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Old 10-26-21, 10:21 AM
  #10  
Tourist in MSN
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Join Date: Aug 2010
Location: Madison, WI
Posts: 11,123

Bikes: 1961 Ideor, 1966 Perfekt 3 Speed AB Hub, 1994 Bridgestone MB-6, 2006 Airnimal Joey, 2009 Thorn Sherpa, 2013 Thorn Nomad MkII, 2015 VO Pass Hunter, 2017 Lynskey Backroad, 2017 Raleigh Gran Prix, 1980s Bianchi Mixte on a trainer. Others are now gone.

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The volume of your tent and the volume of your sleeping bag will be key factors for the total volume you can carry. If you are traveling in heat in any areas where water will be scarce, you will need volume for water too.

I like a dry bag that loads from the side oriented lengthwise on the rear rack. One in the 15 to 20 liter range can handle a lot of food if you stock up at a grocery store in a area without much population and few places to buy food. And you can pack it down much smaller when you do not have much in it.

With that much weight on the rear rack, handling can be a bit iffy. Set your panniers as far forward on your rear rack as you can and still have adequate room to avoid heel strike. If panniers are further back than necessary, you can have a tail wagging the dog feel to handling.

Two rear panniers and a rack top bag or dry bag on top is certainly lighter weight in luggage and rack weight than four panniers. But, I would rather have four panniers and no rack top bag even though the weight is greater with a second rack and another pair of panniers. In the photo below there is a green tent pole bag on top of my rear rack, that was before I cut new tent poles that fold up short enough to fit into a pannier. If I had that same load on my bike today, there would be nothing on top of the rear rack at all, all in panniers. (My rain gear gets strapped on top of front panniers, not in them.)



In the photo above, we had very little food at the time of the photo. I also had a dry bag of about 15 liters in volume to carry overflow that could be strapped on top in back. But at the time of photo, the dry bag was empty and shoved into a pannier. When we started that trip we had several days of food, I had all of it for two in the dry bag on top.

I met a German gal at a hostel, we were both going the same direction so we traveled together for a few days. She had a heavy load on her rear rack but the bike seemed to handle ok with it. Photo below.


Last edited by Tourist in MSN; 10-26-21 at 10:28 AM.
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