Are there better rando rack solutions\ for my Voyageur?
 

I've got the VO rack on here now and it sits higher than I'd like and also tilts slightly up. I can possibly fidget with it enough to get it more level, but I'm not so sure. More importantly though is I wish it sat closer to the fender. Is this just a matter of how long the struts are? I don't see a way that I could bend it to get it further down due to strut length.

I know non-custom racks can't always fit perfectly, but is there a solution that might sit lower on this bike for me? If not this will work just fine until the day I decide to go custom.

https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...e201079337.jpg
https://cimg1.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...f6ac13c825.jpg

The pictures don't show the uptilt. Extra clearance is a good thing. From what I can see, the bike is beautiful

What happened to the part that inserts into the fork crown? I was all set to tell you that I have two identical that fit canti mounts, but yours is lacking the tange that passes through and also holds the front fender up.

Mine do have a bit of give in the support brackets that attach to the brake mounts. You should be able to adjust those a bit to brings it forward and downward a cm or so.

Hmm, not sure which part you're talking about but I thought I used everything in the bag :foo:

That may be true, but this is more than you can tell from the photos and the only issue I have with it is that I'm using a bag meant to be small and low profile yet even with a relatively high stem the top of the bag is now coming to the top of the handlebars.

Sidenote but relevant: It seems to me that actual randonneur bicycles are built with the rack very low, almost integrated with the fender. So I wonder if there are pros and cons to having clearance vs not when it comes to randonneuring. I'm not randonneuring so it doesn't affect me, but curious.

My bad. I have two of those, but they changed the design at some point.

I do believe you can still apply a bit of force to the arms that attach to the cantilevers to bring the whole assembly lower.

New version:

https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...01a37158eb.jpg

Old version:

https://cimg5.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...d33cd16a59.jpg

Yeah, see, yours definitely sit lower but I imagine that canti boss placement also plays into this, right?

Don't think it matters. If you loosen the nuts where things attach to the fork crown, then press the rack down, the arms that attach to the cantilevers will bend a bit. It's not a thing for the squeamish, and I don't know what the limits are, but I think you can get about a cm lower without compromising the rack.

This said, your fender seems quite tight to a significantly lower volume tire. You may be at about the same height as me, but it just may look lower.

You have what? 35's? Mine are 54 and 42 respectively.

You'd recommend doing this while it's attached to the brakes? I feel like the. arms will just go back into place when I let go, as they are stronger and have more spring in them than the piece attaching the fork crown. But really I have no idea so I'll give it a shot.

Fenders are 45mm, tires are 27x1 1/4

Some of what you see as lower is the effect of tire and fender size. This said, when I got the "old" style rack, it simply would not line up to be mounted. The LBS applied judicious force that was sufficient to permanently persuade the rack arms into the proper position. Some of the bending happened at the tange that goes into the fork crown. Some happened at the cantilever attachment arms.

I have no doubt there is some flexibility there, but perhaps asking VO about this will give you an answer about what the limits are.

The regular full VO constructeur front rack is a lot more adjustable. Mine sat low enough to screw the front fender to it, while maintaining a good fender line. At the moment, the only pic I can find has a bag sitting on it for trial fit, but maybe it's enough to convey the idea.

There's some thought that a full front rack ruins fork flex, but I couldn't tell the difference in practice.


https://cimg8.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...042226773f.jpg

The Nitto M18 has adjustable struts where you can customize the angle and length, as they attach via eyebolts to the rack platform rather than being welded to it. That's your best bet.

The issue is that the VO rack is designed for a fork with a greater distance between crown and cantilever mounts than yours (to accommodate a larger tire and fender). The struts are longer than necessary for your fork because your fork was designed for a relatively small tire (32mm) and therefore the designers did not add a ton of tire clearance at the fork crown, meaning the cantilever mounts are closer to the crown than VO designed that rack for. I would get the Nitto rack and not try to bend the VO rack anymore.

I believe gugie has modified those racks to fit better, but that might have involved sawing and torch work.

They are stainless, correct? Then modifying them is a lot more tractable than if it was chromed.

My first front rack was too close to the tire. I have found that clearance disappears somehow.

Poly, I think USA's canti stud plays a part as well. It looks like he uses a jam nut to lock in the rack strut more forward than perhaps it needs to be. First I think the rack should be as close to the fender as can be managed. Part of the "good steering" one wants in a rando bike comes from trail, another part from the load sitting behind the axle, and some from the weight being as low as possible. Just my gut feel as a cyclist and engineer.

So the rack platform wants (IMHO) to be level, low, and the tombstone set as close to the head tube as possible. You have to allow clearance for the brake cables, and hand access to the closures of the pockets and top lid (I'd like to see magnet closures!). I also think the tombstone should best be parallel to the head tube. This allows removing the bag by sliding the bag, but the angle still tends to prevent the bag from bouncing off. If a decaleur can prevent this motion of the bag, fine, but I see a decaleur as mainly preventing forward and sideways motion at the top. I'd prefer to somehow latch the bottom of the bag to the platform of the rack. On my Berthoud I don't see how to do it simply. My Acorn has some velcro straps, but you have to work from under the bike to get them set. On the Berthoud I use a zip tie to hold the decaleur closed and it holds the bag based on the internal top brace. Secure but less removable.

Often one adds a bolt to the fender somewhere on the rack to secure the front of the fender to the rack. On my Terraferma I integrated that attachment with mounting my Lumos, and it greatly reduced noise from the front fender. I used the leather washers there. However as the thin, curved fork blades flex up and down due to road irregularities, so the thin aluminum shell of the mudguard is stressed even with the leather washers. It's well known that good low-rider racks that are integrated with a front top rack make the whole fork stiffer due to the added structures. It's most likely better to secure the rack to the upper part of the fork blades, as your rack and my Mark's Rack does, then add a forward stay to the fender, connecting it to the dropout. A few of my bikes have back and top eyelets on their fork dropouts. If the dropouts move due to fork flex, the stays will push on the front edge of the fender, but they will also move the low edge of it. So rather than bending the front of the fender, the fender is more free to move with the fork. There may be some forced flex at the fork crown attachment, so maybe some innovation is called for to reduce the stress and hence reduce fatigue failures over the long term.

For the OP's bike, the Mark's Rack allows all of the struts to be adjusted for length and angle. Getting one of those should allow putting the platform and tombstone where you want them. I use one on my Terraferma. It's kinda heavy, though. If I ever feel really moved by the concern maybe I'll get Gugie to make me a lightweight one.

I bought RaClips from Waxwing Bag Co. Super easy to install and use.

Your Voyageur is so clean I'm embarrassed. Stunning.

Ah! Thanks for that answer, makes sense. Also always wondered what some of the big benefits of the Nitto racks were. Didn’t realize you cut the struts after adjustment, that’s great.

Time to put this one up for sale then and look for an m18. And it’s looks like it would attach to my low rider mounts rather than cantis, correct?

Not for long I hope! But thanks :)

I would just bend the struts. The rack will move forward a little, which is good. Each of the struts (that go to the cantilever bosses) has to bend in two places, near the top and near the bottom. It won't take much bending-- which is good, because you can't bend them very much. You'll need a wrench for the bottom bend. Alternately, you could do all the bending with the rack still attached to the brake bosses (you'll need to loosen the bolts that hold it to the top tang). If you do that, you'll want to make both bottom bends at the same time, and both top bends at the same time. When you make the second bend (presumably at the top of the struts) take care to get the thing horizontal.

TL;DR: Looks very nice as is, though I like front racks as low and as close to the head tube as possible. This VO rack isn't a great candidate for lowering, since it will also result in moving the rack further forward, farther from the head tube. My recommendation would be to leave the rack as is, or go with the Nitto if you want the lower position. But note that the Nitto M-18 uses p-clamps to attach the struts to the fork blades, so it won't look quite as clean as the VO. Another option might be the VO Constructeur front rack, which is built like a rear rack, with triangulated struts that attach at the dropout. Heavier, but would support more weight---the Nitto is only rated to 2kg or so. It also might allow you to skip the fork tang, and just anchor it up top with the fender. But measure first to make sure you can get the VO rack low enough.

With more drivel:
I like both front/rear racks as low as possible, low enough to mount the fenders directly to the rack while maintaining a good fender line. The older VO Constructeur front racks had bosses underneath for fender attachment, but their quality control was sloppy and the bosses were often welded at inconvenient angles. I've got them on 3 bikes, I made do.

Don't know what's happening with their current rear racks, but the current front rack, with the adjustable tang, no longer has the fender mounts underneath. Probably not worth their trouble QC-wise.

As others have said, you can get your rack lower by bending the struts. I've bent both the struts and the older/original non-adjustable through-tang. Not an easy bend, but the tubing feels pretty thick, so I don't think there's much chance you'd compromise strength/durability. In my case I'm mostly using small front rack bags, not large rando bags, so unless I'm hauling gold bars or filling the bag with ball bearings, I can't get much weight in there.

But getting it lower will move it further forward, which is not ideal imho. Low and as far back as possible is how I like 'em up front. Depending on how low you get it, and how far forward it goes, you could possibly need a longer tang. I don't think increasing that tang length is a great idea.

Looking at the Nitto racks, the ones with adjustable struts use p-clamp attachments to the fork blades, which is a step backwards in simplicity/elegance imho. Also don't know if that complicates attachment to a canti fork----I guess the struts have to go below the canti bosses, otherwise might interfere with the straddle cable?

I also though about the VO Constructeur rack, which attaches to the dropout bosses, so no strut worries. It has a flat mounting tang at the bottom, with three drilled holes, so if the measurements work out you could potentially get it closer to the fender/tire. Like the rest of the rack, the tang is stainless, and it's a chore to cut/trim it. Figure most of a new Dremel cut-off wheel per side. I wouldn't want to have to drill a new hole through that tang.

As a full rack, i/o mini-rack, it'll be heavier, look bigger on the bike, but also support more weight. If the current ones still have fender mounts underneath, the pix on the website do, you could potentially get the rack low enough to attach your fenders directly to the rack, and then not even need the fork tang.

Final analysis, though-----custom front rack FTW!

pcb Thanks for the response! You're right, even if i were able to bend this to get it lower, it would bring it forward a lot more, and that's no good. Much more and it'll be further out than the end of the fender. As for the Nitto M18, would it not be able to attach to the low rider eyelets on the forks instead of using p-clamps?

Such as in this example. Mine appear to sit a little lower than these but if the struts start out long enough before being cut it should work, right?


https://cimg8.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...88c682e8a.jpeg

I use the Nitto “Mark’s” Rack, and also purchased longer struts. I actually go down to my dropouts. Lots of flexibility there.