In a month or so I'll travel from where I live (Amsterdam, Netherlands) to my home country (Italy) and will finally put my hands on a shiny new and expensive carbon bike I got (value of the whole thing ~ 5000 eur). The bike is fully assembled, wheels aside (ie. I don't have wheels at the moment). The plan is to bring it back with me to the Netherlands. I don't own a bike box, and not sure I want to fork out a hefty sum to buy a hard one. But I also would never want my frame or components to be damaged.
So, is there a sureproof way to get my bike back without any damage occurring to it, and without spending a fortune? What would that be?
I've rounded up a few options but not sure about any. Here they are sorted by ascending price.
- Using a cardboard box. For this I'd need to pay only 1 x the fee for checking in the box on the flight back. So ~ 50 eur. However, as you may imagine, I do not feel exactly comfortable with the idea. Also cause of the "no wheels" situation, I feel like it would be tricky to have the bike to hold still. So, would I be able to make this 100% safe? How?
- Renting a bike box locally would be pretty expensive. I've asked, and the price seems to be ~50 eur per week. To this I would need to add 2 x the fee for checking the bag in on both flights (~ 2x50 eur = 100 eur) . So in total we're talking about around 150 eur.
- Buying online some kind of cheap-ish bike box (~ 150 eur), having it delivered to a friend in Italy, and then I'd pay 1 x the fee for checking in the box on the flight back. So ~ 50 eur. In Total, ~ 200 eur and I find myself a bike box for future needs. But, is there such a bike box which is not so expensive but also very very safe?
- Having it shipped via a courier would probably cost around the same or more (150-250 eur, although I've not checked). Not sure it would be any safer, but I guess it could be insured, so if any of the components is damaged I can ask for money back (I guess?).
So many options.. Please help
