus I use platforms with toe clips - that way I don't need "special" shoes and can hike the Grand Canyon.

You can spend as much as you want - $20/day - low budget, $30/day - frugal, $40/day - moderate.
Remember, motels below $50 are rare these days and a lot of state/national parks charge up to $20 for camping.
If you have the time, Amtrak from DC or NYC to SAC is relative cheap - esp. for your bike - $10 for the box and $10 for baggage.
With all the items you use, airlines will kill you on baggage fees -
some people have even had to argue about whether panniers count as 1 or 2 pieces.

Good tires should last the whole trip - I only carry an extra tire to Alaska or such places.
I always carry at least one extra tube - cause I'm sometimes lazy or it's raining.
I also use Mr. Tuffy liners - so usually have few flats.

Cyclebum

You can tour on 'bout any bicycle that's mechanically sound. A mtb will do. What's most important is that it's a good fit and has a granny of at least 20 gear inches.

Free camping, $25/day will get you cross country in reasonable comfort with no weight loss. More is better. Subtract what you normally spend when home to get net cost for the tour.

One set of good tires should survive a x-country. Always have two spare tubes. Most that can go wrong will fail slowly and can be fixed at the next lbs, or roadside depending on your skills/tools.

Train or bus is often the cheapest way to ship a bicycle. Depending on the airline, it may be the cheapest. Box the bike.

valygrl

- there are dozens of threads on here about how much does it cost. The answer is always, "it depends." And, a lot of people will want to tell you how little it cost them. But it takes some effort to make it cheap.

Are you camping? Hotels? warmshowers? Cooking or eating in restaurants? Frugal or more liberal with your spending? Drink alcohol or not? If you are camping, figure between $20-$60 / day depending on how frugal you are, how much you cook vs. how much eat in restaurants, how much you camp in developed camp sites vs. wild camping. Camp sites can be $6 or $35. Hotels cost $40 -$100 (usually $70) and it's up to you how many hotels you use. If you use the ACA maps they have a lot of info on free / cheap camping.

- getting home - plane ticket coast to coast from major airports will be less than $300, and depending on what airline cost to take the bike on the plane w/ you (in a cardboard box) is $50-$150. Southwest and Frontier are the cheap ones. If time is no object, you can take a train or bus, but they end up being not cheap enough to be worth the time for some people. Don't buy a plane ticket back until you are pretty close, so you don't screw yourself with a timeline that you may not meet.

- bring 2 or 3 tubes, maybe a tire, definitely not a cassette. You can buy stuff along the way if you need to replace stuff. Do not plan to carry your whole trip's worth of tubes! Plan in advance when you can, but if you don't have any warning you can always have something shipped to you from an online retailer.

- you can use whatever bike you want, just make sure it can carry your stuff (rack attachments or trailer(which I don't like)) and that it has low gears and strong wheels. A 29er might be a bit of an oddity in the boonies, though, so maybe carrying more tubes would be a good idea. 26" and 700c tubes and tires are probably easier to find along the way.

Newspaperguy

I've toured on a mountain bike and I've toured on a touring bike. I enjoy both, but for me, the touring bike wins out. Mine is able to handle everything from good pavement to packed dirt trails comfortably, which is important considering some of the places I've gone. I have campus pedals and I use shoes with recessed cleats. I wouldn't want to jog in my cycling shoes, but I can walk long distances in them. A good pair of shoes will be comfortable off the bike as well as on the bike.

The point is that touring by bike is incredibly flexible. If a bike is roadworthy, there is probably someone touring on it or on something similar. There is no definitive right way to do this.

BigBlueToe

I've toured on both mountain bikes and tourers. I prefer my tourer, but there's nothing wrong with a mountain bike if you have enough room to avoid heel strike with your panniers. I have size 14s and was always able to find room, though sometimes it was tight. You can avoid this with a trailer, but that's another issue. I've toured twice with my Bob trailer and I prefer panniers.

This probably doesn't help, but I prefer to save enough money prior to my tours that I don't worry about what stuff costs. I still look for bargains and try to travel cheaply, but I don't sweat it if I need to stay in a motel, and if it works out that there's a nice restaurant when I need to eat, I'll order what I want and not worry. On my last tour I booked a sleeper on Amtrak to get to the start. The sleeper was expensive, but so nice!

I've come a long way. When I started I spent as little as possible - stealth camping, etc. I've had fun either way.

fietsbob

Figure 8 bend trekking bars, offer a good variety of changes of hand positions ,
to make an MTB

into a touring rig, all your levers move easily onto the open rear center , without cable changes.

one without a suspension fork, particularly if braze on fittings are there,
so readily accepts racks for front panniers.

an extra benefit.