Hire Hard Bike Box

[e-rider]

I used cardboard box from Germany - bike arrived with bent forks! Simply because someone used a card box and the bike arrived safely isn't a 100% certainty that that will happen everytime and people shouldn't make such claims!

 

[ColinJ]

I just decided that I'd rather spend £400 on a bike box which might get battered but which would last at least (say) 10 holidays, and be fairly certain that my my £2,000 bike and £1,000 holidays weren't going to be ruined, than save the money on the box and risk a cardboard box/bike bag again.

I think I've had about 7 holidays using the SciCon box now. Each holiday that goes by reduces the effective cost of the box per trip. It would be very easy for £400 worth of damage to be done to a bike on a single flight.

I can't remember where I saw it recently, it could have been on CycleChat or elsewhere, but I saw a picture of someone's bike after he picked it up at the airport and it was really mangled. The drops were bent round so far, it looked as though a fork-lift truck must have driven over the bike!

 

[Tedx]

Colin some good points. I guess your bike is quite a lot of money and may bend easier due to light weight parts etc so maybe the bike box is justified.

The thing that also stops me spending a lot of money on a bike box is you have to worry about sending the box to your destination which take more preparation and money.

What do you do with the box when on a long tour?

 

[ColinJ]

Colin some good points. I guess your bike is quite a lot of money and may bend easier due to light weight parts etc so maybe the bike box is justified.

The thing that also stops me spending a lot of money on a bike box is you have to worry about sending the box to your destination which take more preparation and money.

What do you do with the box when on a long tour?

Touring would be tricky, I can see that. Maybe you could contact a bike shop in your destination city and ask them if they would store the box for the duration of your trip for a nominal sum?

My holidays were always based in one hotel with transfers arranged by the holiday company so I didn't have the problem of what to do with the box, I just kept it in my hotel room.

Apart from the damage done to my bike, on the same holiday a Scottish guy had discovered that his rear mech hanger was bent when he took his bike out of its bag. He straightened it out and came out with us on the first day's ride. As we came to a steep rise in the road and went for our low gears, I heard a shout from behind me, followed by profuse swearing. The hanger had just snapped off and put the rear mech into the guy's wheel. We had to do some major surgery on his bike to turn it into a singlespeed to get him back to the hotel (take the mech off, retrue the wheel (broken spokes), shorten the chain)!

 

[zaid]

Soft case = Pure Luck
There's these guys who hire too http://www.bikeboxonline.co.uk/HomeLondonandBristolHireHubs/tabid/627/Default.aspx

 

[Brandane]

I have been thinking about taking my bike on holiday with me. From reading this thread, can I assume that the moral of the story is......

Only take your bike in a soft case or cardboard box if it is old and cheap, and doesn't matter if it gets damaged?

Or....

If you don't want to spend megabucks on a quality case, then don't take a good expensive bike with you?

I am now thinking along the lines of hiring when I get there, but somehow it just doesn't have the same appeal as having your own pride and joy with you. Even though the pride and joy in my case is not exactly a top quality bike; it is still important to me that it is kept in good nick!

 

[jay clock]

Only take your bike in a soft case or cardboard box if it is old and cheap, and doesn't matter if it gets damaged?

Or....

If you don't want to spend megabucks on a quality case, then don't take a good expensive bike with you?

Agreed. to be honest I when i took my cheap road bike to Lanzarote in March I cycled at exactly the same speed as this last time on my pricey bike!

I have now realised that in fact I am also doing a half IM in Mallorca which will be a third round trip in 2011. The money is spent and i will have much better peace of mind with a decent box