why not small panniers

[vermont]

In another post about "how many liters/cc of bag space..." someone named Andy Marx posted a pic of an absolutely awesome idea of using fork braze ons to add water bottle racks (seriously, I absolutely love that idea).  This got me thinking about why would you not use a touring fork to mount panniers instead???
I'm new to the idea of "bikepacking" but an confused why people completely do away with traditional techniques.  Mountain bike with suspension and trail obstacles I fully understand, but it appears many people are using fire roads and dirt roads.  I also understand that traditional panniers are big enough to pack the kitchen sink but small panniers are available.  Personally I went from two back panniers to two front panniers and came to the conclusion that four small panniers are the best, but this was all on roads/dirt roads.
Why not use four small panniers placed correctly?  If you are going without suspension then it seems two small mid mountain front panniers and two small lower mounted rear panniers would do everything a frame bag, handlebar bag and seat post bag would do the same.
I'm not trying to step on toes or get anyone mad.  I am genuinely very curious about new techniques of packing and the adventures that can come from them, but I have always wondered why people shun panniers completely (mt bikes with suspension aside).
Thanks,

[dh024]

I started using two pairs of small Arkel Dry-Lites panniers on my ECR for dirt road/rail trails touring. Works very well. I detest wearing a backpack, so this setup gives me more than enough space to carry everything I need. Last summer I did the Trans Canada Trail (Kettle Valley Rail Trail) and part of the Great Divide route (in Canada), and loved it.

Photos in this thread:
http://www.bikeforums.net/touring/932726-arkel-dry-lites-experiences-3.html#post18431233

[vermont]

So I did some reading after doing a search for "pannier" and came up with two ideas.
Per this website, bikepacking is devoted to large amounts of single track, not mostly dirt roads.  It seems many people like the idea of ultra-light travel and have taken techniques intended for single track and used them for dirt road touring.  For dirt roads, small panniers seem to me to be the best option.  I realize small panniers are few and far between on the market but that relates to my second thought...
The thing I like about the bikepacking idea is innovation.  Taking what was out there and innovating so you can ride single track.  But seriously... wearing a backpack was the best idea that people have come up with???  I surprised no one has come up with bike mounted and SMALL bags to take the backpack away.  I guess that is where my confusion comes from.
Thanks,

[Smithhammer]

Of course you should run whatever you feel works best for your typical riding conditions, and that accommodates what you want to carry. And absolutely, for some types of bike travel, small panniers make a lot of sense. I don't think anyone is saying otherwise.

But here is why I generally prefer bikepacking bags vs. racks/panniers (even small panniers) for what I like to do:

1) Bikepacking bags are lighter. Quite a bit lighter than racks/panniers. And that's before you've put anything in them. Personally, while I'm not an anal-retentive gram-shaver, I do try to keep my rig reasonably light.

2) Just as I try to keep things light, I also try to keep my kit pretty minimal, according to the trip's conditions/needs. Bikepacking bags help encourage me to not bring a bunch of stuff that I really don't need. With racks and panniers, I would no doubt carry more stuff. Is it more stuff I actually need? Doubtful.

3) I don't like having racks on my bikes when I don't actually need a rack. Putting racks on and taking them off frequently is a PITA, imo. With bikepacking bags, when I'm done with the trip I just take them off and I have a nice, naked bike again. No tools needed.

4) Even on some trips that were planned to be largely on dirt roads, I've discovered trails I didn't know about, and taken them. With a lean bikepacking bag setup, I can feel a lot more comfortable doing that, than if I had racks/panniers on my bike. I like knowing I can veer off and explore more challenging terrain sometimes when the opportunity presents itself, even if that particular trip was expected to mostly just be a dirt road grind. Or even sometimes if those dirt roads turn out to be a lot rougher and more technical than we were expecting.

Those are my primary reasons for preferring bikepacking bags, since you're asking. I find them more versatile for the places I tend to like to explore, and I try not to carry a lot of stuff. But everyone's mileage may vary, and there is no right or wrong, as long as it works for you.

[RonK]

I surprised no one has come up with bike mounted and SMALL bags to take the backpack away.

Someone has. Porcelain Rocket makes these Micro Panniers.

[Floorguy]

Revelate has the nano paniers. https://www.revelatedesigns.com/index.cfm/store.catalog/Rack

[dh024]

Bikepacking bags are lighter. Quite a bit lighter than racks/panniers.

To be fair, racks and ultra-lite panniers don't HAVE to be heavy. Two pair of the Arkel dry-lites weight under 1 kg. Given that you aren't carrying much weight in them, you don't need heavy-duty racks (my front and rear racks weigh less than 1.5 kg combined). I like having a handlebar bag, too, that I can detach and carry when I am in town, which adds another .5 kg. So total weight is anywhere from 2.5 kg to 3 kg.

If you weigh out your frame bag, handlebar bag, seatpost bag, and backpack, I know they won't weight 3 kg. But the difference won't be huge, either. Maybe a couple of pounds? Like you suggest, what matters is most is how much stuff you want to carry.
 
I see ultralight panniers/racks as a mid-point between ultralight backpacking and traditional road touring. You just need to find your spot along the continuum and pick the system that fits your personal needs.

[Adam Alphabet]

Bikepacking bags if anything have spawned an innovation in bicycle touring set ups of ALL sorts and opened the doors to terrain that was previously difficult to travel with traditional touring kit.

The Micro Panniers and things like the Anything Cage with accessory bags are great examples of combining innovative materials/construction from bikepacking bags and adapting it to traditional touring set ups. There are people riding all over the world on all sorts of kit and any combination of kit you can think of, it promotes innovation, it's rad!  4 pannier touring ain't dead and definitely has it's place as mentioned by vermont for gravel roads and road touring etc..

The only way to figure out what works for you is to try it out. It's one of the main reasons I make all my own gear. I can experiment with set ups to optimize the travel for my trips whatever that trip may be.... from month long gravel/road some single track vacation tours in a foreign country to blasting down the AZTR300 as fast as I can. Different set ups for different trips.

Backpacks ain't dead either.. it all comes down to the terrain/trip, your goals, your past experience, personal preferences, limits and thresholds you've discovered for yourself etc.. At the end of the day the more you experiment and figure out what works for you the happier you'll be on your trips. Everyone has an opinion but no one can tell you what the ideal set up is for you, you will come to your conclusions in time.
Good Luck!

[Flounder]

I remember years and years ago before the term bikepacking became vogue, we just called it mountain bike touring. Because camping gear was a little heavier and bulkier, racks and panniers were simply necessary, and they sucked. Pushing a bike with panniers blows. Plus, in rougher terrain the panniers bounce and rattle, and I broke many racks in my day.

When camping gear became incredibly light and compact, it was easy to fit it all in soft bags allowing the bike to be more nimble, and frankly, more fun to ride loaded.

When I can afford to do it, I love loading my bike with just 7-10 pounds of gear and covering big miles and a fast clip. With bigger loads, racks and panniers, I always felt like I was riding a donkey.

[chrisx]

My front rack broke the first time I bumped the bag into a rock.
Lowrider front rack lasted 3 miles, It was 2 miles to get on a trail.

[Twaing]

My experience is that a rear rack with 20 liter drybag on the center of rack is more convenient than a seat bag and does not add any extra drag.  I hang a roll up set of Arkle ultralights on the side and use when I get groceries, a bottle of wine when I pass a store near where I will camp, or other temporary stuff.  A holster holding a 14 liter drybag on the front rounds out the rig.  I just added a framebag but I don't know what i will put in it as I had all the room I needed before. 

[offroute]

No shunning panniers here – they have their place. Spare attachment HW and some means to band-aid a broken rack are a must.

I prefer panniers to other kinds of bike bags for touring, but some rides and bikes call for minimalism and a svelte profile. Right tools for the job.

[Marc40a]

I've been thinking the same thing re: small panniers, at least, front ones.

I like:

1.) the idea of having clear view of my front tire/hub area for technical sections.

2.) the capacity (You could fit 5 Salsa Anything bags in 1 Ortlieb front roller!)
 
3.) having weight down low on the front for climbing/handling

I'm still thinking about rear pannniers. I use them daily on my commuter on a minimalist rack (Tubus Fly) but I'm hesitant to step up to the scaffolding required for a 29+  camp bike.

[black_labb]

Panniers, racks and bikepacking bags all have their place. There is only so much space in bikepacking bags but panniers can be difficult on some terrain, though probably not as much as some make it out to be.

I started bike touring on roads and then moved to more remote touring as that's where my interest lies. I haven't done a tour with bikepacking gear yet but plan on it. Excluding a tandem one with my partner which wasn't remote my last 3 tours have all needed 7 to 20 days worth of food which I can't see that working with a bikepacking setup.

I think the issues of panniers is overblown for 2 reasons. Firstly riding with panniers isn't much harder assuming the same amount of gear is with you, just don't take what you don't need and make sure the bike is balanced (don't load it all over the rear rack, spread the weight evenly, road style bar bags make a bike handle terribly). There is extra weight in the rack and panniers but it is proportional to the volume they can carry.

The other thing is not that many people actually ride routes that are technical enough for panniers to be a problem. A lot of people think a full bikepacking setup is necessary for the great divide MBR but really panniers and racks would be suitable as well. People always look at the equipment used in the more demanding applications and tend to copy that even if their application doesn't necessarily justify it. Just like the very unfit middle aged person on a fancy carbon roadbike that would be much more suited to a more robust but uncool hybrid. Bikepacking is the cool thing right now which effects some people's gear choice. Less than half of people using bikepacking use their loaded bike in conditions that panniers would be inappropriate but still didn't consider them.   

Bikepacking gear just like everything else is a compromise. Saddlebags for instance aren't the best way to store gear on the back of the bike. Many of 8-12L volume are around 500g (~1.1 lbs) and reportedly can't take too much weight otherwise there is annoying sway. My very reliable Blackburn EX1 rear rack is 570g and can have a drybag (which many already have in their saddle bag) strapped to the top holding more bulk and weight.  This may make a backpack unnecessary which could result in less overall weight and more comfort. It also makes a dropper post a possibility though an unlikely combination. Not all frames will fit a rear rack (especially full suspension) but I can guarantee that many people who could have fit something similar didn't even consider it as bikepacking gear seemed the be the thing to do. Rack reliability is a concern but so is every bit of gear. I've accumulated between 5 and 6 months of offroad touring and more onroad with one of my EX1 racks with no Issues with quite a bit of weight in 40L of heavy panniers bouncing around on them. Halve the loaded weight and you should have no issues on the roughest tracks you would want to take your loaded hardtail down.

That's not to say that bikepacking gear is a silly fad. It's another valuable option for people to load gear on their bike but shouldn't be seen as the only option. Decide on your gear based on the conditions you expect to use it in.   

Here in Eastern Australia there are few tracks that are long enough to make a decent trip without having services so far apart that bikepacking gear is still able to hold enough food unless you can manage to get food drops organised. I can only think of one moderate length "local" ride that could be possible with bikepacking gear and that is on the other side of the continent and panniers would still be ok.

It seems that the majority of long distance rides with notable technical elements are in North America with a bit in the UK and Europe. I'm jealous of the logistical simplicity of bike trips on some of the famous routes. To have guidebooks and maps telling you where shops,  watersources, to turn and where to get the best beer is you can go quite minimal on gear which allows bikepacking gear. When there is a lack of information on track conditions and services you have to prepare for the unexpected including bringing more gear. On a solo trip to Siberia I had little information, daily river crossings that could be flooded, some very deep muddy tracks and a lack of services beyond the occasional town meant I had to prepare for the worst. My gear and food amounts meant a bikepacking bag setup wouldn't have been possible. Now that I've been and am familiar I could go lighter and a bikepacking setup could probably work. Not following in other people's footsteps (tyre tracks) is rewarding but it is hard work to prepare for something like that and the heavy bike isn't as quick/fun. I am jealous of the well documented bikepacking friendly trails available in North America and am in the early stages of planning to ride the Colorado trail next year which has me really excited and I will need to use bikepacking gear due to the trail conditions. 

[Quixotic geek]

It's interesting if you look at the luggage used on the recent Transcontinental, the vast majority were using bike packing luggage. Given that many were using what is effect a TT bike, I'm inclined to think that a lot of it comes down getting the luggage into the plane of the bike for aerodynamics and balance. When you're doing what is a 3800km individual TT, any savings on aero are worth it, where as on a more casual tour, they may not be so significant.

I have a set of Ortlieb back roller classics that I've used for the last few years, but am now starting to move towards bike packing style luggage (Alpkit, Miss Grape, Apidura all on the potentials list). Getting everything into the plane of the bike really appeals, and it's also encouraging me to take less crap with me, just the essentials.

J

[Lentamentalisk]

As everyone has said, it all comes down to pounds per cubic inch. If you only need a few cubic inches of volume for an incredibly minuscule load, you can save a lot of weight by taking advantage of the structure of the bike that already exists. If on the other hand you need a lot of volume, bikepacking bags start to lose their competitive advantage, as they need to start incorporating more and more structural material. That said, if you aim for a very minimialist rack and very light panniers (I have a Tubus Carry Ti with Revelate Micropanniers) then the whole rack and panniers setup will weigh only about what a typical seat bag would weigh.

But that only addresses the weight issue. There are also the bike handling (weight distribution), bike rattling itself to pieces, and side to side clearance issues.

[AugustWest]

I'm eyeing the Rogue Panda small pannier set.  It's always hard to bring all the food I need - I don't like to stay in hotels and eat in town - and just a few extra liters for grub would be very welcome.

[Smithhammer]

I'm eyeing the Rogue Panda small pannier set.  It's always hard to bring all the food I need - I don't like to stay in hotels and eat in town - and just a few extra liters for grub would be very welcome.

I have a pair of the RP Kaibabs. They're a great little pannier, and ride quite well. Easily adaptable to just about any rack. I think they are a great option for longer trips on milder terrrain, gravel/dirt roads when you want some extra volume, but are still trying to keep things somewhat minimal. On rougher terrain, as with just about any pannier, they can feel a little unweildy, but certainly a lot better than most other options I know of. RP makes excellent bags.

[B@se]

Bikepacking bags if anything have spawned an innovation in bicycle touring set ups of ALL sorts and opened the doors to terrain that was previously difficult to travel with traditional touring kit.

Bicycle touring in Norway in 1890... so Bikepacking is not really new.

From that point the bicycle touring took of, resulting in the usage of panniers.

Cheers

Bas

[AugustWest]

Love that photo.  Is that from the Rivendell website?  (LOL)  I'd like to know more about those tires...I wonder how many flats they had with rubber from that period?