Western Flyer 

First, my tent is never stored in my panniers. A wet tent will make everything in the pannier damp. I sewed up a waterproof breathable tent bag out of a synthetic marine canvas, WeatherMax, and bungee it down between my rear Panniers. The fabric heavy enough to take day in, day out wear and tear of touring. Perhaps more importantly it is provides a very high degree of UV protections that lightweight tent and stuff sack nylon lacks.

reppans

I'm into ultra-compact multi-modal touring and try and keep everything to a near airline 2-item carry-on equivalent (incl. bike). My tent is only 1.7lbs/3L so easily fits in my pannier. It also sets up fly first, footprint/inner tent second, so the interior can be kept quite dry. However. if it's raining, I'm probably wearing my fly (rain cape) .

veganbikes

I carry my tent in my tent holder on my rear pannier (Arkel GT-54) in the past I carried all my hammock stuff in there but now I have a tent and so far my tours have been all in colder times when my hammocking is not as practical.

The tent is Fly Creek UL2 HV..., whatever last years iteration of the Fly Creek UL 2 was! So nice and light and fairly easy to use.

I haven't yet figured out my ultralight set up for Sub24 trips on my Fixed Gear/Single Speed Rando Cross Fun Time Machine which doesn't have a rear rack and only a rando rack and a seatbag but I am sure I will figure that out (maybe strap it to the top of my rando bag? or hang it from the frame?) But I probably would only do these trips in the summer (at least on that bike) so I could get away with hammocks

thumpism 

I use the rear panniers as stuff sacks, with the sleeping bag in one rear pannier and the tent, its fly and footprint in the other. The pannier fabric is waterproof but seams pierce the fabric and compromise that so I use plastic bags as liners before tent and sleeping bag go in. If stuff has to be put away wet I'll stop during the day for a break to air things out, if possible. Rain can persist and I have had to live with damp stuff for a couple of days but, hey, it's a bike trip.

Doug64

My tent, sleeping bag, Thermarest pad, compressible pillow and small sil-nylon tarp/goundcloth fit nicely in an Ortlieb Rack Pack. Everything, including poles and Rack Pack weigh just at 10 lbs.


My tent (blue compression bag) is stuffed not rolled into a sil-nylon compression sack. It can go in wet, the sil-nylon bags keep moisture contained. Our tent is in the blue compression sack, and my sleeping bag is in the the green compression sack. The full length Thermarest is in the orange bag.



This setup works well; everything you need to set up camp is in the rackpack.

John N

I have forty years of touring and pretty much tried most configurations except a back pack.

Where I put the tent depends on the tour and how much gear I am bringing. With more gear, typically when cooking and in cool weather, I put it in an Ortlieb rack pack (medium) like you are thinking about. I will then use Sport Roller Plus bags for rear bags and Sport Packer Plus bags for the front. I usually have a little "inside the pack" space to spare.

If it will be warm so I don't need to bring cool weather clothes, I typically put the tent (and other stuff like tool kit, rain gear,etc.) in a Ortlieb back roller plus pannier and use a Arkel rack pack. Not much inside space left afterwards.

In both cases, I always put the sleeping bag in one of the front Ortlieb Sport Packer Plus bags along with the inflatable sleeping pad. To me, it is much more important to keep the sleeping bag dry than the tent. I can always use a towel to dry off the inside of a tent if needed. I also use a medium or small handlebar bag for the valuables.

JaccoW

That's impressively small.

From my experience with hiking in Sunndalsøra NP in Norway; Everything gets wet after a while but the good news is that it's usually fairly windy so things tend to dry quickly.

The weather is similar to Iceland but because the soil is often grass it stays wet and there is often a lot of condensation on the tent in the morning except when it has been storming that night.

Either keep it separated from the rest of your gear or put everything in ziplock bags. You can put your tent in a Sea to Summit dry sack with Event base and carry it on a rack so it can still dry a bit during the day.

Yan 

I use the same panniers as the OP. I keep my tent and poles inside my panniers. Put the poles in the pannier diagonally and it should just close. If the poles truly do not fit, put the tent inside the pannier and strap the poles on top of the rack. Try not to lose the poles or you will be in for a seriously **** night. If there is no room in your panniers for the tent, feel free to keep it on the outside as well. Your tent does not care about getting rained on. Fold it with the floor on the outside. The interior will be dry when you unpack it. If this is not the case, buy a new tent. If the interior does get wet, for example from setting up the tent during rain, use a shirt to mop up the water. Source: two tours through SE Asian during monsoon season.

Caretaker

My sleeping bag goes in a pannier. Never put the tent in a pannier, it goes in its stuff sack along with poles and strapped to top of rear rack with sleeping mat. Tents are designed to get wet.

gauvins

In your opinion, how stable would a rack pack be, over a rack but without rear panniers?

We prefer to travel with front panniers only, but will have to deal with cold nights on our next trip, which will considerably increase luggage volume. The idea for now would be to ride with 2 front panniers and a rack pack.

escii_35

Depends on if I'm traveling with 4 or two bags.

Config

#1. Two bags and two stuff sacks. Tent lives in a stuff sack on top of rear rack. Poles are located with the sleeping pad in another top riding stuff sacks.

#2. Tent lives in rear dry bag. Poles and pad are still on top of the rack.

djb

Hi there, I'll answer first-- I tried the pack only once with bungees and it was ok, but I think the main factor will be rack top width. The big advantage of using the pack buckles with ortlieb pannier middle buckles is that it can be very secure, plus the tops of the panniers act as a wide base. In the last week's I have been on rather rough roads sometimes, and the pack had never become loose, and this is something I really appreciate. This trip in general has a lot worse roads than last years trip, mostly because of taking smaller back roads.

If you ever come to Montreal, let me know and I could show you. I'll be back in early March.

Tourist in MSN

I am not Doug but I will offer my thoughts.

In the attached photo you can see that the 31 liter Ortlieb duffel or they call it their rack-pack sits directly on my two rear panniers. It is only attached to the two panniers, not the rack and not the bike. (In the photo there was one strap around the middle to the rack, but I was on a very rough road and wanted to hold it in place better that day.)

Sometimes when it was only partly full, it might shift in position by a few inches, but the straps from the bag to the panniers held it in place quite well. The pannier straps on the Backroller directly clip into the upper buckles on the ends of the bag, refer to the photo in my previous post at this link.
https://www.bikeforums.net/20167316-post13.html

I would think that trying to balance anything that long on the rear rack without panniers would work really badly.

I think you need to find a roll top dry bag that has a diameter that is no more than twice the width of your rear rack platform width. And about the length from about the rear of your saddle to a few inches overhanging behind your rear rack. Roll top so that if it is not full, you can roll the top down to make it full by reducing capacity to make it less floppy. My Surly rack is 6 inches wide, thus I think a maximum of 12 inch diameter drybag would be stable lengthwise on that rack if you strap it down well enough. But my Tubus Logo is only 4 inches wide, on that I would not want to exceed an 8 inch dry bag. (Sorry for using inches instead of your country's units.)

The wider the bag on the rack, the better you need to strap it down.

Doug64

My opinion and experience mirrors djb's and Tourist in MSN's posts.

gauvins

@Doug64 , @Tourist in MSN, @djb, thanks for your thoughts.

Looks like a rack pack should be secured sideways on top of panniers. I'll have to "run a simulation", but for now it looks like we'll have to ride with rear panniers anyways because of the added volume of thermal layers and, above all, the shocking volume of the quilt we've purchased.

May start a new thread to pick your brains. OTOH, it is not as if we're crossing Antartica

Thanks again

Tourist in MSN

I thought you were doing Bryce in Mar or Apr. That should not require that much extra volume for cold weather gear. Or is there another trip in the works?

Big quilt or anything that is compressible, a compression sack should work well.

I have two that are waterproof, but I have not really tested them for waterproofness, I am just relying on the rating. If you want waterproof, do a google search for event compression sack.

gauvins

Yep. Bryce (Zion->Bryce->Page->GCNP). In May actually.

We apparently have to be prepared for sub-freezing nights. And one leg will require us to carry a significant amount of water. I'd say 6 extra litres at least.

So, compared with our typical mild-weather tours, we'll have to deal with the additional volume of a 20F quilt + thicker sleeping pads + mid layers + water. Not clear at this point in time that this fits inside front panniers. Maybe if we tie some gear to our rear racks, inside a rack pack or not. And yes, we can certainly be OK with rear panniers + rear rack, but I now have a strong preference for front panniers. Then again, I'll have to learn about weight distribution and bicycle handling on dust roads. (i.e. is there an argument for keeping the front wheel "light and nimble" or for relieving the rear wheel of as much weight as we can).

No deal breaker. But it is February. My mind wanders

djb

Hi gauv, re riding on dirt, I can't remember but I don't think I sent you the link to my crazy guy trip journal of this trip, but about a week or so ago, I rode on a dirt road that at times was very loose, and I was pleasantly surprised by how well my bike handled.. I kind of have a more even weight distribution, still more in back, but more weight in front compared to my light front days. Yes the 2in tires helped, at lower pressures, and yes i have lots of two wheeled experience with "pushing" of the front and using body language and pedaling to keep up right.

Again, if ever you are in Montreal, ill show you my troll setup and you could ride it loaded to see how it feels for you. If that doesn't ever happen, ill be sure to weigh my panniers so I can tell you the front back weight distribution. When I'm back though.

Tourist in MSN

Just an FYI - in USA there is a brand of bottled water sold in stores called Smart Water. As bottled water goes, it is on the expensive side, but the one liter sized disposable bottles fit perfectly in most bike water bottle cages. The bottles are thin plastic like most disposable bottles are, when I put one under the down tube I use a velcro strap to make sure it stays there. Again, I will refer to the photo I showed on page one of this thread, I have three of those bottles on my bike for a capacity of three liters. The photo was taken in Iceland, I brought three empty Smart Water bottles with me for that trip because of the capacity. The one liter size is the only bottle they sell that fits a cage well.
https://www.bikeforums.net/20167316-post13.html

Also shown in that photo, I have my rain gear strapped on top of my front panniers where it is readily accessible. But on my Pacific Coast trip where the chance of rain was nil, I often strapped a liter or more of water on top of each front pannier in half liter sized disposable water bottles.


If it is a road, not a narrow single track, I find no problem with my normal loading and weight distribution on gravelly and cobbley roads. Roads will give me the width I want to pick my line quite easily. But I do a pretty normal distribution of roughly 25 to 40 percent of the weight on the front of the bike, so I can't comment on your weight distribution.

gauvins

Yes yes, available here as well.

We have steel bottles, one insulated, the other a standard SIGG. Might make sense to switch to larger size, but will not make a material difference, so we must figure a way to carry several additional liters. Current thinking is to use soft 3L bladders. They take almost no space when empty.

gauvins

don't remember receiving a link. where are you riding?

djb

Sent you a message

cyccommute 

Most every tent bag I’ve ever run across is waterproof enough even in driving rain. Even if it weren’t, the issue isn’t usually water getting in but water getting out. Tents, in my experience, get wet at night and often don’t dry when rolled in the morning. It doesn’t take long for the tent to dry when it gets set up in the evening.

A more waterproof bag will only keep the water inside the tent during the day.

I also don’t...and wouldn’t suggest...putting the tent in a pannier. That space is too valuable to waste it on something that is perfectly at home on the deck of the rack. My sleeping bag, by the way, rides there too but it’s in a waterproof Sea-to-Summit bag.

irwin7638

I use Ortlieb Front Rollers, I pack the tent and rainfly in one, my bed (mattress, sleeping bag and pillow) in the other. I use a huge Rivendell saddlebag on the back rack for clothing and personal items and store the tent poles under the flap.




Marc

Dark Arrow

It is very interesting all the different ways people have found that work for them to carry their tent. My current plan is to do something like "Tourist in MSN" now to decide on the tent to replace my old Mountain hardware room with a view

Bear