T-Rex
Template denier
Here’s what I’ve figured out about flying with a downhill bike, from recent experience flying to National Series races. There have been some good articles in magazines over the past year or so about flying with bikes generally, and I won’t repeat a lot of what is in those articles. This thread is specific to flying with a DH bike, but I have included a few other handy hints of a general nature.
Downhill bikes are heavy and bulky. By the time you add your riding gear and some basic tools it’s a struggle to get in under the weight limit. Weight is key. In the last two months we have flown with Qantas, Virgin and Jetstar with no major hassles.
Weight
Know your weights before you arrive at check in – you can get a fish scale for $20 from Ebay, it weighs up to 50kg accurate to 10g. I found trying to weigh the bike in the box using bathroom scales really awkward, and not even remotely accurate.
Weight limits by airline at the time of writing are:
Virgin – 28kg (23kg + extra 5kg because you are carrying sporting equipment)
Qantas – 23kg
Jetstar – 20kg
Exceptions to the above: If you are a gold frequent flyer with Qantas, you get a 32kg baggage allowance. If you book through the Qantas web site and get a codeshare on a Jetstar flight, you still get the Qantas 23kg allowance.
If you are going to be over the weight limit, with Virgin it’s cheaper to prepay on line for the excess baggage, $7/kg vs $10/kg at checkin. I haven’t checked the other two airlines.
If you are close to or slightly over your weight limit, pack heavy stuff eg pedals, helmet, into your carry on – the limit is 7kg but it doesn’t often get checked. However, don’t take tools in your carry on. Things like allen keys won’t get through security.
Packing
I have tried travelling with a Torpedo 7 hard case, a bike shipping box scrounged from the LBS, and a Qantas bike box. The Qantas box was the best of the three, it’s bigger than a shipping box, and at 3.5 kg significantly lighter than the Torpedo 7 case.
To get longer life out of the Qantas box, reinforce the bottom corners and the hand holes in the side with cloth backed tape. The hand holes in particular are prone to getting ripped by the baggage handlers if not reinforced. So far we have done two trips with our Qantas box, and I reckon we will get at least another two out of it. They cost $16.50 and you get them from the sales desk at the airport.
We were able to box the bike by removing pedals, wheels, handlebars and derailleur. If you are tight for space you might want to remove your rotors, as they are pretty easy to bend, and 8" rotors are particularly vunerable. At the very least make sure the wheels are positioned so the rotors are facng the inside of the box. Putting spacers in the brakes is a good idea, and we used some foam tube that bikes ship with from the factory (from the rubbish bin at our LBS), held on with 300mm cable ties to protect the frame from scratches. The cable ties can be unpicked and reused. If you have to put other stuff in with the bike such as a track pump or spare wheel, cable tie it all together to minimise movement and possible damage. Position the wheels with the rotors inwards, and put some extra protection around the ends of hubs, cassettes etc so they don’t punch holes in the side of the box. Put your axle/Maxle back in the forks and rear dropouts to prevent them being crushed. If you dont have a separate axle or Maxle, use some other sort of spacer such as PVC pipe to reduce the liklihood of the rear end and sliders getting crushed from having baggage piled on top of them.
You are supposed to deflate the tyres, at the pressures we run for DH it’s not really an issue but at one airport the baggage handling guy stuck his hand in through the hand hole and gave the tyre a squeeze. We didn’t fully deflate them because we run tubeless, in this case we snuck though.
A $5 Office Works tape dispenser is very useful for repacking the bike, and it even comes with a roll of tape sufficient for one trip. Use heaps of tape, if your cardboard box gets left out in the rain by the baggage handlers, the tape could be the only thing holding it all together.
Insurance
You might want to insure your bike when flying. The extra travel insurance they try to sell you is a waste of money. The Qantas extra insurance for which they charge you $32 only covers the bike up to $500. Bike specific insurance is expensive. The best insurance I could find was to include the bike on the home and contents policy, $66 per year for $4,000 cover.
Other random advice.
If you have to rent a vehicle at the other end, a van is a bit more expensive than a ute, but gives you somewhere out of the sun and rain to work on the bike etc, plus you can lock the bike in it relatively out of sight. A bit of Bunnings rope is handy for tying the bike and other luggage in the back of the van.
Make sure you have ID for kids at checkin at the airport. A Medicare card got us through Jetstar checkin in Adelaide, if I didn’t happen to have that on me T-Rex Junior was looking like having to reassemble his bike and ride it home.
Don’t take too many spare parts to big races eg Nationals. You can get most stuff at the track, often cheaply. We picked up Minions for $40 each at Adelaide, and everything else we saw was reasonably priced.
That’s it Rotorburners, I hope if you are flying with your DH bike any time soon you can find something useful in this thread.
Downhill bikes are heavy and bulky. By the time you add your riding gear and some basic tools it’s a struggle to get in under the weight limit. Weight is key. In the last two months we have flown with Qantas, Virgin and Jetstar with no major hassles.
Weight
Know your weights before you arrive at check in – you can get a fish scale for $20 from Ebay, it weighs up to 50kg accurate to 10g. I found trying to weigh the bike in the box using bathroom scales really awkward, and not even remotely accurate.
Weight limits by airline at the time of writing are:
Virgin – 28kg (23kg + extra 5kg because you are carrying sporting equipment)
Qantas – 23kg
Jetstar – 20kg
Exceptions to the above: If you are a gold frequent flyer with Qantas, you get a 32kg baggage allowance. If you book through the Qantas web site and get a codeshare on a Jetstar flight, you still get the Qantas 23kg allowance.
If you are going to be over the weight limit, with Virgin it’s cheaper to prepay on line for the excess baggage, $7/kg vs $10/kg at checkin. I haven’t checked the other two airlines.
If you are close to or slightly over your weight limit, pack heavy stuff eg pedals, helmet, into your carry on – the limit is 7kg but it doesn’t often get checked. However, don’t take tools in your carry on. Things like allen keys won’t get through security.
Packing
I have tried travelling with a Torpedo 7 hard case, a bike shipping box scrounged from the LBS, and a Qantas bike box. The Qantas box was the best of the three, it’s bigger than a shipping box, and at 3.5 kg significantly lighter than the Torpedo 7 case.
To get longer life out of the Qantas box, reinforce the bottom corners and the hand holes in the side with cloth backed tape. The hand holes in particular are prone to getting ripped by the baggage handlers if not reinforced. So far we have done two trips with our Qantas box, and I reckon we will get at least another two out of it. They cost $16.50 and you get them from the sales desk at the airport.
We were able to box the bike by removing pedals, wheels, handlebars and derailleur. If you are tight for space you might want to remove your rotors, as they are pretty easy to bend, and 8" rotors are particularly vunerable. At the very least make sure the wheels are positioned so the rotors are facng the inside of the box. Putting spacers in the brakes is a good idea, and we used some foam tube that bikes ship with from the factory (from the rubbish bin at our LBS), held on with 300mm cable ties to protect the frame from scratches. The cable ties can be unpicked and reused. If you have to put other stuff in with the bike such as a track pump or spare wheel, cable tie it all together to minimise movement and possible damage. Position the wheels with the rotors inwards, and put some extra protection around the ends of hubs, cassettes etc so they don’t punch holes in the side of the box. Put your axle/Maxle back in the forks and rear dropouts to prevent them being crushed. If you dont have a separate axle or Maxle, use some other sort of spacer such as PVC pipe to reduce the liklihood of the rear end and sliders getting crushed from having baggage piled on top of them.
You are supposed to deflate the tyres, at the pressures we run for DH it’s not really an issue but at one airport the baggage handling guy stuck his hand in through the hand hole and gave the tyre a squeeze. We didn’t fully deflate them because we run tubeless, in this case we snuck though.
A $5 Office Works tape dispenser is very useful for repacking the bike, and it even comes with a roll of tape sufficient for one trip. Use heaps of tape, if your cardboard box gets left out in the rain by the baggage handlers, the tape could be the only thing holding it all together.
Insurance
You might want to insure your bike when flying. The extra travel insurance they try to sell you is a waste of money. The Qantas extra insurance for which they charge you $32 only covers the bike up to $500. Bike specific insurance is expensive. The best insurance I could find was to include the bike on the home and contents policy, $66 per year for $4,000 cover.
Other random advice.
If you have to rent a vehicle at the other end, a van is a bit more expensive than a ute, but gives you somewhere out of the sun and rain to work on the bike etc, plus you can lock the bike in it relatively out of sight. A bit of Bunnings rope is handy for tying the bike and other luggage in the back of the van.
Make sure you have ID for kids at checkin at the airport. A Medicare card got us through Jetstar checkin in Adelaide, if I didn’t happen to have that on me T-Rex Junior was looking like having to reassemble his bike and ride it home.
Don’t take too many spare parts to big races eg Nationals. You can get most stuff at the track, often cheaply. We picked up Minions for $40 each at Adelaide, and everything else we saw was reasonably priced.
That’s it Rotorburners, I hope if you are flying with your DH bike any time soon you can find something useful in this thread.
Last edited:
