jonwvara 

Re-visiting this thread to find and print out the Amtrak baggage-handling rule book attached to post # 19, as I prepare for a spring tour along the Ohio River. One thing that I forgot to mention before that could save someone a bit of grief:

When I flew out of Memphis (after taking the train from New York to Savannah, and riding from there to Memphis), I uneventfully checked my rinko-packed bike for an upcharge of $75--fair enough, I figured. The bike has an easily-removed faceplate stem, so I took it off the handlebars to prevent it from poking through the plastic bag, and stuck it in my carry-on bag.

At the security checkpoint, it took me awhile to notice that people who had been behind me in line were being sent by while I was kept waiting, and that there were three or four people clustered around the x-ray machine. "What's going on?" I asked. The woman told me to be patient.

A few minutes later she came up to me holding the stem in her hand as if it were a handgun. She said "when we see something like this on an x-ray, it really gets our attention." Oh. Lesson learned. Since then I have made it a point to leave the stem with the frame.

Since someone asked, I bought the big 6-mil bags from some industrial supply company I found on the internet--I forget the name. I had to buy 20 of them, I think, at a cost of something like $60. I can be reincarnated twice and still have a lifetime supply. But even if that happens, I doubt that I'll be able to find the damn things.