Cyclist1092309

I have recently bought a road bike (Cube Aerial 2010) and have extremely enjoyed riding on it. I have started looking at doing some tour cycling and want to know what people think of road bikes to be able to handle touring such as if the structure is sound enough to carry panniers with the weight. I will just be doing road cycling and planning to do a shorter stint at the start of the summer (maybe 3 days) and longer at the end (2 weeks) to make sure I am able to do it.
I cannot really afford and do not want to buy a touring bike but would really like to be able to do it and try touring. I am not panning and hulking a massive amount of stuff, i have seen a couple of items I will get such as a tent 1.5kg, sleeping bag and matt 1kg and cannot imagine I will be taking lots of food and clothing.
Thanks,
Sam
P.S. Any advice, experiences, blogs or anything on touring would be appreciated!

prathmann

Sure, but you might have to make some modifications. One option is to use a small trailer like the BOB. That puts most of the weight on the trailer instead of the bike, but a disadvantage is that the trailer itself is a significant load - especially if you're trying to travel light. So I prefer to use panniers on a rear rack.

If your bike has eyelets at the rear dropouts then adding a rack is pretty straightforward, but you'll probably need to add some vinyl-coated 'P-clips' from a hardware store to attach the top of the rack to the seat stays. If there are no eyelets you can also use P-clips at the bottom of the seatstays for that attachment. Seatpost racks are another option but they tend to sway more and I don't like to have such a cantilevered load exerting force on the seatpost - so I'd recommend the P-clip option instead. Another option is that Tubus makes an adapter to attach the rear rack to the QR axle mount:
https://www.thetouringstore.com/TUBUS/Fly/FLY%20PAGE.htm which also has the advantage of moving the attachment back a little farther. Road bikes have short chainstays and therefore panniers can interfere with your heel when pedaling so you'll want to move the rack and panniers back as far as possible.

LeeG

see if you can get the load under 20lbs and do without panniers. Rear rack with gear piled up under seat and a compression sack attached under the handlebars.

nun

Can you tour on a road bike?

Yes, search the forum for "ultralight" and "lightweight". Things that you might want to change on you road bike to make touring more comfortable are the wheelset and the gearing.....but if you're enthusiastic, fit and pack sensibly you should be able to do it. FYI a 1.5kg tent is heavier than you need to be taking. Try to get your sleeping bag, mat, cooking equipment and tent combined weigh under 2 kg.

dwmckee

I have done over a thousand miles of loaded touring on a cannon dale recing bike. Not ideal but you can make it work. Issues are you till have a harsher ride and the load will do a bit of beating on the frame (may strip eyelet holes, etc.). I thread lower rack bolts from the inside out and hold the rack on with nuts for protection from stripping holes. It will take more constant input for steering too and may wear you out sooner. I would be a little apprehensive if the bike is super lightweight though.

ztmlgr

You can tour on any bike. It just depends how problem-free you would like your tour to be. I checked the specs for your Cube Aerial. I see 2 areas you may want to look at to improve your touring experience on this entry-level road bike.

First, I consider the Cube's 30-39-50 chainset and 12-25 cassette to be too high gearing for touring, specifically going uphill with any kind of load. I don't care how young and fit you are, grinding up hills with a load in too high a gear can take the fun out of touring, as well as wreak havoc with your knees. You don't need to replace the entire crank, but I would replace the 30T inner ring with a 26T or even a 24T. I made this change to my Bianchi road bike and have had no problems shifting between chainrings. For even lower gearing, I would replace the 12-25 cassette with an 11-28. Your specs may say this exceeds the max range of your drivetrain, but I made this change and have had no problems. Those 2 changes should cost you less than $60 total.

Second, your Shimano R500 wheels have 24 spokes on the rear and 20 spokes on the front. While the wheels may handle the increased load of touring just fine, there is a chance that you may start breaking spokes when you add extra weight. The spoke count of those wheels is well below what you would find on touring wheels which typically have at least 36 spokes. With that low a spoke count, it would seem breaking even a single spoke would render your wheel unrideable and bring your tour to a screeching halt. I started breaking spokes when I added touring weight on the stock wheels that came with my road bike (Bianchi Brava) and I ended up replacing both wheels with 36-spoke touring wheels and have not broken a spoke since. The only way to tell for sure how your wheels will respond is to load the bike up with your expected touring weight (or even more) and put in some test miles. If you break even a single spoke, you can expect to break many more and should decide right then to replace the wheels. I was told by the guy at my LBS that the entry-level road bikes cut corners to keep the cost down and one of those corners is in the quality of the spokes. This is a more expensive change, as replacing both wheels will set you back at least $200.

MichaelW

Your frame is strong enough but it lacks the threaded eyelets to accept a bolt-on luggage rack.
Your luggage options are:
Seatpost-mounted luggage rack.
Std lugage rack with P-clips (or Tubus Quick-Release adapter)
Large carradice saddlebag.

You can also fit a bar bag at the front and a frame-bag under the top tube.

You would be advised to use ultralight camping. Since you are looking at short summer tours, you should be able to get the load down using eg tarp-tents.
With an ultralight load you dont need to use heavy-duty touring wheels or very low gears. Whilst low spoke-count wheels are not ideal, they are quite usable. You may want to change the rear cassette to a 12-28 (or even 11-32) but the crankset is OK.

I think you can tour with the bike you have.

dwmckee

Ztmlgr and Michaelw have some great points too. I broke a lot of spokes on my 36 hole eyeleted rims and had to put on a triple front and new freewheel too. I was riding a 28 28 as my lowest gear and made it from Pittsburgh to Portland ME, but often found lower gears would have been optimal. I carrier about 40 pounds too which was too much. Try and get total gear down to 25 pounds or so which at first seems impossible but really is doable. Also I had everything on a rear rack (which broke en route) but a front rack with 20 - 25 percent of the weight will ride better and alleviate some stress on the rear wheel and rack. Less gear weight better distributed and careful riding on smooth roads MIGHT be just enough to get by on your current wheels, but I fear you are pushing the limits with your current wheels so make sure your 25 pounds of gear includes extra spokes a cellphone and a credit card!

One thing to understand about loaded touring is that weight on a rack is much harder on the bike than your body weight because rack weight has no dampening like your body weight does. As a rideryou constantly use your knees as shock absorbers when you stand slightly as you hit rough road and you shift weight back and forward as you roll over bumps. Weight on a rack cannot do this so is static and every bump is transmitted full force to your rack, frame and wheels and over time it all adds up to fatigue metal parts much faster than unloaded riding.

One last suggestion is to put on the biggest tires you can, at least 28 mm but wider is better and properly inflate. This will eliminate some rim pinch flats and will cushion the load somewhat which is more comfy for you and dampens things some for your frame, racks and wheels.

dwmckee

And gosh, that 20 spoke radial laced front wheel looks scary to me... You might do better with an inexpensive 3-cross 36 hole front rim you could swap in for touring.

sstorkel

You can... but I wouldn't. Before my first tour, I thought about using my road bike. Went so far as to mount a handlebar bag and a Carradice saddle bag. What I discovered was that the 22lbs of weight I was planning to carry on my credit card tour had a big impact on the handling of the bike. The bike was very squirrely with the additional weight. Not quite unrideable, but definitely not fun.

In addition, my route involved a significant amount of hill-climbing and the road bike gearing wasn't quite low enough to be comfortable. It was doable, but my knees wouldn't have been happy about the amount of stress they'd have to endure.

I ended up building a touring-specific bike using Nashbar's cheap double-butted aluminum touring frame. Used a bunch of components from the parts bin, bought a cheap trekking crank (26/38/48 triple) and shopped for bargains until I could afford to build some 32-spoke touring wheels. The bike turned out great and was perfect for the tour. I still ride it quite regularly...

Cyclist1092309

When cycling I have never had to go down to the lowest two sets of gears on the chain-set, I am always on the upper and generally on the upper of the rear cassette, I have cycled for some time so have not found this hard so feel I may not need to get a new set if I am in the upper boundaries of my gears and also I would be planning to go under about 10kg and keeping to the bear minimum, what do people think now about the wheels and gearing? Thanks for all your help!

10 Wheels

I rode a 500 mile tour with the tent on the down tube and panniers on a seat post rack.






The tour:
https://www.bikeforums.net/showthread...League-City-TX

dwmckee

Sorry, yet one more thing to add. A racing bike with short chain stays may give you problems with your heels hitting the rear panniers, especially if you have larger feet. I had this problem with my Cannondale but was able to shift the bags back enough by playing around with mounting ant the rack adjustments but you may not be so lucky. Some combinations are not possible to work out.

There are a lot of disadvantages and compromises with using a racing bike for touring, but most often you can get by for a couple of shorter tours until you decide if you want to invest more in a bike made more for touring. You just have to decide for yourself how much you are willing to spend to modify your current bike to get by and keep in mind that if you spend a few hundred bucks you might instead be better off just buying a used touring bike.

Other options to consider are to borrow or even rent a touring bike for a short tour.

sstorkel

At some point, I think you have to make your own decisions. What might be right for one of us, won't necessarily be right for you.

Suggest you buy luggage from a place with a liberal return policy, install it on your bike, load it up with the amount of weight you expect to carry, then go for some test rides. That's what I did and it convinced me that I needed a real touring frame and slightly lower gearing. Having gear early meant that I could use it for local training rides, which helped build endurance and also helped me with route planning (ex: because I knew how far I could ride and how quickly).

bigjim1

Grab a coffee and read this. All you need to know.


https://ultralightcycling.blogspot.com/

fietsbob

gearing ? with a load ? 1:1 is a good thing 34:34 x wheel diameter, or smaller 24:34.

Wheels , normal spoke count , 32 or greater. you can alwys buy a replacement at a decent bike shop.

merlinextraligh

For a light weekend trip, we throw on a seat post mounted rack and panniers. More than that, we use a BOB trailer.

Admitteldy the trailer adds weight, but it solves most of the problems with touring on a road bike.

Hooking it on is just a matter of changing QR levers, so no problem with lack of eyelets.

The trailer carries most of the weight, so not much concern with your road wheels not being up to the task.

Again because the trailer is carrying the weight no need to use rock hard tire pressures on your tires.

No issues with short chain stays and heels hitting panniers.

And you can carry a lot of stuff if you need to.


Thus if you're only occassionally going to tour, and don't want to make a lot of alterations to a racing bike, or buy a dedicated touring bike, the BOB trailer is apretty neat solution.