Bikepacking - a viable alternative to racks & panniers

Aye.

Carradice > life.

I dont go off road but what is the argument against panniers again? Aero?

Aero, weight, handling, heel clearance, etc etc

Weight is less central making the bike handle less like an unloaded bike.

Nothing is better for carrying lots than panniers though

a frame bag makes sense, all other bags esp the DangleSaddle Bag® >>>>>>

Road and gravel touring where you can get away with dull bikes with panniers and without seatpacks or bar harnesses >>>>>>>>>>

+10 to this
Amey stop dithering and come on one of my bikepacking trips.
You will see the light, and by light I mean a full assortment of dusty révélate designs bags

Cc @amey

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I like the idea of bikepacking but the inconvenience of access, especially the seatbags is what makes me suspicious.

It’s all about thoughtful packing rather than just ramming stuff in panniers. Considering the size and weight of each bit of kit, when you need to access it, how it will affect the handling of the bike based on where it is.... on a tour a couple of years ago I planned to run my tent/sleeping bag/sleeping mat on top of a porter rack, with everything else (aside from tools and snacks which were in a frame bag) in 2 small front panniers. After a couple of days I realised where I had gone wrong, the camp stuff was way heavier than what was in the panniers, so I moved things around and put the heaviest stuff closest to the ground - handling was transformed.

Touring with 2 rear panniers will always handle like shit - weight on the back of a bike will never feel good.

Bike packing is a sliding scale away from riding a barge.

Touring with 2 rear panniers will always handle like shit - weight on the back of a bike will never feel good

If you're touring on super smooth roads only then I don't think this is true.

But yeah, on rough ground and shitty windy roads (modern touring then...) I've come to really dislike my pannier setup. :(

Bikepacking bags are good because no one can get the time off work to go on a "fully loaded tour" so you might as well just take your recreational bike (which only gets ridden for 6 hours at a time and therefore needs no luggage carrying capacity) strap some bags to it and go on a little weekend trip. Take them off when you get home because you're only going to go out twice a year in that configuration. It would be annoying to have a rack on for the 363 days of the year that you won't be carrying anything, but also kind of annoying to detach and reattach it, because it'll eat into the 48 hour window of time you have for your 'trip'

Agreed that once you have to bolt something to your frame you might as well just buy an LHT and start an instagram account with the 🌍🚲 emoji in the bio.

Riding on a flat, smooth, straight road ok, I’ll give you that.

Both climbing and descending is shit with rear loading, cornering at speed with weight on the back the bike wants to stand up/go straight on. With balanced/front loading it’s much easier to corner, the bikes wants to lean in.

4 bolts to fit a rack, not exactly the end of the world is it.

Think the debate goes a bit beyond this.

Both climbing and descending is shit with rear loading, cornering at speed with weight on the back the bike wants to stand up/go straight on. With balanced/front loading it’s much easier to corner, the bikes wants to lean in.

It's very hard to get a rear loading to be as stable as possible, even if it's well packed.

Only a handful of saddle bag have addressed this issues, like the Porcelain Rocket Mr Fusion which have it's own saddle support system that nearly completely eliminated the side swing.

So it's basically the capitalistic society's fault (and having to raise children). I've been thinking about that angle when I was in full-on audax mode. A 600 is basically made so that it fits within a weekend (40h time limit) and you can sort-of go back to work straight afterwards. It made me sad and wonder about the purpose of it all and go on multi-day small tours instead which I enjoyed tremendously. Still used bikepacking gear though.

Also I used a front rack last year around Christmas as I was riding back home. Super nice on flat tarmac, I wanted to die as soon as there was some headwind or incline (extra points for both at the same time). Also loved commuting with it for a while afterwards but when you don't need panniers the rack alone is still quite a bit of extra weight or a faff to get on and off.

functionality aside, key part is bike-packing bags look cooler than panniers,

Imagine being on a sick tour with panniers, you've ridden through the night into dawn, been sleeping in ditches Monday and Tuesday, it's now Wednesday. First person you see in days on a bike goes by, you wave, and all they think is "that guy is a bit overloaded for the commute".

couldn't handle.

amazing Rusjan setup here!

I've just done a tour to Norway with the below set up.

Enjoyed it much more than previous tours where I've had a rear rack, 2 panniers and dry bag all on the back.

Saw the grams, looked immense .. and the food 😍

Was great, just rather wet. A ratio of 2 dry days to 11 wet wasn't really what I was hoping for

The problem with front panniers is you need two, you can't just ride to work with one pannier containing a jacket, shoes and some lunch because your bike will veer horribly to one side. You can with the rear rack

Edit: well, you can do it, it's just annoying

Lovely bike and lovely set-up

So it's basically the capitalistic society's fault

Applies to everything tbh.