Messages

1

Gear Talk / Re: Packing a DSLR?

« on: September 12, 2015, 07:03:24 pm »

@pptouring: Hi, it's a 5DIII and I used to have a couple of fixed L-lenses, but now I have the 24-70 2.8 on it. The other lenses are tugged away in the rear panniers.

I don't tour with a handlebar bag, because it influences the steering too much, especially if you have such a weight in it.

True, those mirrorless things cost quite a lot... and me too, I'm also happy with my DSLR.

Nice! I would like a 24-70 2.8! I recently picked up a 14mm 2.8 for stars and Milky Way stuff. :-) Do you tour with front panniers? I only ask because you mention the steering. We tour with front panniers and the handlebar bag is not even noticed.

2

Gear Talk / Re: Packing a DSLR?

« on: September 12, 2015, 07:12:56 am »

The disadvantage is that I cannot quickly grab my camera, but it's way too heavy for a handlebar bag.


Good luck!

Hey BicycleJinkies which camera are you carrying that is too heavy for your handlebar bag and what handlebar bag are you using?

I carried a Canon 6d with a 24-105L lens in Ortlieb handlebar bag for nearly a year with no issues. My wife carried a T3i in hers for almost two years without any issues. The T3i is a lot lighter, but that 6D and L lens is pretty heavy plus I still carried other stuff in my bag as well.

I too have thought about getting a mirrorless but I am not ready to make that jump because I really like having the full frame sensor. Yes I know the Sony is FF but I don't think it's really that much smaller than our Canons to justify the cost.

3

Gear Talk / Re: Recommendations for Long Sleeved Jerseys & Tights for Sun Protection

« on: August 31, 2015, 01:06:01 pm »

The no stink claim has not proven to be true for me and in fact when I used Merino on tour it was the stinkiest garment I had along.  I find it soaks up more moisture and takes forever to dry if it ever does in humid weather. 

Really? Were these 100% Merino or did you have a mix? You are the first person that we've heard this from. Our daughter, my brother, and several friends also swear by their Merino stuff, but I guess wear what works for you. As for costing $60 and up... just look for them on clearance.

Some fun stuff -

https://youtu.be/0FxiuRu1PLc  <--I haven't gone this long without washing, but I have gone a few weeks. ;-)
http://www.woolrevolution.com/virtues.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merino

4

Gear Talk / Re: Recommendations for Long Sleeved Jerseys & Tights for Sun Protection

« on: August 31, 2015, 06:02:57 am »

Thanks Ron!

Are you recommending the 200gm Icebreaker products? I live in Central Florida (aka - hot, humid), and I am finding it hard to believe this could work, but I may have to try it out.

Cheers,
Mike

Hello Mike, until these two Icebreaker shirts most of mine have been the 150 weight long sleeves and yes this is what I normally cycle in even when it's hot out.

This was yesterday. Temp was 87F (feels like 99F according to the News) over here on the Gulf Coast.

5

General Discussion / Re: Cycling Around the World, but.........

« on: August 19, 2015, 10:37:07 am »

 I have budgeted £40k for my around the world trip, and I am pretty sure I will need every penny.

Depending on how many Pints you need a day, this should be plenty of money. We spent less during our 2 years and this included health insurance, flights, and immunizations.

Have you heard of Helpx.net? Check it out. It's free to join, but to get to the good stuff (Premier membership) it will cost you a few Euros. We paid 20 Euros for two years and it paid for itself with one stay. We house sat and did some work on a farm up in Scotland for about 2 weeks and loved it.

http://pedalpowertouring.com/tours/europe/united-kingdom/first-helpx-experience/

We were supposed to help restore an old ship over in Colchester too but that didn't work out so well.

Oh the good times we had! :-)

6

General Discussion / Re: Cycling Around the World, but.........

« on: August 19, 2015, 08:49:21 am »

I would imagine your not thinking being back at work for too long

Well... for a couple years at least. 

We are doing our best to live within the same budget that we used while traveling and so far we're doing ok and the savings account is growing.

Hang in there and everything will fall in place for you. When you do hit the road, it will take about 3 months for your new way of life to kick in just so you know. We were told this by other long term travelers and it seemed to be the same with us.

As for honing your photo skills, yeah you'll have plenty of time doing this during your travels. We did anyways.

As for returning... well we really did not plan on things working out the way they did for us, but I think we would have been foolish to pass up the offers for jobs. Sure we were going to have to one day, but we were not ready to stop traveling. In fact we were planning and just about to book flights to South Africa 2-3 weeks after arriving home, but like I said it would have been foolish to pass on the jobs. Alaska to Argentina is 100% on the horizon as long as nothing crazy happens to us in the meantime.

Best of luck and I look forward to following your travels.

Ron

7

Gear Talk / Re: Recommendations for Long Sleeved Jerseys & Tights for Sun Protection

« on: August 18, 2015, 09:21:44 pm »

I found a long-sleeve summerweight jersey to be perfect for riding the TransAm.  Here's a source for them in Colorado:
www.boure.com/

Canari is another brand that makes such jerseys.

To heck with that synthetic crap! You wear it once and it stinks to high heaven. Seriously!

I just ordered over the weekend from Sierra Trading Post two long sleeve shirts that were on clearance. Normally costing close to $100 each I got them both for about $30 each.

    
Icebreaker Oasis Shirt - UPF 30+, Merino Wool, Long Sleeve (For Men) $27.66
Icebreaker Tech Shirt - UPF 30+, Merino Wool, Midweight, Long Sleeve (For Men) $30.77

Clothing made from Merino wool is the bomb! This stuff is truly amazing and we love it, but be careful with nylon to merino wool mixture. The more nylon (i.e. in socks) the faster it stinks.

Over 3 years ago we were already touted the benefits of Merino wool products. It's soft, does not stink even after a week of wearing it, it dries super fast, and most importantly you look good off the bike when you roll into a town and not like a cycling dork. ;-)
 
http://pedalpowertouring.com/gear/gear-reviews/merino-wool/

Ron

8

Gear Talk / Re: Back To Bar Cons

« on: August 18, 2015, 09:07:42 pm »

... but I am not comfortable on flat bars.

After all Co Motion...

Have you tried flat bars with Ergon GP5 grips? We've toured, long distanced cycled (randonneuring), & commuted daily using drop bars, butterfly bars, and flat bars with Ergon GP5 grips. So far the flat bars with GP5 grips wins for us. I recently put a Jones H-bar along with some Ergon grips on my commuter and it seems ok, but I can't really comment until I get a few more miles with this setup. I will say at the moment the H-Bar seems to have too much sweep for me.

9

General Discussion / Re: Cycling Around the World, but.........

« on: August 18, 2015, 08:26:09 pm »

Hello Stephen, my apologies, but I totally forgot about this thread and I think I owe you an email with the plugin name that we use for our blog map.

Anyway, today marks 4 months since arriving back home. We were both contacted by our former employer somewhere cycling through the middle of Texas about the possibility of returning to work once we got home. Bam! We both landed jobs with the same organization we left from, Petra got her same position, I took another position but under the same boss. Lesson here... do not ever burn any bridges and keep in touch with your former co-workers. :-) So back to work now for just over 3 months and it is beginning to feel like we never left, but the desire to get back on the bikes grows more everyday.

Our blog is still behind sadly, but we are working on it. Added several entries for Vietnam and are almost done there, but we have all of the Southwest from San Diego, CA to Tarpon Springs, FL to write about.

Stephen if you're still interested the plugin is - Google Maps Travel Route, by traveller11

Here is a link to what our map looks like. http://pedalpowertouring.com/breadcrumbs/

Here is a write we posted last week that some might find interesting - http://pedalpowertouring.com/general/how-we-saved-enough-money-to-travel/

Happy Travels
Ron

How are your plans coming along?

10

General Discussion / Re: Wearing the same bottoms...questions for the other ladies

« on: July 17, 2015, 10:53:17 am »

My wife and I just finished a very long bike ride and our daughter joined us for the final 6 months of it and all three of us just wore underwear. We personally know of another young lady that spent over 3 years solo and all she wore was underwear too. 

11

Gear Talk / Re: Touring Bike Selection

« on: July 16, 2015, 07:51:47 am »

Thanks for the plug for Stan's. I appreciate real world feedback.
As for the fenders, I'm going to give it a try. I'll buy from a shop with a liberal return policy in case they don't work.

Wayne

One downside with using Stan's and low tire pressure would be hitting a bump and causing the tire to "burp". Breaking the seal/bead on the tire and rim. This only seemed to happen to the guys running very low pressures out on the MTB trails and hitting a lot of roots or taking a turn to fast (this shouldn't be an issue fully loaded ;-)); otherwise, the stuff works great. i hope this makes sense what I am trying to explain.

12

Gear Talk / Re: Gearing for Touring Bike

« on: July 15, 2015, 07:25:54 pm »

Seem you left that word out of your earlier posting.

Yeah I did that intentionally. It was suppose to be more of a silly (not to taken seriously) response. Everyone else is listing measurements or 44,32,22 X 11-44 combos, so I thought I would just throw out our simple combo of 38x17 out there. However, I did not expect the... "Tour de France guys can't do it, then no one can..." blah blah blah comment! Hence my follow up being even more sarcastic. Whatever! I try to occasionally come on here and offer up some of the things that have worked for us in real world touring experiences and not what is spoon fed to me via magazine articles and I also like to have a little fun. 

13

Gear Talk / Re: Touring Bike Selection

« on: July 15, 2015, 07:06:33 pm »

I'm planning to put fenders on my bike and convert the MSO tires to tubeless.
I currently have tubes installed. Running 30 psi front and 35 rear unloaded. They are very nice on hard packed gravel.

Wayne

Sounds great, please let us know how this works out. With our 26" 2.0 tires unloaded we would run low like that too, but when loaded up we would be around 50psi and this still provided some cushion. Whereas on our other touring bikes with the 700x35, we would have to run them a little harder and you could feel it on the road and this partially why we went with 26" so we could have fatter tires and lower PSI. The thought of going tubeless with STANS liquid has crossed my mind a couple times too. On my XC racing machines I've been using STANS since about 2005 and swear by it. Great stuff.

14

Gear Talk / Re: Touring Bike Selection

« on: July 14, 2015, 10:49:06 am »

I also own a Co-Motion Americano. I recently installed Clement X'Plor MSO 40 x 700c tires. They are lighter than the 35 x 700c tires I replaced. No fenders yet. They will be next. After that, Old Man Mountain racks. USA made. I ride gravel roads. I hope to ride the GDMBR.
Oh, 24-34 low gear. I won't tour with anything less.
I plan to tour with an all up weight under 235 pounds. If I hit my target, my touring weight will be less than some riders without touring gear.

Wayne


Sent from somewhere around here.

 

Yeah you can run fatter tires on the Americano and Cascadia (NorWester Tour) without fenders.

15

Gear Talk / Re: Gearing for Touring Bike

« on: July 14, 2015, 09:45:25 am »

You recommend a 38 tooth front chainring and a 17 tooth rear cog for climbing mountains on a touring bike.  Professional Tour de France riders use easier gears than that for climbing mountains.  And they don't carry panniers and gear on their bikes.  38x17 low gear.  Sure.

I guess we are pretty darn tuff then aren't we? Yup, we started out with a 44x16 combo but that was a bit rough on the knees, so we changed our gearing to 38x17 and that seems to be a nice spot for us. We did met a Dutch fella that was cycling with a 40x21 and he seemed real pleased with that. 


Here we are crossing Brenner Pass, Austrian and Italian Border. Made it with a 38x17 on my 26" Co-Motion Pangea Rohloff. ;-)