Bicycle luggage - your experiences and opinions if at all possible

[Young Fairfoul]

Dear All,

Im Steph and a product design student at the Open University. Im also a bicycle fanatic. and would love to show you my trusty steed ( He's called the Bombay Sapphire) but cant work out how to embed a photo here of me and him on the road

I appreciate I am new to this forum, and this may put you off helping me with this, in all honesty I am not a member of any cycling forums. If I were, I have a horrible feeling I wouldnt get any work or study done in a day! Hopefully now though I will be able to return the favour with some of you in various threads ; my specialties are carbon fibre, magic ratios and track standing with no hands

Anyway, enough about me. Back to the matter at hand.

I am really keen to spend the next 6 months reinventing aspects of bicycle luggage. I am a true pack horse but would like to have a bit more versatility, comfort and moreover design a more sustainable and long lasting bag/pannier/trailer... im pretty open right now.

What I would love to find out more about is your experiences of luggage, what you own and what you love and hate about it. Your experiences, work-arounds, frustrations. This is all in the hope for a well rounded product that's going to make us all happier cyclists

I would like to assure you that any data collected from this survey will be handled in strict confidentiality, this is for my own personal analysis which will be turned into a completely impersonal report of people's attitudes. All questions are with anonymity in mind so Im definitely not scraping for your email addresses!

If you think the survey is rubbish and you'd rather just post a reply of your opinions, views, current cycle luggage etc then please please feel free - any response would be greatly appreciated

If you think I'm a pest and would rather ignore me you are more than welcome but thank you for reading this post.

Well here goes nothing!!! http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/YWRZ8SW

A huge thank you in advance for your time and consideration.

Steph

 

[Young Fairfoul]

And having had a little schnuffle around within this section....

I would be more than happy to share design progress along the way with you all.
In fact, Id love to have your opinions as a product comes into fruition!

 

[Dave Davenport]

The people most interested in luggage hauling tend to be cycle tourists and your survey doesn't seem to take them into account.

 

[shouldbeinbed]

Done, sharing would be good, so many design types hit and run, it'd be nice to see some sort of commitment as a quid-pro-quo. There is another bag design questionnaire on here too.

 

[Young Fairfoul]

Hi Dave,

Thanks very much for pointing that out and for taking the time to whip through the survey!....You have a really good point there. I havent done a huge amount of cycling as a tourist so perhaps that's why it slipped my mind.
I have a pretty mahoosive courier bag I use for long weekends away, although it can be a little cumbersome for day to day - what do you tend to use? Panniers? Or a type of backpack?

All the best, Steph

 

[deptfordmarmoset]

Done. It seemed a little awkward to complete because I use different ways of carrying things on different bikes.

 

[Young Fairfoul]

Done, sharing would be good, so many design types hit and run, it'd be nice to see some sort of commitment as a quid-pro-quo. There is another bag design questionnaire on here too.

Thanks for filling it in. I'm truly hoping I don't fall into the "design type" category. The thought gives me the shivers!

I should be moving onto the concept stage in June so I'll be sure to share some possible solutions with you all then. I'm all for collaborative projects!

 

[Young Fairfoul]

Done. It seemed a little awkward to complete because I use different ways of carrying things on different bikes.

Thanks! ... In such circumstance do you think something multi-functional might help? Maybe a pannier/rack bag that can be compressed and worn as a back pack? Or a backpack that can be clipped to a rack dependent on which way you'd rather look at it.

Or... if you had to pick one type of luggage solution that you think is those most compatable with your cycling needs... what would it be?

 

[deptfordmarmoset]

Thanks! ... In such circumstance do you think something multi-functional might help? Maybe a pannier/rack bag that can be compressed and worn as a back pack? Or a backpack that can be clipped to a rack dependent on which way you'd rather look at it.

Or... if you had to pick one type of luggage solution that you think is those most compatable with your cycling needs... what would it be?

A backpack which can be quickly attached to a rack would be good provided it was comfortable on the back. I tend to use a backpack for light loads on the road bike but the tourer and pannier bag/rack for the shopping or 'away for the weekend' type stuff so a hybrid would be very convenient for most purposes.

 

[Dave Davenport]

A backpack which can be quickly attached to a rack would be good provided it was comfortable on the back. I tend to use a backpack for light loads on the road bike but the tourer and pannier bag/rack for the shopping or 'away for the weekend' type stuff so a hybrid would be very convenient for most purposes.

Like this?
http://www.ortlieb.co.uk/vario-ql3.html

 

[Dave Davenport]

Hi Dave,

Thanks very much for pointing that out and for taking the time to whip through the survey!....You have a really good point there. I havent done a huge amount of cycling as a tourist so perhaps that's why it slipped my mind.
I have a pretty mahoosive courier bag I use for long weekends away, although it can be a little cumbersome for day to day - what do you tend to use? Panniers? Or a type of backpack?

All the best, Steph

For touring; large bar bag, rear panniers & the tent on top of the Tubus steel rack in a canoe bag, about 20 to 25kg. Having a lot of the weight on the back is ok because I've got a full on touring bike, but if you were using a more standard mountain or road bike you might need to be more careful about weight distribution.

 

[Young Fairfoul]

Like this?
http://www.ortlieb.co.uk/vario-ql3.html

ahhh my stepdad was raving about this on the phone today - I just hadnt got round to having a look. Awesome! Thanks Dave

 

[mickle]

Clarjis.

 

[MrJamie]

Done also

Also found it difficult to complete, given different bikes with different luggage for different purposes and different criterior for each

 

[SatNavSaysStraightOn]

Like a lot of others here, I have found that I miss not having a rucksack handy when on tour, but the very rucksack is the cause of issues because the rackpack it would need to replace is so exceptionally handy, not least of all the way that Ortlieb have designed it to clip into their existing rear roller classic panniers. (click on the images for a larger view). This is my OH's bike when we were cycling around the world. Our panniers lasted really well. We added the rear pockets to the rear panniers part way into the tour and they made for a very useful addition - they are just visible on the photo below. I added a reflective band around them from a hi-viz jacket that I found at the side of the road. It would have been nice if Ortlieb had taken that into account, because you have to place the pocket over the only rear facing reflective patch and the pocket does not have one.


A few others we met on longer tours - most had similar setups - the first photo here the couple had the rear pockets which is how we became aware of them. the last couple were using rucksacks instead of rackpacks but they were not particularly stable IMO and one thing we have found is that on a longer tour, bungee cords perish and can not always be easily replaced.


A shorter tour. The 2nd picture is from our first tour.


A solution that didn't really work... though would have covered all storage issues!


Of course none of that covers my road bike or my mountain bike both of which also have panniers & racks