Touring - those bolt bosses on my forks and seatstays

I have heard that the bolt bosses on seat stays and/or forks on touring frames are for panniers or something. Is this correct? If so how come all the panniers I find are rack mounted and all the racks I find mount to the brake bridge or seat post? Am I missing something here?

Yes. Mine mount to the bosses.

What make are your panniers? I'd like to get some for my bike and if I can avoid purchasing a rack that'd be good. I want something relatively easy to take off/put on rather than mucking abut with a rack. All I can ever seem to find are the ones with hooks that mount on rear racks.

I actually would not be surprised at this point if there existed a pannier that could be bolted directly onto a fork or a seatstay, or that could be hooked onto bolts. But the bag would either be mounted semi-permanently on the bike (so that you couldn't carry your bags into a tent, for example), or the mounting would be so flimsy that it could not take much weight before it fell apart, or most likely both. It would be far preferable to install racks on your bike, which give the bike the infrastructure to carry heavy loads stably, and then mount panniers on the racks, which you could add and remove with ease. Seriously.

braze ons are for the racks. I've never seen panniers that attatch directly to the frame but then I haven't seen a lot of things such as a million dollars

Yes. Mine mount to the bosses.

He's speaking of his racks, not his bags. The mounting eyelets are to mount racks upon which you hang the paniers. You should look at 10wheels' set-up or Nun's. They have chosen to carry their loads in somewhat non-traditional ways. I am pointing out different options here, not in any way am I saying alternate is bad, it's just less common. I like Nun's set-up so much I want to set up my wife's bike like that so she can carry some gear while I carry the bulk of it and we can tour together. Check out Carradice and other similar seat style bags, they may suit your needs.

The bosses are for rack mounting, the panniers mount to the rack. You're probably looking for racks somewhere like Performance or REI, where they have a lot of racks meant for commuting or light weight day-riding, rather than touring. Seatpost / brake-bridge racks mostly are not going to be sturdy enough for a 20+ pound touring load.

"real" touring racks mount to the braze-ons with bolts.

Look at Axiom, Old Man Mountain, Tubus and Jannd racks.

An example of rack mounting.

[http://i783.photobucket.com/albums/yy112/Doug64_photos/Bianchi-1-1.jpg

Thanks for all the info guys. I currently do a lot of off road riding locally but I havent really done any packing before. I used to camp a lot back in the day. Figured I should try putting two great activites together so I've been looking at some bags. I'll definately take a look at your various suggestions.

If your poor and and thrifty you can always build them. I built a front rack for about $4. I got some cold rolled stock from the local hardware store, $7 for a 20 foot stick of 5/16 solid. I built a jig to keep the bends on both sides uniform, and then welded them up.

There is a article about building racks at this webpage.
http://www.bicyclinglife.com/HowTo/HeavyDutyRacks.htm