>>1945309Surly is butted 4130, made in Taiwan.
That's basic cromo but it's not bad.
Reynolds and Columbus both make tubesets at that level, 520 and Aelle respectively, plus others.
Lots of solid old bikes have a similiar spec, old Diamondbacks are kinda the same. Ride varies from quite good to meh. Then again if you spec 36 spoke wheels and marathons everything is gonna ride meh.
Also disc brakes ARE an advantage for a wide tire tourer. So >muh vintage bike, is less valid to say here. I tour on rim though lol.
I think the frame is around $600. The price isn't unreasonable, it's just not a brand which is knocking on the door of absolute value.
Gunnar sold Ox Platinum / 853 framesets at $1400 before they shut down (rip). That was the low-cost high end for steel.
A full built new bridge club is like $1400.
>>1945264>Surly Bridge Clubalways thought they looked excellent but would prefer 2x or 3x
>Surly in generalUsed to be more prevalent but i've seen a lot of really cool people riding long tours on Long Haul Truckers and Crosschecks and their meme fat tire bikes. I think they're bikes for people who really ride.
Surly also has a proper Lineage. Surly and Soma were both offshoots of Breezer which is an OG. The PLP video tour of Soma goes into this history of it. It's quite interesting, including their long pre-war links from San Fran to Japan.
>Is steel an advantage for tourers?Yes but then again 'touring' is too vague a term and many good touring bikes are made of other materials. Basically it's more durable.
If i could only have 1 bike, it would be sportier. Imo surlies are very good when you spec them for full racks/baskets and load them. On tour, yes, also in town this is useful as a shopping/beater, however, do you want your shopping/beater to cost that much money? That's the real question. Imo the viability depends on how bad the theft is where you live. Also, do you want your heavy basket bike to be an e-bike?
