Originally Posted by
chrisl137
I haven't flown UA with a bike in quite a while because of the high fee if you don't manage to get through without charges, but I've successfully flown UA more than once with a soft case without being charged. It's a $50 travel bag from Performance that I upgraded with various foam and cardboard sheets and some $12 wheels bags. I built an internal support from a 2x4 and a fork mount, and it ends up being a lot like the airport ninja a few posts up but for about $150. I might even have an html page floating around showing how to pack it. They usually don't even ask when I check that one.
My GF and I went to Hawaii years ago on another airline with two frames in a Trico Ironcase and the wheels in another box. The person at the next terminal told ours "look up bikes" and my GF said something like "It's climbing equipment" after she started looking, which worked like a Jedi mind trick. She couldn't find climbing equipment in the list, so no charge. On the return it was "What's in the box?" "Camping equipment" "Any fuel?" "Nope" "is it over 50 lbs?" "Nope" "ok". And that was about a minute after the ag inspection had run it through a full x-ray.
AS and WN are by far the best with bikes - AS is now $25 for a bike, and WN is generally pretty lax. A friend and I flew with three bikes and a big wheel box, plus some big duffels and I think paid $100 or $150 (it was a while ago - I think my bike in the soft bag went free) for the lot of it.
Presently, the "bike fee" is less, sometimes by a considerable amount, than the oversize charge for a bike-size piece of luggage. Be careful what you wish for, if you claim it's not a bicycle. :-) And yes, the smaller carriers are generally more favorable than the legacy lines.
Originally Posted by
onthesam
1K here who travels somewhat frequently with bicycle(s), both internationally (J and F) and domestic. The
Originally Posted by
onthesam
only station where I've had the fee waived is F check-in at NRT. Be prepared to bust out the CC at check-in and pay the fee.
An upshot is once you've paid the fee, there is pretty much no limit on the size of carrying case you can bring. I use a hard shell now but they'll take a large carrying case with proper protection for fork, frame and wheels (there's a soft-sided but padded one from EVO out there, if you're not trying to break the bank). No need to squeeze it all in a box!
I hope to try checking in the track tandem this summer 
ps I haven't tried to bring a tandem -- is there a policy?.
Asia-US were the last bastions of free bike carriage. Asiana in fact still doesn't charge, either direction. As for tandems, what people generally do is two boxes. One for the frame without wheels, fork reversed. Wheels in a second completely-legit (under 62") box. They generally don't measure the size of a bike box.