On Thursday night, I got all my gear ready. Now I just had to prep my bike. I was hauling everything I needed for a comfortable night. I also planned on a few extra luxury items since this trip was about fun, not survival. I've never used a handlebar bag before. Thought it might be nice and convenient. I could load it with my cell phone, my digital camera, wallet, and a little bit of food. I could also put my map and cue sheets right on top. So, I thought I'd try this.
It's pretty light, not that expensive at $70-80 when compared to others like Ortleib. What the heck, I'll give it a try, at least for the road/pavement portion of my weekend. It's got a nice clip on mount so I could easily remove the bag for the gravel vibration fest if needed. As I went to mount the bag, things went awry.
Take a look at this picture.
Missing anything? Yep, the lower pivot pin wasn't installed and the bottom portion of the left clamp fell to the ground. Strike 1. I then looked to the instructions and parts just to make sure I wasn't supposed to install the pivot. Strike 2. Crap. It's not going very well. I could have modified it and made it work, but since the bag is brand new, I decided to forgo the handle bar bag for this trip. I also want to test out of the package stuff before I start tinkering and making things work the way I want them too.
In the end, I mounted my Nitto front rack, loaded a dry bag and strapped it to the rack. I also managed to strap a map carrier to the bag. Nice. You can see that set up in the slide show.
I did end up using the Axiom Typhoon water proof rear panniers with good success. I'm going to do a few more long commutes (50+ miles) on them before reviewing them as well a few off road commutes. Maybe I'll have the replacement bar bag as well. If I have a problem with bar bag number 2, it will be strike 3 and I'll move on to another brand.
More touring product reviews coming.
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