Travel Bike Lifestyle Question

[saab2000]

So I'm trying to thin the fleet and the Serotta may be next to go. It's my S&S coupled bike and is nearly perfect in every way. It also almost never gets ridden and it's probably been four years since I packed it up for an airplane ride.

Curious about those of you who own coupled bikes. How often do you fly with them? Do people just ship a bike around the US nowadays with a bike shipping service? It's affordable with these services and I own a Trico Iron hard case.

This is the bike in question and sadly, it just isn't in my regular rotation. I think I've mentally moved on from it though it would be sad to see it go because there will never be another Serotta like it and many of us know this forum was the Serotta Forum in its origins.

Not sure if I should hang onto it or let it go. Not really asking for that advice but I'm curious about people who travel with a bike. Do you? Or do you ship it? Or do we own these bikes hoping to travel with them but never really doing it.

I'd be surprised if I've ridden this one more than 500 miles in the past three years and I haven't travelled with it a single time during that timeframe.

[p nut]

I thought about doing the same in the past. But just never made sense to me to hold on to a bike that will get used maybe once or twice a year. Not to mention the hassle of assembly/disassembly. I even thought about a Brompton that I could take on family trips and not have it take up a ton of room or have to bring a bike rack. But again, only a handful of times it will get used annually. I just decided to ship the bike using bikeflights for the few occasions I do travel and want to ride. Just renting would be another cheap option.

This is heavily dependent on how much you travel. If I traveled more like some of my neighbors, I may look into one. Or take up running.

[Mzilliox]

darn, it looks a bit big for me...
good question, im still new to travelling with my bike...
I dont mind packing and unpacking yet.

i travel to ride at least 2x per year.

im not sure if thats enough... im not sure if id consider shipping a bike instead.

[saab2000]

I'm just afraid that if I get rid of it I'll immediately want to take a trip and regret it. A full sized bike case is very cumbersome and while there's not quite as much assembly as with the S&S bike, it's a lot more than nothing.

The simplest thing is to hold onto it for the time being. But it is the most likely candidate to be sold off if I really actually need to reduce the fleet.

[tv_vt]

Got a travel bike in 2013 and have done 3 Euro trips, with another coming up this summer. Wife has one too. Has really been great to have a bike I can travel with. At 6'2", there's no way my regular bikes would ship or travel very well, and you don't always have a good place to ship too anyway.

Having it be a Hampsten Strada Bianca doesn't hurt either.

[DRZRM]

I had couplers put on an IF Ti Planet-X specifically because I travelled to SLC/Park City annually for many years and taking that bike made those 10-12 days annually much better for many years. It paid back my investment a million times over. When eventually that trip fell out of my regular job responsibilities I travelled with it a handful of other times over several years, a couple times internationally, but like yours it mostly just sat in a box. After a few moves without unpacking it, I eventually sold it on through the PL Classifieds. Though I miss the aesthetics of the bike, and I'm currently "replacing" it with a disc gravel bike that is not a travel frame, I think I made the right decision...but every time I look at it, I miss the bike...sigh.

PS That Serotta is a looker though. I still have a 98 Legend I'll probably never sell.

[Ken Robb]

If we assume that this bike rides as well as another bike in your stable why not keep the coupled bike so you always have the option of packing it small? Even if you don't fly with it you might want to uncouple it to fit in a car for a road trip rather than use a rack.

On a similar note when I was asked if I would sell my wonderful Serotta Legend I decided to do it because my Strada Bianca by MOOTS was just as good on pavement and lots better off-road with room for 700x35 tires. OTOH I'm suffering mild withdrawal symptoms because my Hampsten will be delivered to a new owner tomorrow. As I age I need ever-more relaxed positions on my bikes and that will probably mean using moustache bars on a Dirt Drop stem on my Rambouillet. I considered putting moustache bars on the Hampsten. That might have worked but with its 1 1/8" fork my choices of high rise stems wasn't too appealing.

[skouri1]

I have a coupled cx bike (serotta incidentally).
I use a co-motion hybrid hard-soft case.
Got a decent dent in the seatube, so traveling can definitely be hard on the frame without very careful packing.
If i were you, I still wouldn't sell it. Even if you can find a use for it a few times, you will begin to recoup the cost. While packing is kind of a pain, having your own bike and avoiding fees is sweet.
who knows--maybe in some phase of your life you will begin traveling more with your bike.
The threaded BB, chris king headset should make it future proof.

[Kirk007]

I just sold my Kirk s&s bike last winter for the same reason. Hated to do it but I have too many bikes and at this point in my career am sick of business travel so when I am on the road I don't stick around at places, even if they would be good places to ride a day or two.

I'm going for the heavy duty bike box route for taking a bike on bike vacations.

I sometimes wonder if it was the right decision but it is what it is.

[Clean39T]

I travel frequently for work, but usually just 2-4 day trips. I always wish I was able to have a bike with me (especially since I'm usually traveling to CA or AZ from the PNW), just have never figured out how to make the hassle worthwhile.

If I can get it sorted out, I'd probably go for a heavy-duty standard metal road frame (titanium most likely) outfitted with eTap rather than a coupled bike.

[saab2000]

Originally Posted by skouri1

I have a coupled cx bike (serotta incidentally).
I use a co-motion hybrid hard-soft case.
Got a decent dent in the seatube, so traveling can definitely be hard on the frame without very careful packing.
If i were you, I still wouldn't sell it. Even if you can find a use for it a few times, you will begin to recoup the cost. While packing is kind of a pain, having your own bike and avoiding fees is sweet.
who knows--maybe in some phase of your life you will begin traveling more with your bike.
The threaded BB, chris king headset should make it future proof.

The Campagnolo headset (I love complete groups!) is even sweeter!

There's no urgency on this but it's something I do contemplate if I move to the Denver area and if I move into a smaller place. If I end up with a 2-car garage it's a moot point because I will have enough space. If I end up in a mid-rise or high-rise condo some serious questions will be faced. I'd like to live in a high-rise condo in many ways. Lock and leave and never worry about maintenance, etc. But storage is usually at a serious premium in these kinds of places.

[simonov]

I almost never use my S&S bike these days and will probably do the same. I don't travel as often and when I do it's just easier to deal with the packing of a larger bike case. On top of that, the TSA seems to have an easier time checking the bag when it's a regular case and not a puzzle. I love the bike, but it hasn't made the last 4 trips, so I think it's time to move it along.

[weisan]

Saab pal, looks like you are not to the point of having to make that decision yet so I would hold on to the bike if were you.

a coupled bike and is nearly perfect in every way

That in itself is more than worthwhile keeping it unless you are thinking someone else could benefit from it and is approaching from an utilitarian perspective, then yeah sure, why not, at the end of the day, it's just stuff.

[donevwil]

My S&S bike is my primary ride so it gets ridden most by default. Still not sure that was the right decision, but it is what it is.

Kirk007's S&S Kirk is now my wife's, that'll be a similar scenario as your Serotta. We air travel with bikes maybe once every two years, but it was such a hassle for me to lug around two full sized cases with my wife hauling the luggage into and out of trams/trains/cabs/etc. that we committed to coupled bikes.

If you know your destination and can have it shipped direct that's easiest, but once you have to lug a full size Trico case around in public transit you will miss the S&S. In addition, when we did our last Cinghiale Tour Andy warned against shipping to Italy as there have been hold-ups in customs leading to a day or more delay getting one's bike. Sure enough someone on our tour had their bike held up and missed two days of riding before they could rent one. They ended up never riding their own.

[DRZRM]

Yeah, E-Tap, titanium, and disc brakes (I can't tell you how many times I pulled my wheels out of that case to find them knocked out of true, though you'd need CL to make it easy to take off the rotors) would make it almost worth getting a new one. Set up would be so fast, though without hydraulic splitters, you'd have to remover your brakes and roll and store them with your bars. There is always something.

Now that I think of it, I still have my coupled SS MTB for travel (been so long that I traveled with it I finally set it up for dirt jumping with my kids) so I didn't sell everything off.