What wrenching skills/tools do I need for independent touring?

[Eden]

hmmmmm from the experiences of things that can go wrong on a tour.

Change a flat - of course #1

Adjust brakes - no one has fun riding with a rubbing brake

Adjust derailleurs - know how to use both the barrel adjusters and the limit screws

basic wheel truing - doesn't have to be perfect - just know enough about a spoke wrench to get yourself to a populated area/bike shop. Think about carrying a temporary kevlar spoke and know how to use it, if you'll be in very remote areas or gone for a significant amount of time.

spare cleats - cleat bolts. Really ruins the fun when you can't connect to your pedals...

chain maintenance - I've never snapped a chain, but I know some who have.... again for remote areas or long tours, I'd carry a chain breaker (the Park Tool Pro one rocks!!) and a spare link. For really, really long/remote tours perhaps a spare chain.

derailleur hanger? Again - probably only necessary for long tours or very remote areas, but I have know people who've bent a derailleur hanger just by having the bike fall over (and with panniers there's more weight if the bike falls on the wrong side)

know how to tighten your headset. This only requires allen wrenches, which any multi-tool should have, but there is technique involved. I've learned this one pretty well as mine seems to loosen a bit more often than I like... though I don't want to over tighten, as I have a carbon steerer...

Those are the things that I can think of. Some of them I'd only worry about for tours of longer than a few days or in areas where you'd really couldn't get any help in the case of major problems. Haines (yeah the automobile manual folks) actually makes a quite good bicycle maintenance manual. I've used to quite a bit. Park tool has good online tutorials.

[OakLeaf]

To Eden's list I'd add one brake cable and one derailleur cable and the knowledge to replace them. If a cable should break at the lever (which is where they're most likely to break), it may not be immediately obvious where the new one attaches, so it's best to know this in advance.

The advice Eden gave about headset adjustment really goes for any fasteners - it's just more critical when you're talking about carbon parts. No one's going to advise you to carry a torque wrench on a tour , so you'll need to get a feel for when a fastener is tight enough to hold, and don't tighten past that point.

[Melalvai]

Know how to adjust your seat height & tilt. The best way to get that perfect fit is to make about a million tiny adjustments. You might not know until mile 40 that it's not quite there yet. SO much easier to just do it than to have to take it to the bike shop and say "another 2 millimeters please".

What type of tool(s) depends on your bike seat and the seat clamp.

[DebW]

I did a tour a couple years ago with some people that were rather novice at bikes. Seemed like I was adjusting someone's brakes almost every day. And did one major wheel true when a guy put his bike in a bike rack by one wheel with loaded panniers and it fell over. Here would be my recommendations, most of which have already been mentioned:

at least 2 tubes
patches, glue
2 power links for chain
kevlar spoke
1 gear cable (single ended)
1 brake cable (single ended)
spare bolts for attaching the rack
chain lube
zip ties

tire levers
allen wrenches 3, 4, 5 mm and any others to fit your bike
8, 9, 10 mm open-end wrenches if needed
spoke wrench
compact chain tool

Be sure you have the right wrenches for everything on your bike, including the fender and rack connections, and the tiny screws or bolts that center your brakes, and your cleats. Check that not only are the wrenches the right size, but they fit in the right places (multitools sometimes don't) and give you proper leverage. Even though my bike doesn't need any open-end wrenches, I carried one tool with 8, 9, and 10mm wrenches on it and used it many times for other people's bikes.

[malkin]

Credit card and all that other stuff.

[MomOnBike]

At the risk of sounding irresponsible, you don't need to carry a whole repair shop for the short (overnight-ish) tours you seem to be doing. Yep, if you were heading out across the state, country or Mongolia you'd need all those things and more. Really, though, a bike is a pretty sturdy piece of equipment, and you won't be far from home. Worst case, you can either limp back or call for a rescue. In that case, your pride will need repair, but we all deal with that.

So, my personal list:

Patch kit/pump
Small screwdriver (if you can get one with the interchangeable flat/Phillips head, so much the better)
multi hex wrench

You can do a lot of damage, er, repair with just that much. Once you start going further afield, you will find out for yourself just exactly what tools you need for your particular style of touring. Take those.

[NadiaMac]

Others have covered the tool/skill question, but I thought I'd chime in with the points that resonated because they are also pretty straightforward to learn how to do:
-chain tool (can fix damaged/broken chain, obviously; can also use to render bike functional if DR breaks/malfunctions-- chain will need to be shortened)
-spare spoke(s) and spoke tool
-spare cables- brake and DR
--lube (squeeky chain is annoying and hard on your drive train)
--boot material/spare tire (if tire rips or tears)

Also super handy to have on hand is duct tape (wind some around a pen to make it easier to carry)-- it's amazing what you can do with duct tape and it saved my ride when my glasses snapped at the nose piece as I crested a mountain pass in the rain on a recent tour (I am blind as a bat and had forgotten my spare glasses).

-a couple of zip ties-- plastic doohickies, can use to lash things down and as emergency fasteners.

[sfa]

A lot depends on where you're going. When I toured heavily, I pretty much just carried the tools to fix and patch flats, lube the bike, and a multi tool and allen wrench set to adjust things on my bike as needed. I didn't carry spare cables, tires, spokes, chains, etc. because I knew that I'd never be too far from a bike shop and I'd rather trust those sorts of repairs to a professional (and would rather not be dragging the weight around for things that I likely wouldn't need). I knew that even if I did do a quick repair by the side of the road, I'd still take the bike to the next LBS and make sure it got done right.

But I was traveling in populated areas, never more than 30 or 40 miles from the next town, so it wasn't likely that anything much would happen that couldn't wait until I got to the next town (and didn't--I've had just a few flats, had to adjust the brakes and derailleurs a few times, and had to tighten a few attachments. The worst damage to my bike - stolen handlebars - I wouldn't have been able to fix on my own under any circumstances!). If I were in less populated areas, I'd start adding to my tool list and bolstering my mechanical knowledge. But I've also discovered, after reading way too many journals on Crazyguyonabike, that most people, when they run into mechanical problems, either put up with the problem until they get to the next LBS, or do a quick field repair to get the bike as far as the next LBS, or they call for assistance. It's a balancing act between wanting to be prepared and not wanting to overpack, and where the balance lies depends on the likelihood that you'll be stuck by the side of the road with no way to get the bike into a shop.