raybo

I am planning a ride in Italy and I want to get my gear weight down to save on flying with an extra piece of baggage and because some serious climbing will be involved. As such, I am reconfiguring my entire touring set-up.

I have purchased and installed low rider racks (Salsa Down Under) and have tried to pack my gear in my front Ortlieb bags, but they are too small. Everything fits in my Ortlieb rear bags with room to spare (for food). I haven't ridden with the rear bags on the front rack yet and thought I'd ask here if anyone has done any touring with rear Ortliebs on front low rider racks as their only gear carrying system?

If you have, did you encounter any problems I should know about?

79pmooney

I have never used rear Ortleibs, just the fronts but I have dragged full Ortleibs on corners on standard Blackburn LowRiders. If the rear panniers hang lower from the mounting hooks, you better try them before you commit. (Good thing about Ortleibs is that it will take more than a scrape or two to do them any damage at all.)

Ben

Doug64

My front panniers hang low enough. I think 79pmooney makes a good point, rear panniers may be too close to the ground on a low rider rack. I have also scraped my front panniers on curbs. The bike I usually tour on, not this one, is a quick handling cross bike. I try to keep the front end weight light to maintain that responsiveness.

bikebark

On our tandem we regularly use Ortlieb Back-Rollers on a Tubus Tara front rack without any problems.

pdlamb

Is there a reason you're not hanging the big bags off the rear rack? Too much gear for small bags up front sound like you'll be hauling a lot of weight, and a lot of bulk. That's likely to adversely affect bicycle handling if you carry it on the front.

bmike

works fine on a salsa down under rack...

IMG_2918 by mbeganyi, on Flickr

staehpj1

Have you considered using the front panniers and carrying a few bulky items on top of a rear rack? That, possibly combined with some judicious trimming of the list, would be my suggestion. A few things could also go in a handlebar bag or bar roll if necessary.

If you must use the big panniers on the front, I'd guess the low riders will be a problem. Front panniers on a low rider rack are about as close to the ground as I'd want to go.

raybo

Actually, I've cut my gear down significantly: No camping or cooking gear and less clothes (both on- and off-bike). As I explain below, the issue isn't weight or even gear bulk, it is trying to fly with one less case.

I am flying from SF to Italy with my bike in its box for my 1 free checked bag. I'd like to travel with everything else in my carry on bag and camelback. While this limits the amount of gear I can take, it severely limits the amount of metal I can put in the bike box. Neither my rear nor front rack won't fit in the bike's (S&S) box. In an attempt to create a gear handling system that I can put in the bike box, I found the Salsa Down Under low-rider front rack which is two "S" shaped pieces of metal that are not connected over the wheel that, when laid flat, should easily fit into the bike box, though I haven't tested that yet.

I rode with the racks and front bags on my bike yesterday and really liked how the bike handled. I then tried to stuff all my gear into the front bags and had no space left over for food and a few other odds and ends. I need more space to put things on my bike.

The rear bags have more than enough room in them for what I am taking, but hang a bit lower than the front ones. I'll be riding with them on the bike packed up with gear to see how the weight and the "hang" affect my biking.

Another idea is to buy a frame bag and stuff some of the gear in there. I see no reason to buy more bags unless there is a problem with using the larger rear bag on the low rider.

It isn't all that clear to me that the rear Ortliebs hang all that much lower than the front ones. They are definitely bigger, but it appears to be a result of being wider, not necessarily taller.

I'll report back after I take my ride today.

fietsbob

In France in the late 80s one of the classic Cyclo-camping sets was 4 equal sized Panniers all 4 low riding ,
the rear pair well to the rear behind the rear axle to not kick them ..

Japan's Builders emulate the French and so you can buy that sort of rack setup thru Nitto Sellers even now ..

Every thing packed into the panniers .. no rack top loads ..



FWIW, Ortlieb hooks to the bottom is just about an inch less 12" vs 13" front vs Rear

& new holes can be made and the old ones filled..

saddlesores

seat post mount platform rack and/or frame bag.

staehpj1

I have a hard time imagining not getting by fine with two front panniers when carrying "No camping or cooking gear and less clothes (both on- and off-bike). " Are you sure you can't either trim the list or compress stuff more?

Booger1

I like front panniers only....Have never used that exact combo.....You need at least 5-6 inches clearance for turning,a little more if you don't like hitting most curbs.

The thicker your front panniers,the higher they need to be.....Thicker front panniers make for some interesting turns if you need to lean into a turn at speed....you don't want to catch a front pannier while turning....It's fun enough while going straight....

alan s 

No way I would ride with two large panniers on the front. It if were me, I'd pack a rear rack and two loaded rear panniers in a box and check in as baggage. Install the rack when you arrive and throw the box away.

escii_35

Not a good idea. But when a bag gets stolen during a deload for some stairs you make do.

Puerto Varas - Roads End - Then North to Quito: (no caption)

Bonus points. Name the picture location.

Edit: My favorite configuration is one stuff sack on the rear and two medium sized bags on the front.

raybo

You and I will not agree on this point. As a vegetarian, I can't simply assume that I can eat a meal at whatever place happens to be in the village I am staying in. As a result, I have to carry a certain amount of "just in case" food. In my experience, this takes up about the same space as my off-bike clothes.

I also refuse to carry only a single pair of bike shorts. On this trip, I will carry 2. Two of the biggest space hogs are rain pants and coat.

My first choice was to try my rear panniers on the front, recognizing there was some risk. I took a test ride this morning and the bike handled better than it did with my old front rack on it.

The bottom of my panniers were above the San Francisco curbs, though, I did manage to pop one off at one intersection were there was a storm drain with a bit of a depression. If I go with the rears on the front, I will have to be careful as I ride around not to do this. Like any change in biking gear, I will have to get accustomed to riding with this new height limitation before I am comfortable enough to take them on tour.

Here is my current list of things that are going in the panniers. My tools, spares, and maintenance gear go in the under-seat bag. Also, I'm not counting the biking gear I am wearing when I ride (bike shorts, shirt, reflective vest, camelback, riding shoes, head covering, helmet):

1 Bike Shorts
1 Wool Bike Shirt
1 Pair wool socks
Biking Shoes
Leg Warmers
Rain Jacket
Rain Pants

1 Pair pants
Red Down Vest
1 pair underwear
Flip-Flops
Walking Shoes
Hat
1 wool T-shirt
2 Hankerchiefs
1 Kerchief
Cable and lock

Toiletries
IPad

The only real space-eating luxury on the list is walking shoes. These are lightweight running shoes that I use for walking around/hiking on off-days and in the evening.

Any suggested deletions and/or substitutions are welcome.

raybo

Note that taking an additional box on the airplane will cost me, at least, $200 extra. It would make more sense to buy a rack in Italy and simply discard it there than to fly with one.

I'm trying not to do either with this new configuration.

Doug64

Measuring from bottom of hook to bottom of stiffener, the Ortlieb classic roller rear panniers hang about an inch lower.

raybo

I just measured the clearance on the bags with the bike standing in my garage at 7 inches.

This is the first time I've ridden with low-riders on the bike, so the entire experience is new to me and will require a bit of a learning curve.

staehpj1

Not sure if any of this will work for you or not, but...

That doesn't sound like all that much stuff and a lot of it will probably compress pretty well. I usually find that clothing can be compressed into half or even one third the space it takes if just folded and packed in a pannier. For some items rolling tightly and jamming then into a tight fitting stuff sack works well. Some items stuff better without rolling. How much effort have you made to pack clothing into as small a space as possible? I am surprised you can't fit your list and a couple days of food in front panniers.

I guess the same items can vary a lot in space taken up. As you say rain gear can be pretty bulky, it can also be pretty tiny. Could you get by with light coated nylon jacket? How likely is rain where you will be? How cold is it likely to be? Do you really need rain pants? If so could you get by with lightweight coated nylon ones or maybe light wind pants? I usually only wear mine in camp unless it is pretty cold and it sounds like you won't be camping.

Have you considered where you might put the walking shoes outside of your panniers? How bulky are the walking shoes? If they are really bulky and you are resistant to carrying them out side of the panniers, maybe consider some more minimal trail runners that can be crunched down flat or stuff them tightly with clothing items.

In any case good luck getting this all ironed out in a way that works for you.

Have a great trip!

Tourist in MSN

I carry an old fabric brief case on planes when I travel, that qualifies as one "personal item" that is allowed in addition to a carry on bag. I think you could justify one front pannier as a "personal item" in addition to your carry on bag and shove it under the seat in front of you. If it is a front roller, that even has its own built in shoulder strap. The point here is to maximize your allowable volume for carrying gear onto the plane. I have carried my helmet in my carry on, but I would not be shy about wearing my helmet onto the plane if necessary to save volume.

Two options come to mind if you wanted to use your front rollers on the front and carry more gear on the back:

- Option one - one of those racks that clamp onto the seatpost and you can either use a rack top bag or strap a dry bag of roughly 15 to 20 liters to that.

- Option two - a Carradice saddle bag hanging from your bike saddle. (Or a bag made by a competitor to Carradice.) I used a Nelson Longflap on my last tour on my saddle, it worked great. I used some cardboard from a pizza box in it as a stiffiner, fortunately it never got wet enough for the pizza box to loose its shape. That is just a bit over one kg in weight but it packs down pretty small since it is almost exclusively fabric. This would carry roughly the difference in volume between a pair of frontrollers and a pair of backrollers. I also had a pair of toe clip straps on the Long Flap to allow me to strap clothing outside the bag too.

Regarding low panniers on the front, I think the slice in the bottom of one of my frontrollers is from a curb scrape.

The strap that goes over the top of a front roller, I often use that to strap water bottles or damp clothing or rain gear on top of the pannier. Not much volume here, but it adds a few liters.

staehpj1

Good suggestions, I'll add that just strapping a dry bag under the back of the saddle might be an option. I'd exhaust all options for packing the clothing tighter first though.

skimaxpower

Trying to kludge a solution to save on baggage fees seems a bit silly to me. When flying for a recent bike tour, my partner and I managed to fit nearly all of our gear (minus the bikes) into one big cardboard box:

• My two rear panniers
• Her two rear panniera
• One of myfront panniers
• One of her front panniers
• Nearly everything that goes inside these bags.

As carryons, we each took one front pannier as a shoulder bag, and loaded them with a few of the heavier items. We were also able to stash some goods inside the bike boxes.

raybo

I appreciate the good advice.

I will try to scrunch the clothing down further and see if that makes a difference. I currently put my clothes in gallon ziplock bags. Maybe another method will work better. If not, the rear bags are not a bad solution as far as I can see now.

A frame bag is another idea that I'll consider, though, again, buying more bags isn't all that appealing given I've got a full touring set-up already. Or, does N+1 apply to bags as well as bikes?

I used to carry all my tools and spares in a bag on the platform on my old front rack. I've now transferred them to a Vaude seat bag that hangs off my saddle, so I don't have any room for expansion there.

The shoes are a luxury, but I like to hike and good shoes are kind to my feet. When I carried Teva's, I got blisters after a day walking to and around Williamsburg. I've carried real shoes ever since.

I'm planning to ride in the foothills of the Dolomites in northern Italy in April. That is likely past the snow season, but not out of the question. It is still a time when it rains. I will have to be prepared for cold and wet. My rain pants are coated nylon and waterproof. They are good as a warmth layer and dry barrier. I do not plan to leave them home.

saddlesores

blisters with tevas? bandaids and/or thin cycling socks. problem solved.

bmike

Get a bike packing seat bag and frame bag. Maybe even a front harness and dry bag. If you aren't carrying camping gear put iPad and shoes and hotel clothes in the drybag in the harness. Strap the rain coat to the outside of the drybag. Use the pouch for stuff you want easy access to. Put food and easier to access clothes in the seat bag. Use the frame bag for water, roadfood, and tools. Add some feedbags as needed for snackage, camera, etc.

All the bags can compress down for flight, or you can strategically sort gear into them for carry on access, and leave the frame bag, tools, etc. Packed with the bike.