Originally Posted by
Salamandrine
Thanks for the detailed explanation. That does make sense. Your solution sounds like a very good idea.
It occurs to me that in older days, if a bike fell over, the Pletscher rack or maybe Blackburn rack would have bent or broken long before the braze on -- assuming the eyelet is brazed on. With a modern tubular steel rack, the eyelet is much more likely to be the failure point. Also, I suspect people now tend to load bikes more heavily than in the past when bike touring.
My experience is the opposite. I think people load bikes
less heavily when touring vs BITD. Part of it is lighter equipment - lighter tents, sleeping bags, cooking gear, etc. I have a Rip Van Winkle life with bikes, rode and toured a lot in my youth, stopped when wife, house, and kids sucked up my time, and now I'm back restarting my youth. Personally I know I carry signficantly less gear weight, and only use steel racks where in my youth aluminum was the choice, and I've broken aluminum ones in the past, always near the eyelet.