Surly bikes?

[eofelis]

I have a Surly Pacer and a Long Haul Trucker. Both are 42cm, the smallest size.

I love them both!

My bf has a Crosscheck, 54cm, that he really likes a lot and is planning to tour with, pulling a Bob trailer.

Anyway, I have been riding my Pacer for about 3+ yrs now. It's not a fast racy bike, but mine is very comfortable and stable. I've done many 50+ mile rides, and I did a century last year. I've done a lot of climbing and descending on it and it's always been an outstanding ride. I have the Surly steel fork on mine. I like that it's kind of a bombproof type of bike. Even the powdercoat on it is pretty tough. It goes where I point it. It goes pretty well on gravel roads too. This would be a great bike for supported tours or credit card tours. Mine is set up with Ultegra 9speed triple STI, with XT rear der, 12-34 cassette, Mavic Open Pro wheels (this bike takes 700c wheels). My lowest gear is 30-34 and I can climb just about anything. (We have a few hills here in Colorado). I have a lightweight pannier rack on mine, with a rack trunk, so I can take along those "essentials" on an all day ride. I just did a 46 mile ride today with about 15 miles of climbing. I consider this a sport-touring bike.

I got my LHT in Dec. I haven't toured on it yet, but plan to do a short tour this summer, and I am thinking about a coast to coast in 2007. The fit on this bike is very close to the Pacer (in the 42cm size anyway) This bike has 26" wheels and mine is built with an XT drive train (mtn bike gearing, high gear of 44-12, low gear of 22-34.) I tried this bike with road cranks at first. It seems to work better with the mtn bike gearing, even for riding on the road. It's a heavier frame than the Pacer. That said, it's certainly one of those proverbial brick *houses. It rides very nicely for a heavy bike. I did one half day ride over the winter where we got snowed on and had to ride on a road with 2" of snow on it, the bike didn't care at all. BFs Crosscheck went fine that day too. I've had it loaded with recyclables and other stuff riding around town. It doesn't care what you strap onto it. I plan on pulling a Bob trailer for touring.

I was looking at the Crosscheck too. (One can never have too many bikes) The sizing on them is different than the Pacer and LHT. They run large on some sizes and small on others. The standover on the 42cm CC is 73cm, versus 71cm on the 42cm Pacer and LHT. That putthe CC out for me, it's too tall. My bf usually rides a 56cm bike and he had to get a 54cm CC.

Anyway, if you have any specific questions about my Surly bikes, feel free to ask.

There is a googlegroup of LHT owners. http://saanichbc.net/surly/