Tourist in MSN

A lot of communities have a bike coop or a bike charity, or maybe both. They often have bins or buckets of old parts off old donated bikes. Downtube friction shifters are often free or cheap.

dgodave

At your age (our age, actually) you can run a risk of tendon or joint injury grinding big gears up hills day after day, unless youre really used to it. Highly recommend having some really low bail-out gears even if you dont plan on using them.

Thulsadoom

A consideration for bar-end shifters with upright bars is that when it's hot, the sweat runs off your head and shoulders, down your arms and off the heels of your hands and dowses the shifters in a steady stream of salty sweat water. Before long your cables and housings start to rust and your shifting is impaired.

Tourist in MSN

Good point, and if your shifter cable for a bar end shifter is galvanized instead of stainless steel, this can happen.



I think I had three remaining unbroken strands when I got home.

GamblerGORD53

That Schwinn looks like my bikes, except mine are all IGH now.
What is for sure is, if it won't fit 35/ 38 mm tires, then it's NOT a tour bike. 1x is a joke now as well.
I doubt the LHTs are the right bike for you. Something like Kona Sutra maybe.
I ride half my miles with SA bikes with low GI at 45 to 48. My Rohloff14 is the king of tour bike drives, no doubt.
I love my SA XL-FDD dyno drum brake in the front. Lights always on, brakes are absolutely foolproof for 30,000 miles.
PS IMO, NO bike from the 1970s would be suitable with narrow dropouts..... And my SA 3 speed is on a 42 lb 1973 CCM. LOL.
I did 2 tours with 21 GI on my 120 lb bike. Hills are maybe 1% of the miles. My push speed is mostly 3.2 mph.

greatbasin

I'm a newbie, so I'm not sure how much of that is verbal irony or sarcasm. I just posted a thread about 1x drivetrains. So why are they a joke now? I'm just clueless and wondering. I figure with many sprockets, they might take a narrow chain, otherwise I'm not sure what the trade-offs are.

Those are greenguard Marathons on my Schwinn. There's not much choice in 27x1.25, but I'm very happy with those and would be willing to tour on them any day. They've been bulletproof and I ride them on everything - pavement, gravel, rocks, mud, the boards on the slope-style course. Years ago, I put Schwalbe Big Bens on my kid's mountain bikes, mostly because the cheap factory knobbies wore out and were constantly plauged by flats (my skinny Marathons rode every same mile with none), and because my kids were riding more pavement than trails though we definitely did both. The Big Bens didn't disappoint. I don't know if I'd tour on them, but they were comfy and durable. For touring, I'd probably choose something with less rolling resistance, maybe Marathon Plus or Almotion. I don't have those choices in 27.

Sturmey? Tell me more about that. I briefly considered internal hub gearing. I love the idea and the clean look, and I'd love a generator hub and something like roller brakes too, but I'd have to commit to build or buy a new bike to get any of those things. I checked out Nexus/Alfine mostly because they have plenty of ratios and I kind of fell for those pretentious Pashleys. The Rohloff is impressive. I read more about that over on cyclingabout. If I was considering a career in bicycle touring, there's a Co-Motion Americano with a Pinion P 1.8 and Gates drivetrain on the San Francisco Craigslist right now complete with the S+S couplers.

I feel more like a grumpy old man. I don't even want an aluminum frame to be too fat in the downtube because it will make me think of those battery-powered mo-peds that so many people are buying. I don't detest what makes other people happy. I just feel better when I look at what I'm doing, and I can see the resuts of my decisions make me feel good about myself.

Tourist in MSN

Your comment on sarcasm, I know that was not intended for me. But I am answering some of your questions. I already responded to your new 1X thread.

Rohloffs are nice and so are derailleur systems, they each have advantages and disadvantages. I have one Rohoff touring bike and two derailleur touring bikes. I use whichever I think will be best for the conditions.

A large diameter downtube can make a bike stiffer which for touring is pretty important if you are carrying heavy loads. My titanium bike has a pretty big diameter downtube, if it was skinny it would not be a very good bike when I have four panniers on it.

greatbasin

Yeah, I totally get it. I have an aluminum driveshaft on my truck. That thing looks almost as big around as a beer keg. The large diameter gives it torsional rigidity that a smaller diameter could only possess with much greater wall thickness and weight. I'm not just put off by the aesthetic because I think its trendy or faddish. This guy 'Charlie MoPic,' wrote, "...it is often history and tradition where our hearts lie, fond for a simpler and more dignified yesteryear." He was writing about his Pashley on a video he uploaded in which he fawns over its retro panache but then explains how the factory had to crush the chainstays to fix a noise, had neglected to tighten the derailleir cable, and how the bottom bracket failed all within a short time after purchase. He was right that at least I can pine for a simpler and more dignified past, though I'm aware that it was neither simple nor dignified. I suppose that when the future looks ugly, a person is more inclined to try to find hope in a reinterpretation of the past. Where I think Charlie was mistaken was in his expectation that as a consumer the producer had an obligation to make him happy in exchange for his eighteen-hundred pounds or whatever. I'm happier when I can take responsibility myself to make something work that I depend on. I don't suppose a Rohloff hub would fail in my lifetime. It's happened, but it probably wouldn't in my experience. On the other hand, nothing has ever failed on that Schwinn. If it ever did, writing an angry letter or posting a video expose to social media wouldn't do me any good. What I'd need to do is find a replacement part on ebay and get my tools out. I don't really want to make an emotional investment in a consumer bauble because heartbeak and depression aren't even part of the solution.

I thought about reliability because most of the advice I've read about touring bikes expounds reliability as a priority. I've certainly seen bikes that were so shoddy that things didn't work right to begin with and I'd have no expectation that what did work would continue to do so for very long, but they weren't bikes that I would take pleasure in touring on anyway. Now suppose I bought that fancy Americano. I would have reason to believe it would keep going trouble-free for probably much longer than I would ever ride it in my lifetime. But what if it didn't? Suppose there was an unlikely problem with the pinion gearbox or the belt drive or any other less unique component. I'd still have to fix it, and in the case of that bike, likely have to have someone else fix it.

It seems reasonable to 'invest' in reliability to avoid having a tour interupted with mechanical issues. On the other hand, a tour isn't just a consumer bauble that we purchase with the expectation that someone else has done everything to assure that things go according to some plan. It should be an adventure that's wholly dependent on the participants to see through. Sometimes we have to insist on having a window and some controls like the early Mercury program astronauts. Things like that make me prefer a vintage bike, maybe even a French one. I'm not going to whine that something doesn't meet my expectations as a consumer. For me, the worst thing would be if it worked perfectly but didn't have any interesting result.

I know this thread's been going on for some time now and I haven't got a bike yet much less toured anything. I'm probably going to have to travel to California, to LA or the Bay Area to get a bike unless I decide to order parts for a build. I wasn't able to travel this weekend since I'm on-call for work, so it might not be until next week. I hope I'll have something to show before long. I hope to tour the 395 corridor and Yosemite (Tioga Pass when it opens), as well as Point Reyes, Marin county, and SF this summer. I'd share a pic of the bike, but touring, I'm only taking my film cameras and I don't like to scan much so you'll just have to go see it by bike for yourself.

garryg

Good luck on your quest, Not to be a smartass but if you want to tour on a bicycle it is best to have a touring bike. It is that simple.

Thulsadoom

A touring bike is whatever bike you choose to tour on.

GamblerGORD53

Don't confuse wacky boat anchor greased roller brakes with awesome SA DRUM brakes, the best ever made since 1931.
My Simcoe roadster bike bought last year came with roller brakes and a Nexus 7i. It now has the SA dyno hub that was on my tour bike, that got a new one the same.
You could wear thicker shoes to help with standover, mine are steel toe ones. I wore nothing else the last 12 years, tours and every ride. Your seat is about as slim as there is.
I'm 5'8" and have mostly had 23" bikes.

greatbasin

I picked this up yesterday. Not exactly a "touring bike," but it does have a steel frame and triple chainring crank. The specs are here: https://web.archive.org/web/20031002...Vigorelli.html

The only discrepancies from the catalog are the Bontrager wheels, the front derailleur is a 105 instead of Ultegra (the Imola model had the 105 groupset in 2003), and the Ritchey alloy seatpost. The seller couldn't explain, but thought they were original. The tires are Conti GP2000's and the date code on them indicates they were manufactured in 2002.

It's a 51cm frame. The seat is adjusted to my size and can be compared to my Schwinn earlier in the thread. With the smaller frame, the top tube should bring the handlebars closer, except that on this bike the stem is 110mm which negates a lot of that. At least the head is closer and with a stem change I could bring the bars closer and higher. The consequence of the smaller frame is the steeper seat tube angle to maintain enough front center to avoid toe-overlap. I could adjust the seat reward on its rails, but that would make the whole thing fit like a bigger bike. Notice I have the seat forward. This puts the bottom bracket further under my pelvis, but it's not extreme like a tri-bike.

I don't like the riding position at the moment. There's too much pressure on my hands and pressure and pinching at the base of my cervical vertebrae. I'm going to try a 30 degree stem to bring the bars up. I'm not sure I'll ever be able to get this bike to fit to my liking, but I will certainly figure some things out.

As for touring, it's got some good features like the Reynolds 631 frame and Ultegra 3x9 that gives about 29 to 115 gear inches - not expedition freighter gearing, but I would think quite good for sport touring. The biggest problem is the lack of cargo attachment options. The front carbon fork has no provisions and even the rear (Reynolds 525) has no eyelets. Even if I opted for "bikepacking" style luggage, there's not a lot of room on this small frame. The chainstays are a mere 406mm. I'll just have to see what I can come up with. I'm not thinking of trying to kludge-on some traditional wire racks with p-clamps. I don't think I need to transform this thing into a klunky shopping cart. If I figure it out, it will definitely be lighter and more efficient than driving a truck. Bear in mind I'm anticipating touring with about 160 pounds of rider, cargo, camping gear, food and water, so while the books say a "touring bike" should have 36 spoke locomotive wheels, I think 20 might be enough.

LeeG

Nice, just so you know what you have is a road racing bicycle with a triple crank. Not a touring bike or sport touring bike. Not something I’d put panniers on unless it was a steel fork or otherwise designed to mount front low riders. Also the wheels, not for any extra load. You mentioned reliability wrt a touring bike. The only difference in reliability between bikes will be found by operator awareness as to whether something is adjusted correctly or going out of whack or loaded appropriately. You certainly can tour with that but I see $500 + for a range of parts to make it work for touring carrying 25 lbs. I wouldn’t put rear panniers on 20 spokes even weighing 125 lbs. Get the seat back to where it’s in the proper position for your knees especially if you need a more upright position. The cheapest bar position change would be a tall stem and be pared you might change it again.

greatbasin

Thanks. I've no misconception about its intended purpose. I'm not intending front paniers because of the carbon fork. It's sort of a pity since I think those would result in better handling than rear, but there's no guarantee I can get rear to work either.

Tell me more about the seat position. I'm accustomed to just riding what I have. I watched some Cam Nicholls videos with Neill Stanbury (bike fitter) on seat position, so I've heard some ideas on how to set it up but translating that to what works for me is going to take some practice.

For the bars, I could add a stem riser and a shorter stem to bring the bars up and back, but that would be two additional parts versus the single 30 deg. stem which will bring the bars 44mm up and 15mm back. I'm not so much interested in being cheap if I can get it right. In the end, this is not a low-budget excercise, but I am reluctant to spend more until I know what I actually want. I ordered a bunch of stuff and should have it before the weekend -- like tires, so I don't ride around on the 20 year old tires. If everything works out, I might try a 3-day, 2-night ~150 mile tour on the weekend. The chances are I won't get it together for two weeks, but I hope to get out for more than a day ride by then.

mtnbud

"As a starting point for fore/aft adjustment of the seat, the centre of knee rotation is vertically above the pedal axle – experiment from there to find what feels best. Thomas McDaniel / Immediate Media"

More info.

As far as for carrying gear, consider a trailer. Maybe a Burley Travoy:
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Or an extra wheel:
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With the Travoy, maybe you could strap your backpacking pack straight to the trailer. The Extrawheel would require buying panniers.

greatbasin

Thank you. I checked this out. I set my bike up with the forward pedal level at 3 o'clock. I placed a yardstick at the pedal axle and used a spirit level to ensure I held it vertically fore-aft. Sitting comfortably on the saddle, the stick came up just behind my patella. If I scoot back in the seat a couple inches, my knee is behind the stick. If I scoot forward, the femur/tibia get ahead of the stick. I think I'm pretty close. I don't have a trainer (stand) so I need tires to ride this thing much and then I can check the balance of exertion between the quads and hams.

With respect to 'touring' bikes, there are a few popular models that fit the smaller frame sizes with 650B wheels instead of 700C presumably to allow a shorter center front distance without toe overlap. That shorter center front distance should allow a lower seat tube angle. The thing is, with 'proper' touring bike with 650's like the LHT, the difference is only 1 degree of seat tube angle. On the LHT, there's just as much (1 degree) difference in seat tube angle between a 56cm frame and a 50cm frame. So if the effective seat tube angle or the seat position in relation to the bottom bracket seems wonky, it's ultimately a result of the smaller frame size. It affects road bikes and tourers alike.

As for the trailer, I'm keeping that option open. I used to have a Trek 2-kid bike trailer. That thing was awesome. I pulled it with two kids using the Schwinn all over the place. It could also convert to a jogging stroller and I built skis for it (for x-country) and could even convert it into a cart my dog pulled with a harness. I'm still hoping to fit everything in a few smaller bags though and keep it to two wheels.

staehpj1

Nice bike. The wheels aren't very heavy duty, but it will help that your body weight is pretty low. That combined with a low gear weight might make the wheels adequate given that your total load would be less than a lot of riders body weight.

I think either a set of bikepacking style bags or a Carradice Camper Longflap or similar and a bar roll or a handlebar bag would be good ways to go with this bike. You can add a large stuff sack under the flap of the Camper. Personally I'd be tempeted to go with the carradice setup.

Folks do go with trailers and they do have some advantages. Even the lighter weight trailers add quite a bit of weight in terms of light weight packing. Maybe not so bad when comparing the lighter trailers with the heaviest rack and pannier systems though so look at actual numbers for the whole system when choosing.

Gearing... You will likely need lower gearing, but a different cluster will likely take care of that. Be sure that your derailleur wraps enough slack and the chain is long enough for the big front ring and big rear cog or you will eventually shift to the full cross chain gear and destroy the rear derailleur. If the RD isn't doesn't have the capacity to wrap that many links of slack you may need to go to a smaller big ring. Dropping to a 50, 48. 46, or whatever really isn't a handicap on tour or really otherwise.

Tourist in MSN

Is your steerer tube steel or carbon? If it is carbon there may be some limitations for stem height or angle.

I think I have a 35 degree stem on my road bike in photo.




I agree with Staehpj1, bikepacking or Carradice style bags would work well on that bike. I met this couple when I was touring Iceland, they were there for two weeks and were using bikepacking bags on their Ritchey BreakAway bikes.



I do not know if you can strap on anything type cages onto your carbon fork or not, but you might be able to add some small drybags there if you can. Since I own no carbon fiber gear, I am quite ignorant on that.

If you want to strap fenders on, consider SKS Raceblades or Raceblades XL, which depends on which size tires you have. They can be strapped on with elastics, I have them for my road bike.

greatbasin

I'm going to try some bikepacking style bags and a beam rack in the rear. If it works out, I'll be able to hit the road earlier. I also have ideas how to build something custom which I would do myself but I would rather get something off the shelf if it gets me touring sooner. The thing is, this bike is smalll. There isn't room for a big saddle bag like the Carradice Camper Longflap or for a really deep handlebar bag. There's only about 19 cm under the saddle. The longflap is said to be 26cm. Thanks the tip on the fenders. I had written-off the possibility. It's great to live in a time when so many ideas have been given material substance.

That woman's white Ritchey breakaway in the photo looks like its about my size. I'd like a little more capacity, but she's showing something can be done. I considered buying a Ritchey Breakaway in Titanium last week. It was nominally my size and had 34/40 tires and 34/28 low gears. I didn't want to spend that much money when I was unsure how the fit and type of bike would work out for my purpose. I got this Bianchi because it was 10 times less money and will serve for proof-of-concept, frame fit, baggage capacity and so many other things. Like I've written earlier, I don't mind spending a few thousand, but I'd hate to have done that and then be frustrated I can't get the bags I need on it because I spent the wrong thousands. This bike might end up frustrating some of my desires, but it didn't cost me much and I can afford to start over if I have to and I would be doing so with a lot more knowledge from practical experience. If I can actually tour on it once or twice, I'll know even more when deciding on what to spend.

I'm starting from a position of doubt and letting this bike convince me and it's gradually showing some hope that not everything is wrong with it and who knows, it might actually work out and be great. I prefer this to buying the bike of my probably ill-informed dreams and then only having to discover the depth of the let-down.

pdlamb

That's one way to approach things, and sometimes it works out OK. It's also common for someone to try something new, like bicycle touring, and start with something that's so far from optimum that they decide it's not for them and give up. (That's why I'm not a great guitar player, for example; $15 rummage sale special was no fun!)

I hope this bike works out for you. With a little luck, you'll get into riding shape and have fun doing so, and then extend to short overnight trips with rain gear and a change of clothes, and you'll figure out you like this bike touring, regardless of how you do it. Whether or not you decide to go for fully loaded or stick with a lighter load, with a little luck you'll enjoy yourself out on tour.

Tourist in MSN

A photo of my roadbike with the SKS Race Blade XL fenders, I have 28mm tires. (If it looks familiar, it is a Break Away, but badged as a Raleigh, the two seatpost clamps are the giveaway). Some rubber elastics hold them on, but they can be fitted for longer term with zip ties, but I have only used the elastics so I can't comment on how well the zip ties work.



***

A friend of mine was trying to figure out how to avoid his luggage rubbing on his tire, I saw this DIY thing that someone had put on their bike for that, snapped a couple photos of it. I would have done it differently, but for DIY it is a good idea.






Or, a seatpost clamp type rack like you mentioned. Some of those racks also have small pannier brackets, but if you try that it is important to get the same amount of weight in the panniers on both sides. I used one of those types of racks on my folder, brought one pannier to the grocery store and the rack kept twisting on my seatpost so that the rack rubbed on the rear tire because all my weight was on one side.

staehpj1

In my experience those type racks are inclined to do that even when the load is balanced. They are also kind of heavy for the amount of load they are designed to carry. I tried one for a while and decided I'd rather adapt a regular light duty (or heavier if needed) rack to fit, Even with no bosses there is always a way. That or strap a stuff sack on whatever seat bag you use.

In one case I just used a light duty regular rack with light dry bags strapped on. It worked well for my situation.

Something to consider any way.

Tourist in MSN

I found that they work fine for light weight, for example the rack top bag was one of my gym bags pre-covid when I went to gyms. This rack was a cheap Nashbar one. But I would not have wanted to risk much weight on that rack. This is my road bike, I rarely have a rack on that bike.

GamblerGORD53

Da hell is that now?? You have a tri bike now. You can't even put those wheels on the Schwinn with those useless spokes.
Putting old 700c wheels on the Schwinn could help.
IMO, Go back to the Schwinn. Level the seat and angle the bar grips down an inch.
Better to have gears that suck than spokes that suck.

staehpj1

The OP said they weighed 135#. With a light gear load the wheels ought to be fine. He can carry some gear and still be as light as the average rider with no gear. He should avoid carrying a lot of food and not worry about the days where once in a great while that he needs to carry extra water, but only load up on a lot when it is a must.

The gearing on the schwinn would be easy enough to address. The problem is that the frame is apparently way too big. The parts to convert to s triple and a wider cluster are pretty common either used or new old stock if you are lucky. The local bike coop in many cities would fix him up easily. Some bike shops have some old stock. Barring that there is ebay and FB marketplace. Heck, I wouldn't be surprised if I had most of them in my parts bin. The the frame size looks like a show stopper though so why would he bother?

As far as the wheels go. I wouldn't use them for a heavy load, but what is the worst that could happen? Limp along fixing spokes? A wheel failure? If on a short tour maybe worst case you'd go home early, but if you had spokes you'd likely finish the tour. On a longer tour you'd buy a wheel.or a wheel set and keep going delayed by a few days. I have actually done that because of a worn through rim failure (I misjudged the remaining wear at the beginning of a long trip). If you are on a multi month tour you likely have the flexibility in the budget to replace a wheel or even a wheelset set. I know that may not be true for everyone, but most of us here seem to be retired or near retirement so it would seem likely that we would generally be somewhat financially secure. So with his light body weight and some care taken in keeping the gear light I don't see it as that big of a deal.