Personal setups » Kurisu’s setup
by TheSingleGuyHi All,
Aussie living in Japan here – long time MTB rider and hiker, about 5 years ago started combining the two with regular touring (mostly 2-3 day trips, but always dreaming of longer) and last year made my first foray into proper BPing land. It went pretty well, I used a DIY-modified rear rack and Topeak bag plus some dry bags strapped to my bike.
I’ve just come back from my second overnighter after testing a new tent and some more modifications to my Topeak rack (poor man’s copy of OMM rack) that worked really well.
On the bike I have the rack, with the Topeak bag containing most of my food, cooking gear (Ti mug, mini sized gas burner, spork-thingy, chopsticks) and clothing, plus my sleeping pad.
In the blue drybag under the seat is my sleeping bag, inadequate for the late-spring cold snap we just had.
On the bars I strapped another drybag containing tent (minus poles and pegs) – next time I’ll put my sleeping pad and something else here too to help balance a little bit.
In the backpack I had a bit more food, a jacket, spares and tools, tent pegs and poles, and not much else really, I should have filled it up more. The weight was very reasonable, not much more than the camelback I’m accustomed to riding with.
Although it isn’t the lightest setup, I like the rack/Topeak bag – they are integrated – it slides on and clips into place. Very easy to take off and helps packing/unpacking, and it was much cheaper to use gear I had or could buy locally to ordering CDW or Epic Designs bags and paying for international shipping. Plus the rack is ready for my panniers for that tour of the length of Japan I’ll do someday.
So far this setup has proven to be rough singletrack-rated – and the balance is quite good – up or down on technical terrain hasn’t been a problem at all. As it warms up I’m looking forward to finding more adventure in the mountains of central Japan that are right at my backdoor. By the way, my sorry little camera didn’t pick it up, but Mt Fuji was visible to the naked eye in the above photo.
If anyone would like detailed photos of my rack mods, please let me know. I’ll be happy to take some close up pictures and ramble on some more.
ScottM on 
Dylan on 
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Rod on
just curious , can you camp anywhere you want in the Japan woods or do you have to stay in designated camping areas?
Officially, it’s designated areas only, but if you’re discreet and leave no trace you can stay pretty much anywhere. Certainly you’ll almost never have anyone barging up to your tent and demanding that you move. At worst, next time there’d be a sign…
From the pics, it is hard to tell what your rack modifications are…. I suspect that you rigged something to attach to the seatpost instead of the seat stays? Or maybe it is something to clear the disk brake?
I’ve been using a stock Blackburn Mtn rack for years with DIY bracket to attach to the seat stays without issue on a V Brake equiped bike.
It’s both, actually, although the main reason for the lower attachment mod was that my frame doesn’t have rack eyelets. I found tabs that I could bolt on and allow me to mount the rack to the QR ala OMM racks. I’ll do a detailed (geek) post about the rack next week.
Could you give some more details on how you modified the rack? I have the same frame, and don’t have the funds for an expensive rack like an OMM or the like. Good setup, I like it. Also, what brand/model of tent is that?
CK,
Sure, just let me dig up my photos and I’ll do a more detailed post – a few people have asked now.
Tent is a Japanese sports store special – Southfield somethingorother. Very light, minimum weight is 1.4kg, roomy for one. Too much rain and too many bugs here in Japan to go tentless very often (and I’m getting soft…).
Cheers,
Chris
Here’s a post on my blog with some details and and possibly too many words.
http://kurisu-in-japan.blogspot.com/2010/06/due-to-popular-demand.html
Cheers.