My touring bicycle leads a rough life. I camp every night, so my bicycle sits outside where it is exposed to dew and rain. Each morning, off I go, rain or shine. Along the way, I lock my bicycle outside grocery stores, restaurants, and coffee shops where it could possibly be stolen.
Meanwhile, my vintage Cinelli road bike sits in pristine condition inside my storage unit where it is protected from the elements. If it is raining, I select another day to take my road bike for a spin. I avoid taking my road bike to grocery stores and I never lock it outside restaurants. If I stop at a Starbucks, I lean my road bike against the nearest window where I can keep an eye on it!
My touring bicycle is a rough and ready machine that I don’t hesitate to ride on a rainy day or take grocery shopping. I use my touring bicycle for day-to-day travel around town and for touring. For all these reasons, I selected a moderately priced Surly Long Haul Trucker for day-to-day use and for touring. Surly chrome-moly steel frames have a sterling reputation and I needed an extremely strong, reliable bicycle with a supple ride and relaxed steering characteristics.
I selected the lower priced Surly Long Haul Trucker with V brakes because I was uncertain if I had the knowledge or proper tools to maintain the disc brakes that came installed on the more expensive model. I was confident of my ability to adjust and maintain V brakes. In my experience, V brakes have ample stopping power.
My new Surly bicycle was moderately priced because it featured inexpensive Shimano Deore components. I paid $1,300 for my new Surly Long Haul Trucker. I outfitted my new bicycle with a pair of Shimano Dura Ace road pedals ($250). For long distance touring, nothing is more important, in my experience, than high quality pedals and perfectly fitted bicycle shoes! My favorite bicycle shoes are Specialized Torch 2.0 road shoes ($175).
The Shimano Deore components on my Surly Long Haul Trucker began to fail after only six months (5,000 miles) of hard use. I replaced the wheel bearings and bottom bracket bearings and kept going. (Meanwhile, my Dura Ace road pedals continued to perform just like new!)
I decided to upgrade my bicycle with better components as soon as I had saved the necessary funds and had located a bicycle shop that was willing to order the parts I had selected and install all the parts in a single work day. That way, I wouldn’t have to pay to stay at a hotel while my bicycle was being overhauled. Because I haul all my camping gear in my bicycle trailer, I can’t easily camp without a functioning bicycle to pull my bicycle trailer.
Cosmic Cycles in Flagstaff, Arizona ordered all the necessary parts and graciously agreed to do their best to complete my Surly overhaul in a single day provided I arrived with my bicycle just as the shop opened its doors on a Tuesday morning when the shop was not likely to be busy.
Cosmic Cycles in Flagstaff, Arizona is one of the best bicycle shops I have ever visited. The Cosmic Cycles staff is friendly, extremely knowledgeable, and professional. They treated me just like family. Best of all, Cosmic Cycles has a vintage spoke machine that can cut and thread stainless spokes to the exact length you need. This is incredibly important if you happen to own a heavily laden bicycle trailer whose spokes are under constant strain! Scott, the owner of Cosmic Cycles, used the spoke machine to cut and thread extra spokes for my bicycle trailer while his assistant installed all the new parts on my Surly Long Haul Trucker.
My Surly upgrade cost $1,500. That is more than the original price of the bicycle. When everything was complete, however, I can honestly say that I have never owned a better riding, lower maintenance, or more reliable bicycle. For simplicity, I opted to omit the front derailleur and installed a single “narrow-wide” front chain ring. Many modern bicycles have only one front chain ring because modern cassettes offer such a wide range of gear ratios.
Here is a list of the parts I purchased for my Surly upgrade:
Sugino XD2 forged alloy crankset square taper 175 mm ($155)
Wolf Tooth 110 BCD 36T 5 bolt chain ring compatible with SRAM flattop ($80)
Problem Solvers single chain ring bolts ($15)
Sugino 68 x 113 square taper bottom bracket ($60)
Shimano Dura Ace SL-BS77 9-speed bar end shift levers ($160)
Tektro RL520 brake lever set for linear pull ($40)
Kool-Stop Thinline brake shoes ($30)
Volt narrow, black, chrome-moly, gel saddle ($95)
Lizard Skin DSP 4.6 mm handlebar tape ($50)
DT Swiss R460 700 cm/ Shimano 105 135 mm/ 9 speed factory built wheelset ($515)
Labor ($300)
Total $1,500