Bikes on planes
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Bikes on planes
Postby Andywear » Sun Aug 14, 2016 4:31 pm
My wife and I are traveling Cathay pacific with our bikes. It's an absolute nightmare trying to get a straight answer out of them regarding packing, size, weight, anything...
We've purchased a TARDIS bike bag but might need to also pack it into a cardboard bike box (based on the Cathay pacific info only). So confusing!
Has anyone got any generally comforting stories about either this airline or others...tips, advice on how to circumvent specific or common airline issues?
I'm happy to be more specific as required. This is our first tour overseas so we are possibly panicking unnecessarily.
Cheers,
Andy and Josephine.
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Re: Bikes on planes
Postby Derny Driver » Sun Aug 14, 2016 8:36 pm
What we usually do:
1. No excess option: for short trips and races we put the bike and towels and sheets, clothes, tools, etc in with the bike. Put your clothes in plastic bags and use the bags as packing. Use your kitchen scales to weigh the bike. You have a limit of 20kg so you can get a fair bit in. Then take a large hand luggage and whatever won't go in the bike bag in there. You can take a laptop bag too and put some stuff in that. Put bike shoes in the hand luggage. If you bike goes missing you can borrow one, but you cant borrow bike shoes.
2. Extra bag option: Prepay for an extra bag. then you can have hand luggage, suitcase, and the bike. This is good for longer trips where you need more clothes.
Cardboard boxes are the lightest option, you can fit a lot of stuff in there including spare wheelsets. The downside is that you have to dismantle the bike a lot more to get it in the box.
Hardshells are heavy and you still need to do a fair bit of disassembling. Good if you have a 30kg limit.
Soft cases are the best in my opinion.
Go option 2.
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Re: Bikes on planes
Postby Andywear » Mon Aug 15, 2016 7:47 am
Cheers,
Andy
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Re: Bikes on planes
Postby Derny Driver » Mon Aug 15, 2016 9:25 am
They are all the same as far as I can see. Air New Zealand has a little loophole where you are allowed to package a bike in 2 boxes and call it ONE bike. So you can take a box with the bike in it and another box for the "wheels". But both boxes cannot combined weigh more than the 23kg limit. Plus you need to have that website information printed out or on your phone as the check in people don't come across people using the loophole much.Andywear wrote:Thanks so much! Greatly appreciate your reply. Feel a lot more relaxed about our options. BTW, do you recommend any particular airline as being bike friendly?
Cheers,
Andy
Apart from that, they are all pretty similar I think.
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Re: Bikes on planes
Postby RonK » Mon Aug 15, 2016 9:39 am
It's a common mistake to buy tickets based on price without consideration of the airline's luggage policy vis bikes as baggage. The cheapest ticket price may not ultimately be so cheap when you arrive at the check-in and are slugged with punitive excess baggage fees.
It's important to research carefully before buying tickets.
I have used a soft bag on many flights, and have never had any objection from the airlines. I'll be using a Tardis later this year for a flight to NZ as it is much lighter than my internally-framed bag.
For peace of mind buy I another bag allowance in advance if I'm scratching to stay under the allowance (which is usually the case with my internally-framed bag).
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Re: Bikes on planes
Postby Leaf T » Mon Aug 15, 2016 10:26 am
Malaysian Airlines have been good for me on two occasions. Thai were good too although I nearly got stung for 1-2kg excess when leaving Vietnam. Probably depends on who checks you in at the time though.Andywear wrote:Thanks so much! Greatly appreciate your reply. Feel a lot more relaxed about our options. BTW, do you recommend any particular airline as being bike friendly?
Cheers,
Andy
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Re: Bikes on planes
Postby Greentourer » Mon Aug 15, 2016 12:05 pm
Boxed in cardboard, my touring bicycle will hopefully survive unscathed.
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Re: Bikes on planes
Postby ft_critical » Mon Aug 15, 2016 12:17 pm
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Re: Bikes on planes
Postby dalai47 » Mon Aug 15, 2016 3:33 pm
Emirates fan here. Flown international a few times with their 30kg allowance to Europe. Since partnered with Qantas the later has also upped their Europe luggage allowance to 30kg too. I haven't used them for Europe, but Qantas were fine for the USA with 2*23kg.RonK wrote:Recalling previous threads on the subject, I think Emirates usually gets a pretty good wrap for bikes as baggage.
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Re: Bikes on planes
Postby brizmatt » Mon Aug 15, 2016 7:40 pm
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Re: Bikes on planes
Postby avolve » Tue Aug 16, 2016 1:59 pm
It seems they have changed their policies, and that bikes are now count towards the noraml number of bags allowance (sporting goods, in the past, did not count). There is a $50 handling fee for bicycles, and they can weight up to 32kg.No overweight or oversize charges apply to bicycles, provided they are within the maximum weight and size limits indicated above.
http://www.aircanada.com/en/travelinfo/ ... l#bicycles
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Re: Bikes on planes
Postby cancan64 » Wed Aug 17, 2016 7:13 pm
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Re: Bikes on planes
Postby cancan64 » Wed Aug 17, 2016 7:40 pm
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Re: Bikes on planes
Postby juzzle » Fri Aug 19, 2016 5:32 pm
Generally, any size bike box will be accepted, though read the fine print carefully about weight. Turkish Airlines are dirt bags when it comes to carriage - $160 cross continent, but airlines like Virgin and Emirates are very accommodating. The only real trick is finding another box at the return end of your trip.
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Re: Bikes on planes
Postby tmac100 » Sun Oct 09, 2016 2:00 am
ITMT, my diamond frame is sitting in a shed in Gippsland waiting for me to return to cycle Cape York to Cairns in July. Maybe my bucket list will be getting shorter after all - BUT it seems the older I get, the longer the bucket list gets
That said, I may be bringing my Greenspeed GTO back to Gippsland because someone can possibly use it there as compared to me using it in the MENA. That will be easily done with Sri Lankan to KUL (in business class) and Air Asia KUL-MEL. Doable - but not free.
That said, bicycling and carting the bicycles by air is certainly less expensive than hiring a car for a few weeks in Australia
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Re: Bikes on planes
Postby outnabike » Sun Oct 09, 2016 3:30 pm
We had to change flights at Adu-dhaby for a connecting flight. We only had two suitcases and on arrival in Germany found they had lost one of them.
"There is the cue for lost luggage" they said. Honestly 50 couples all lost a bag on this one flight.
From what I saw and the way the handle luggage, just throwing cases around, I would be very worried for a bike in just a soft bag. I saw some stuff being transferred and the bike bag was the first into the huge trolley 2 metres deep and a tone of suitcases on top of it.
It took me 5 hours of waiting and paperwork to get out of the German air port, as I had spent so much time prior to getting into that cue.
On the bright side we had the bag delivered to us in Holland the next day or so and on a Sunday.
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Re: Bikes on planes
Postby Chris249 » Sun Oct 09, 2016 9:09 pm
We've done the trip to Europe with bikes in soft bags several times, plus several flights inside Europe. One cracked plastic cap that Shimano put on a brifter for appearance's sake was the only damage.juzzle wrote:I've never actually tried getting my bike on with a bag because airlines don't seem to understand the concept of a hard bag/case vs a floppy bag (which would be suicide for your bike - have you seen the way baggage handlers treat luggage?!).
As some others have said, a cardboard box isn't very impact resistant, and some (including an airport baggage handler/cyclist interviewed on Cycling Tips) say that if bikes are in boxes then other baggage is placed on them, which allegedly happens much less with bags. The British touring cyclist club apparently recommends clear plastic bags, I think.
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Re: Bikes on planes
Postby Chris249 » Sun Oct 09, 2016 9:12 pm
Chris249 wrote:Plenty of us in this thread have used soft bags without having our bikes killed. We've done the trip to Europe with bikes in soft bags several times, plus several flights inside Europe. One cracked plastic cap that Shimano put on a brifter for appearance's sake was the only damage.juzzle wrote:I've never actually tried getting my bike on with a bag because airlines don't seem to understand the concept of a hard bag/case vs a floppy bag (which would be suicide for your bike - have you seen the way baggage handlers treat luggage?!).
As some others have said, a cardboard box isn't very impact resistant, and some (including an airport baggage handler/cyclist interviewed on Cycling Tips) say that if bikes are in boxes then other baggage is placed on them, which allegedly happens much less with bags. The British touring cyclist club apparently recommends clear plastic bags, I think.
Como Vivente road 2009
Principia track track 2014
Cervelo P2K TT 2003
Merida CX4 2010
Concaeio road
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Re: Bikes on planes
Postby il padrone » Mon Oct 10, 2016 9:30 am
"An unjustified and unethical imposition on a healthy activity."
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Re: Bikes on planes
Postby scirocco » Mon Oct 10, 2016 10:34 pm
I've done nearly 20 medium and long haul flights in the last five or six years with the bike packed properly in a cardboard box. The boxes often come out looking like they've been in a train crash but never a scratch on the bike.
Sure, it takes me 2 hours to pack it but I'm 5 kg lighter than people with soft bags and 10 kg lighter than the hard cases.
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Re: Bikes on planes
Postby il padrone » Mon Oct 10, 2016 11:39 pm
Not quite sure how you reckon a cardboard box is 5kg lighter than a soft bag ???scirocco wrote:Sure, it takes me 2 hours to pack it but I'm 5 kg lighter than people with soft bags and 10 kg lighter than the hard cases.
My GE Bodybag weighs in at about 1.5kgs. I've done several OS trips using the Bodybag (no extra padding) with zero damage to our bikes - steel frames though. The cardboard box (eg. Qantas box, or LBS bike box) will weigh about 4-5kgs. Cardboard is actually heavy.
"An unjustified and unethical imposition on a healthy activity."
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Re: Bikes on planes
Postby scirocco » Tue Oct 11, 2016 12:06 am
Not the floppy type foldaway bags like the Ground Effect Tardis. I meet up with a lot of people travelling with nice road bikes and I never see that sort of bag used. Even I would be a bit nervous using one and I subscribe to the "put enough padding on it and the bag doesn't matter" theory.
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Re: Bikes on planes
Postby il padrone » Tue Oct 11, 2016 5:15 pm
I tour with a sturdy steel expedition bike that easily handles a bit of bumping (well, not too much). I read that this was in the 'Touring forums'. I don't see too many people touring on light road bikes or carbonium wunderbikes
"An unjustified and unethical imposition on a healthy activity."
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Re: Bikes on planes
Postby RonK » Tue Oct 11, 2016 7:20 pm
Tardis works just fine for me.scirocco wrote:Not the floppy type foldaway bags like the Ground Effect Tardis. I meet up with a lot of people travelling with nice road bikes and I never see that sort of bag used. Even I would be a bit nervous using one and I subscribe to the "put enough padding on it and the bag doesn't matter" theory.
However Air New Zealand managed to bend a rack stay when my bike was in a Scicon type internally framed bag.
But I was well pleased that it was in that bag while it was sitting on the luggage trailer in the rain waiting to be loaded into the aircraft hold.
I could almost see the cardboard bike boxes disintegrating before my eyes. And when I collected my bike from the oversize baggage conveyor at my destination the cardboard bike boxes were in a real mess. I didn't hang around to see the damage but clearly some boxes had stuff falling out of them.
Under certain circumstances I would consider using a cardboard box, but after that experience, if I did I think I would get it glad-wrapped before checking in.
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Re: Bikes on planes
Postby BenGr » Wed Oct 12, 2016 12:42 pm
Don't bother in the States though. As soon as I dropped my box off it was opened. Not even an xray first... (the plastic would still provide some protection I guess).RonK wrote: Under certain circumstances I would consider using a cardboard box, but after that experience, if I did I think I would get it glad-wrapped before checking in.
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