Thanks for posting this, Will. It's definitely an interesting read. To me, his testing proves that bikepacking bags don't make all that much sense for a relaxed tour that will generally be on tarmac and/or relatively well cared for gravel roads. If the time penalty for front panniers vs. bikepacking bags given the same amount of effort over the course of 60 miles is just a measly 15 minutes, why not go with panniers? Again, this only really applies for road touring, though, because panniers (front or rear) are pains in the butt on off-road hike-a-bikes with lots of elevation change. That said, his test assumes the same weight for all setups, which generally wouldn't be the case since most folks, myself included, would take a few more things given the extra cargo capacity of panniers.
One side note: I've only taken one trip since buying a Porcelain Rocket Mr. Fusion seat bag--my setup was front low rider panniers, a few small dry bags (tools, rain gear, etc.) in a front basket, and the PR seat bag--but I would've rather used a traditional saddlebag like my Carradice Super C, mostly because it's so much easier to access the contents vs. the PR bag. I'm waiting to make a final call on this, though, until I take a couple of wholly off-road trips this summer. I might find that the benefits of the seat bag will outweigh the small annoyance of packing and unpacking. Hopefully I didn't digress too much here. Looking forward to hearing others' thoughts. Bob K. in Baltimore -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to rbw-owners-bunch+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to rbw-owners-bunch@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/rbw-owners-bunch. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
