Newspaperguy

I'm curious about how you arrange the gear in your panniers for a tour. Do you have a preference for what goes in which pannier and what goes elsewhere on the bike? If so, why?

I've always made it a point to put fragile items or food in the chain side pannier. If I'm going to set the bike down, I won't put it on that side and therefore, I won't crush anything in those panniers.

Also, when you're packing for camping, where do you put your sleeping bag, sleeping pad and tent? Do you get those things in your panniers or do you strap them to the rack once the panniers are in place?

D.B. Cooper

My tent, sleep bag, air mattress and tripod stool go in a waterproof dry bag, strapped to the top of my back rack and panniers.

Sirrus Rider

I thought you tied it to your waist with parachute cord..

Cyclebum

Sleeping bag and Thermarest in rack pack compression sack, tent in right rear, clothes in left rear, kitchen and food in front panniers. Lots of room left for this and that which varies with the seasons and available services. Since everything goes mostly in the same place each time, no problem finding stuff. Probably about a 40/60 weight distribution.

10 Wheels

R-Front, complete 2 man tent
L-Front, air mattress, blanket, 5 inch battery fan

R-Rear, Food, drink mixes, extra bottles.
L- Rear, clothes, Rain Gear. Battery chargers.

Trunk Bag, tent poles underneath. Bike repair items.


Bar Bag, camera, spare batteries

bktourer1

check this: https://www.cycletourer.co.uk/cycleto.../packing.shtml

Cyclesafe

Front right: Things I strictly want to keep dry.
Rear right: Things that can go in wet.
Front right: Dirty stuff, including tools and spare tire
Rear left: Food and cooking gear.
Rack: Tent

zoltani

I start out with all camp gear and clothing in rear panniers, including tent, sleeping pad, pillow, and sleeping bag. Eventually the sleeping bag and tent end up strapped to the rear rack. Food and camp kitchen go in the front bag along with first aid and tool kit.

tombilcze

As a novice, this is great info. I don't think the following questions are hijacking the thread since they go hand-in-hand with the packing. Another thing I have wondered is how much weight you carry in the panniers? What is a good target weight to aim for to keep the bike from being overloaded? I am just looking fora target to help me plan on minimizing what I will be taking on my first tour.

D.B. Cooper

Just to give you a ballpark idea, I have toured with a 105lb rig. My bike(Cannondale T1000) weighed 25lbs, so everything else- racks, panniers, and all my gear, weighed 80lbs. The gear was divided between 4 panniers,and 1dry bag. This is probably considered a very heavy load, but I travel with a lot of camera gear. I popped only 1 spoke on a 5000 mi tour.

SurlyLaika

That's almost my set up except that I have the sleeping pad and tent in the rack pack, with the sleeping bag in the rear left pannier and my clothes in the rear right pannier. Kitchen stuff goes in front right and misc bike, hygienge, and camp stuff goes in the front right. But it was hard to actually get the front feeling heavier collectively than the rear....there is simply more room in the rear panniers and rack pack =/

SurlyLaika

ohhhh, 60% rear and 40% front...makes sense now.

Cyclebum

I haul about 35 pounds in summer, 40 in winter, plus water/food which can add 5-15 more, depending. Total weight on the wheels is about 250 pounds. No broken spokes.

I don't find extra weight, within reason, to be much of an issue, tho the laws of gravity dictate that it really is on the climbs.

You can't beat an overnighter or two for dialing in what YOU need/want, irregardless of the packing list of others.

gerv 

This seems like an admirable target weight. Nice balance between comfort on the bike and comfort on the ground.

Newspaperguy

If all goes according to plan, I'll be out on a short tour this weekend, but carrying quite a heavy load. Normally, I'd go as light as possible, but this time I'm testing out how things will work for a longer tour, where I'll need the extra gear. Also, Friday night is supposed to be cool and it could freeze where I'll be staying. Saturday and Sunday are supposed to be rainy. This is ideal since I'll know how well I can handle such conditions.

Doug64

Tent , sleeping bag, Thermarest, footprint, compressible pillow.

The rest does not matter, but it realy helps to put things in the same place every time. On-bike stuff in the right rear;off-bike stuff left rear; stove tools and misc right front; food and drinks in insulated left front; valuables, camera, passport, wallet etc handlebar bag. Sometimes things need to be shifted a little from one side to the other to balance the load. About 35-40 pounds total weight.


I put red snap ties through the buckle of the port side panniers and a green tie through the starboard ones. That way I can tell which is which from the front side. This is handy when they are off the bike.

Have a good ride

Torrilin

It looks from your website like you're planning on a 9 day trip?

Instead of thinking of it as something special, ask yourself how you'd pack for a 9 day vacation, or a 9 day business trip. Would you pack food and plan to cook? Would you bring a new outfit for each day, or are you the sort of person who brings a few things and does laundry during the trip?

The other set of questions I'd ask myself is what I'd bring on a day ride of the same length as I'm planning. I often bring a light jacket if I'm riding 40 miles. I pack a lunch. I usually bring 2-3 water bottles. My bike always has a Topeak morph pump on it, and a few small wrenches for taking off my wheels and adjusting bolts. For long rides, I'll often bring a spare inner tube and tire levers. And my camera, medications, cell phone, keys, wallet and mp3 player go with me on pretty much any time I leave the house.

When you frame it that way, you're making it a familiar problem, and odds are the answers should seem obvious.

MichaelW

Generally I try to pack right into the corners of the panniers, to use the stiffeneing to protect vulnerable bits, to use clothes to pad hard objects so I dont wear the pannier material and to keep stuff I use along the way closer to the top.

Whatever packing system you use, its much easier if you stick to it so you can find things and pack up quickly.

I usually put all the maps, guidebooks and paperwork in a bag against the back. Triangia stove, fuel bottle and some outer clothes for padding fill the rest.
In the other pannier I use a drybag with all other clothes, electrical bits, dry, clean stuff (first aid etc).
I put my toolbag, underneath the flap and waterproofs pad it out.
At the front I try to keep wet food and dry food in separate panniers.
Tent, bag, mat and sandals go on top, in drybags where required.

Stuff for the ride goes in my bar bag.

For lighter weight camping, I put tent, sleeping bag and mat inside one pannier and clothes and stuff in the other.

Rob_E

I just did my first loaded ride since I got a full pannier set, and I found a set up that I like, but I think it still needs tweaking:
1 rear pannier for sleeping: that's tent, sleeping bag, tarp, miscellaneous ropes, straps, stakes, etc. It packs really tight, but is also fairly light. I think I need a compression sack in the mix to make it pack easier.
1 rear pannier for clothing. Like the other rear pannier it has high volume and low weight. I'm thinking about two bags in the back: one for clean clothes and one for dirty clothes. My toiletries are back there as well, but I'd like to include them with the food as they might be animal attractants, and I'd like to keep all of that stuff together.
1 front pannier is my food. Ideally I'd like this to be food, dishes, and toiletries. It didn't really work that way last time, but I'll keep whittling away at it. One issue is that I was carrying a Bear Vault, which makes packing a little harder and makes the food pannier my heaviest.
1 front pannier is everything else. Computer with associated cables. Bike tools and spare tube. Maps. Jacket. Basically anything I might need/want during the day, I try to put in one pannier. This also ended up as my overflow pannier, so it had dishes and maybe an extra piece of clothing or two.
On the top of the rear rack is my foam pad with a ground tarp rolled up with it, and my other tarp ended up back there, too, when it was wet.

My set up kind of flips the 60 back 40 front weight scenario around, but expect I'll keep it that way for a few reasons:

• I want my daytime stuff to be on the front where I can grap it without dismounting. This is the 2nd heaviest pannier, so makes sense to balance it out with the other heaviest pannier.
• Because of the cost, I worry a little more about my electronics, and like to be able to keep an eye on them.
• I'm a heavy guy, and my rear hub is the previous model, heavier Nuvinci hub, so while my heavier gear is on the front, the back of my bike is still carrying a good amount of weight even with the lighter panniers.
• Apart from how the load balance affects handling, I also worry about wheel strength. Even with no gear, the rear wheel gets most of my weight combined with the relatively heavy hub, so I don't want to add any more stress back there when the front wheel should be more then capable of handling the weight I'm putting on it.

I may switch it around to try it, because I know that a little more weight in the back is considered preferable and that the LHT is supposed to handle rear weight a little better then front weight, but I found the set up to be surprisingly steady and smooth, so I don't actually expect to see much improvement when I try it the other way around.

indyfabz

The current setup. Anything i might need en route is kept in the left panniers as it's more likely I will lean the right side of the bike against something when I stop. A few years ago in Montana, we had a series of sweat producing climbs of a few miles and then some chilly descents that required an extra layer. In situations like that, I will simply put the jacket, etc., under the rear bungees so I don't have to go in and out of the panniers.

Cooking stuff (except fuel bottle), rain gear, off-bike shoes, pump, book and tarp/footprint are in the front panniers. Everything else in the rear, including the ThermARest, fuel bottle, bowl, cup plate and coffee press. Sleeping bag on the front rack. Tent on the rear rack. Because of the size of the racks, I can align the sleeping bag and tent parallel with the bike.

This was a 3-day solo trip with two days of riding and a day off in the middle. Stopped for food for dinner and the next day's breakfast and lunch about 9 miles from the camground. These bags are huge so there was no problem finding room. About 3 miles from the campground I picked up a 1.5L bottle of wine and still had no problem finding room.

It was a chilly, windy day and rain was expected at night and much of the following day so some wet and cold weather gear was necessary. Don't know what everything weighed and I don't care. I can handle the load comfortably and can make the time I want to make and thus don't consider myself "overloaded." I'll probably take the same load with me for our Montana trip except that my girlfriend will take my bag and I hers for weight and size reasons and I will be toting a 3P tent instead of a 2P.

Some people carry electronic stuff. I like a well-appointed kitchen. That adds to the load, but I like to and need to eat well whenever possible.

Booger1

Sleeping bag,liner,air mattress,tent/groundcloth/stakes,2 water bottles,candle lantern,towel,Sierra cup,go in 2 front panniers.
Kitchen(Svea 123 inside 2 nesting pots,spork,soap,scratchy pad),food,clothes in rear 2 panniers,2 water bottles and fuel bottle on frame.

Weight about 70% front-30% rear.
About 35 pounds summer/40 pounds winter.

zoltani

I was always under the impression that it is supposed to be 60 front 40 rear, and I have noticed my bike handles better (more stable) with more weight up front. Sometimes on day tours i even ride with front only.

Rob_E

That could be. I do the same. I thought the idea was to put more weight in the rear, but I might have misunderstood. I figure most of my weight end up in the rear, so I might as well put my cargo weight forward possible. Also I ride a Long Haul Trucker, which, I'm told, doesn't handle front weight as well as some would like. Handles it fine as far as I can tell, though.

tombilcze

That is a good way to look at it. This thread gave me a good idea on how to pack. I'll work up a list and see how it fits and distributes best. I like some of the posts on what to pack where. I am real leery of over packing and want to pack light.

indyfabz

One approach that is helpful is to not take more of something that you need than you need. Example: If you are going out somehwhere sunny for a week, you are probably going to need/want sunblock. Instead of taking an entire bottle or tube, transfer some to a smaller vial or bottle. I do the same with olive oil, which I always take to cook with. For things like toothpaste and deoderant, travel sizes are the way to go.

Also remember that items of clothing can vary greatly in weight. If I think I will need long pants, I take a sythetic pair that converts to shorts by zipping off the legs. Not only does that eliminate the need for two items of clothing, the pants weight a lot less than, say a pair of jeans.

Just promise that you won't cut down the handle of your toothbrush.