Shipping or flying with bike

Hi - I have a friend who routinely ships his bike for big touring trips he does. He goes to whatever LBS happens to be around, they will often pack and ship it for you in a bike box at a cheaper (can you believe it?) rate than fed ex or UPS at their stores. If it was my bike, I would go to LBS and get a box and pack it myself and have them ship it. They often will ship it to a bike store wherever you are going and you can just pick it up there. I can get specific details from my friend if you are uber interested in this route.

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Originally Posted by Aint Doody

But it does gall me that golf clubs go for free--they weigh more and some golf cases are quite bulky. Maybe I should have said it was golf clubs.........

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At the UBI bike class last week, one guy brought his bike by plane in a large oversized case. He had painted "PRO GOLF" on the outside of the box, and it went for free!

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At the UBI bike class last week, one guy brought his bike by plane in a large oversized case. He had painted "PRO GOLF" on the outside of the box, and it went for free!

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I knew I was on to something! I'll call it anything to take it for free. I hate being discriminated against for trying to be healthy.

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Originally Posted by brittmix

i have a question about shipping also - i need to ship my bike (and my soon-to-be-husband's bike) from raleigh, NC to barcelona. i looked at that sports express page, and it was quoting me over $1000 each way...
obviously, i'd rather pay the $80 to put it under the plane, but my question is - has anyone had any luck with asking the baggage checkers to just let me put it on the front of the plane? also, is putting the bike in a box the only way to ship it? if i took off the wheels, seat and handlebars, and then maybe laid the fork down alongside my frame, and wrapped it all up, could it be considered normal sized baggage? we're only checking our bikes and whatever we can fit in panniers, and while my steel framed bike isn't the lightest thing, it still isn't over the allowed baggage weight. just wondering if we can do this thing any cheaper, because we're going to have to fly our bikes from US to Spain and then Rome to Tanzania, and then Tanzania to US. any suggestions?

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Great trip!

No, the airlines will not let you just put a bike in the front of the plane. At $100 per bike per flight, you're looking at $1000 easy. Maybe there's some European bike rental agency from which you could rent a bike from Barcelona to Rome. Or you could buy used bikes in Barcelona and sell them in Rome.

Or get Bike Fridays :)

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Originally Posted by Tokie

Bike Fridays got a bit messed up by TSA - beware Tulip, bring extra spokes, my husbands wheel sustained spoke damage after TSA checked his BF.There is a good web article on packing your bike for shippping on a triathalon website, but I can't remember where! One thing I liked was wrapping the frame with foam pipe insulation. Tokie

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I have spokes. I also have printed photos of the packed bike and a big note in English and French explaining that the bike only goes in one way, please be careful, etc. taped to the inside of the case. Other Bike Friday folks have reported that this works well. I'll report back after the trip.

I also heard that in one instance, the ticket agent still wanted to charge for a bike for a Bike Friday in a suitcase. The owner got around that one by saying that it's actually bike parts, which it is (took me 40 minutes to pack!)