I did that but the frame was 1980s touring bike that originally had triple chainrings. I laced up some 29er multi wall mountain bike hoops and used 39 mm tyres. The frame was dimpled to clear theses wide tires. I have had to change spindles in the past to accommodate triples. I would pretty much count on having to change your spindle. I used a mega range 7 speed cassette. Here is my drive train. It works like a charm. That big drop down is annoying but you’re glad you have it with a loaded 35 kilogram bike and you’re near an 160 kilometers and you’re faced with a long cheeky climb.
I didn’t use bar end shifters, I don’t like them. I used brake lever shifters, which work great. I had to search the net to find ones for a 7 speed. I also connected cyclocross bar top brake levers which I use quite a bit. It’s easier to use the bar top brakes with a load on, no movement to the drop brakes and it’s faster braking when your hands are on top. Lots of bar padding. I like drop bars raised up by an old mountain bike stem to keep me more upright for rough wash out gravel. Drop bars have more hand positions and you need them for long rough rides.
I’m loading up here for adventure gravel and road riding. I put spare tyres on top of the handle bar bags. You can see them if you enlarge the picture. I sleep out alone, not at campgrounds, but where I get tired or when it gets dark. I sleep in the woods in bear, wolf and mountain lion country so the black and pink frame bag above the frame bottles contains a pistol that I sleep with. It won’t really be an effective big critter killer but the noise will most likely scare them away before I resort to bear spray. Bear spray also effects you as it hangs in the air or can blow back in the wind. The good effective bear spray is real nasty and will choke you up and temporarily blind you. There is no cell service where I ride and there are places where my GPS just shows a yellow background, with no detail showing. No roads, no lakes or streams, just me, the dot, moving through yellow. It feels great when you get back on the map and can figure out where you are. For this heavy rough use I like old touring bicycle frames and forks with straight gauge chrome moly tubing. No problems so far and in heavy traffic, where the shoulder is gravel, I can ride the white line fully loaded.
Typical camp site and destinations.
An abandoned lumber town. Nahma, Michigan. People have bought up the homes and restored them. It’s a nice quiet low traffic place that I usually ride through on my adventures.
