Touring on a fixed

good point, though I tend to buy bikes and ride them until parts wear out

What was wrong with the other 8 bikes you got for touring?

BMW's in America, too expensive to ship it over, so it's there till I moved to Sacramento, the current fixed wheel bike is a Dolan Precursa, would not want to do 2800km on that, selling that frameset after moving the part over to the TFG.

Challenge to do it fixed, it would make it more interesting and hopefully grab a few more attention for charity this September, oh and it won't have a flip flop hubs, 48/20 all the way, including the Pyrenees.

Like I said, a challenge, how dull would life be without such?

You pair of moaning old minnies, it's Ed's money, he can spend it as he sees fit. It is somewhat ironic to see the pair of you, who are not averse to buying a bike now and again, giving Ed some grief for doing so.

When's the ride, Ed?

You just responded to a supposed moan with a moan. :]
My question wasn't about his spending habits...It doesn't bother me in the slightest what he spends his money on, I was just curious to know how he can build so many bikes for touring on yet none of them ever seem suitable for each new ride that comes up for some reason or another.

The only reason I ever get new bikes these days is because I have to sell the old ones cos I'm broke. If I can afford to keep them I keep them for years. The biggest irony in that comment is that I don't even own a bike anymore that I've actually bought.

I dunno, I just like trying different thing every now and then, especially the Moulton which got me questioning conventional wisdom (i.e. Moulton claim that the 20" is more effective with a higher pressure tyres, better for climbing, aerodynamic etc.).

Fact is, it helped me finalised my thought on getting a custom frame and what I want from it.

Ed I'm not telling you how to spend your money but how can buying a new frame be cheaper than shipping a frame back from the US of A?

I sold some component on the BMW before I left - wheelset and crankset for £220, it still would end up costing a lots to send the frame back.

Since I have a mind to move to Sacramento in the next year or two, decided it's best for it to stay there.

TFG frameset is much cheaper than advertised price due to giving me a massive discount.

hmm really? It's a nice frame.

(already having ideas of a new fixed project)

60 dollars via USPS plus customs if you arent able to avoid them. although a low value stated will obviously reduce this. but i am sure you are aware of all the above!

I'm just in the process of training for a sort of touring/endurance ride on fixed.

The original plan was three of us entering the London to Brussels 24hr ride at the end of August and riding it fixed. However, two big issues in 2 days stopped that... the first was one of the three falling off his bike in training and breaking both his hip and his shoulder, the second was the organisers cancelling the L2B24 due to insufficient participants. :-(

So now the remaining two of us are doing our own ride.... Coast-to-Coast, from Pembroke to Great Yarmouth, by fixed gear, in 3 days. The third guy will be acting as a support driver (he'll be driving by then) to carry kit and food for us.

We can't find any record of anyone having done this before, but maybe someone on here will have more of an idea?

And yes, we're doing it for charity and fun, though I don't know the rules of posting links to charity pages on this forum, so I've not done so. If anyone does want to support (or maybe even join us?) let me know.

Dave

To add to the above so you can all call us both mad and imbeciles, we're both riding 2011 Specialized Langsters :-)

'nuff respect to you Ed if you are really going to ride to Morocco fixed. It seems much more of an ordeal than fun to me.

How do you get on with touring and your hearing impediment? Both in terms of traffic and asking for directions in unfamiliar languages etc?

Dave, someone here have done such ride on a stuff track bike with support vehicle from London to Spain, I think there's a topic here but hard to find due to tags being remover.

How do you get on with touring and your hearing impediment? Both in terms of traffic and asking for directions in unfamiliar languages etc?

Regarding the former on traffic - it make no difference deaf or not, unless you relied on your hearing which is not advisable (as according to Cycle Training).

I know a bit of French, need to brush up on Spanish but language aren't a barrier, just as long you pronounced the location name properly.

Ed, thanks for the info. Will go take a look and see if I can find anything.

Dave, I'm interested in joining you if you're still looking for more to ride with you.

You can advertised your charity ride after all you're doing it for the greater good.

Ed - thanks for the further info.

To give you some more background -
The two of us are riding for charities. I'm riding for the Multiple Sclerosis research unit at Oxford University and Chris is riding for the Oxford Radcliffe Hospital charitable fund.
(These are links to our charity donations page should anyone wish to donate...!)

First thing to say - this is not an organised ride! The route is roughly planned, though not yet fixed in stone and we have not yet decided where we'll be stopping for the two nights or staying. It'll either be B+B or campsite. We have one 'support vehicle', with one or possibly two drivers who will be able to carry some kit - clothes, drinks, food etc.
The date is fixed (no pun intended.....) - it's the weekend that the L2B24 was due to take place: 30th August to 2nd September. The plan is to travel to Pembroke on 30th August and then start the ride on 31st, finishing by 2nd September.

As far as pace goes, we'll be aiming to travel at around 15mph average and have short rest stops every 30-ish miles, covering about 125-ish miles per day.

If you're still interested in joining up, let me know and maybe we can meet up for a ride or just a get together (or both) to make some more plans! (I'm new here, so can't DM until tomorrow, but if you head to my website, you can get in touch via the contact page.

Dave
[URL="http://www.justgiving.com/cshadbolt"][/URL]

Hi, Chris here, the other part of the duo doing the Coast to Coast ride and brother of the broken one, as Dave said, we are happy for people to join us and would welcome company for all or part of the ride. Once details of route etc are firmed up we will share them.

I don't understand the brit thing with the charities.
you cycle somewhere and other people donate to a charity? how is that connected?

It's encouraging an adventure + donating to a good cause.

win/win.

Does this happen less in sohiland? We need charities here because our government would rather sell contracts than run tings.

I don't understand the brit thing with the charities.
you cycle somewhere and other people donate to a charity? how is that connected?

In our case, we're riding for charities that mean something to us. Some of the charity events (go climb a mountain, trek the jungle etc) seem a bit like a holiday that someone else pays for, we're hopeful that most people will realise that this is actually quite a difficult challenge that is certainly no holiday and will require some serious effort and quite possibly pain on our part.

If you want to know why we choose our charities, have a look at the two links above.

I guess the connection is that you put yourself out doing something hard and people respect that by giving you money - in this case though, the money goes to charities rather than you.

48/20 all the way, including the Pyrenees.

good luck descending on that

I like fixed as much as anyone but for touring?

good luck descending on that

That's my only nag about my set-up, can climb 15% reasonably well with 48/20 but descending will leave me looking like flash Gordon on a bicycle.

Still, I know I'll have a great time regardless, the hard work will be replaced by the sheer sense of achievement that for sure, will keep it light by having two panniers and a handlebar bag.

I'm doing the Raid Pyrenees with my Dad in 2013, 720km in 5 days a la Randonneur, so I will get to enjoy the descent on my custom 650b bike.

In our case, we're riding for charities that mean something to us. Some of the charity events (go climb a mountain, trek the jungle etc) seem a bit like a holiday that someone else pays for, we're hopeful that most people will realise that this is actually quite a difficult challenge that is certainly no holiday and will require some serious effort and quite possibly pain on our part.

If you want to know why we choose our charities, have a look at the two links above.

I guess the connection is that you put yourself out doing something hard and people respect that by giving you money - in this case though, the money goes to charities rather than you.

ok, thanks for explaining.

Just finished touring ss for a month around Sumatra in Indonesia. I've kept a blog up to date as there wasn't much information on the web about cycling in the area. Turns out that it is pretty amazing.

http://superlighttouring.blogspot.com.au/

Touring SS is good (fixed is silly in areas where there are mountains) but next time I'm going to install a three speed hub gear as swapping wheels in the heat is hard.