Originally Posted by
elcruxio
I was attempting to be hyperbolic in order to be funny. But my sentiment does have its roots in the one attempt I made with one front pannier. I rode maybe 10 meters and decided that it was too unstable to be safe.
Granted, it wasn't a light pannier.
I wonder how much of a stabilizing effect even a little bit of counter weight on the other side makes.
I was not sure if that was in jest or not.
I expect it is very specific to the bike, flex in the tubing, fork rake and trail, exactly where the pannier sits on the rack (fore or aft), how high the rack is on the fork, etc. A heavier spinning wheel has more gyroscopic effect once moving with speed, etc.
But after my experience of getting one side off by roughly the weight of two liters of water that did not impair handling on that bike at all, I quit trying to make sure both sides on the front matched in weight. Since I remove the front racks when my tour is done, the only time I have the rack on the bike is when I am using all four panniers. Thus, have never tried only putting a pannier on one side in the front.
I use a fairly heavy handlebar bag, that does impair handling at slow speed, but the convenience of having it outweighs the impairment in handling.