[Closed] Bike packers - fork mounted carriers, which do you use?

Just got a longitude with gorilla cages already fitted so will be watching this with interest. They seem secure with softish light loads on a couple of trial runs so far.

Product weight...Is lightness a benefit, or weight a guage of durability?

It's a longitude? I have, frame only didn't come with the cages.

Very cynical 🙂 I'd favour robust, my kit isn't the lightest by any stretch.

Blackburn outpost carriers worth a look, if can find in stock. £18 with 4kg capacity. I have them and are great, only use 2 bolts to mount them but sturdy.

I like the qr of the gorilla cage but 1.5kg seems quite low.

On the flip side do you want to be carrying an additional 6kg of gear? That's a spare road bike strapped to your fork!

1.5kg is a big coke-cola bottle, its unlikely you'll carry anything that big or that dense. My cooking kit, and food for a day including jelly babies is under a kilo.

Consider carefully how much stuff you load on the front end, particularly for riding offroad and the way it affects handling - I used a pair of Salsa Anything Cages on my forks and a Blackburn Outland under my downtube for a recent 5-day arctic event

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I try to keep anything up-front quite light like clothing and a couple of flasks otherwise it can accentuate steering-flop when negotiating soft-conditions like deep snow.

The Outland cage only has 2 mounting holes - I had to drill mine to get it where I wanted it - I used it for my fuel bottle. Both the cage types work best with something like Alpkit heavyweight 5L drybags which have strap retainer points. Make sure you use Loctite on the screws as they have a habit of vibrating loose.

I've got a pair of Blackburn outpost cages and 5l alpkit tough drybags, work a treat. The cages seem will made and the strapping is tough and grippy, the two bolt fitting is fine and allows you to choose position on the fork - though I guess lower the better.

[url= https://c1.staticflickr.com/1/737/32187057686_a90b6668c9_k.jp g" target="_blank">https://c1.staticflickr.com/1/737/32187057686_a90b6668c9_k.jp g"/> [/img][/url][url= https://flic.kr/p/R3g5Ss ]Black mountains riding[/url] by [url= https://www.flickr.com/photos/turkey_plucker/ ]Matthew Walker[/url], on Flickr

[img] [/img]

I used a pair of anything cages hose clipped to my forks for my [url= http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/gr5-geneva-to-nice-2016-picture-and-word-heavy ]GR5 epic[/url] last summer, worked great with stove/pot/food in the left side and clothes packed tightly into the right side.

I'll echo the fact that you don't want to load the front up too much. I'm currently looking at lightening the front of the bike up and loading a little more into my backpack as steep singletrack was a bit scary! (forget even attempting to lift the front)

+1 to the "why do you want an extra 6Kg on the front of the bike" comments. I'd only consider putting lightweight, fairly bulky stuff there: tarp, inflatable sleeping mat, that sort of thing.

It's a bit different from front panniers on a road bike as the handling requirements for off-road are different.

A genuine question, why do you feel you need the fork mounted carriers? Certainly in this country that amount of capacity, over and above the usual seat bag, frame bag and bar harness/bag, is rarely needed. Dovebiker's setup above is for some pretty extreme conditions and kit to deal with -30C is by its very nature, bulky.

I got a Longitude F+F and it came with the gorilla cages, might be worth asking where they are?

Damn that bike is well loaded Dovebiker!

A genuine question, why do you feel you need the fork mounted carriers?

I don't need them for extra capacity. More to rejig where I carry things on the bike and the option is there. Also so I can minimise rucksack weight. I don't currently have a frame bag or bar harness. In the past I've had sleeping bag under saddle, mat and tarp along the top tube and other stuff on my back. Getting some of the light bits onto the forks would be great. I'm running rigid so as long as I'm careful about equal loading I can't see it would handle much different to having heavier suspension forks. I don't really like having stuff strapped to the bars and it gets in the way of lights a bit.

Will take another look at the Blackburn cages. I'd discounted them as Charlie was a little scathing about them on his product page.

I got a Longitude F+F and it came with the gorilla cages, might be worth asking where they are?

Interesting. What year was that (mines a 2016)?

I bought mine about 3 months ago, it is a 2017 I guess.

The grey colour? Mines the previous year. This years is a bargain, cheaper by £100 and you get the cages!

Fair enough. I don't have a single method of storing stuff, it depends on what I'm doing, time of year, weather, etc. There's no single right way to do things which is great but also confusing if you aren't sure.

I run with rigid forks as well but they are carbon so a little harder to retro fit cages. Quite a few folk run with bar extenders to get round the bar bag/lights interference.

Thread hijack: can't see the tougher 5l Alpkit dry bags Faustus mentioned. They only seem to do lightweight sil-nylon ones. Maybe they've been discontinued.

Any recommendations for fork cage bags? One of my light-ish ones wore through after a week in my DIY cages.

They're not in the bikepacking products page, but here, many colours and sizes. The Airlock Xtra is the tougher one:

https://www.alpkit.com/featured/dry-bags

Thread hijack: can't see the tougher 5l Alpkit dry bags Faustus mentioned. They only seem to do lightweight sil-nylon ones. Maybe they've been discontinued.

[url= https://www.alpkit.com/products/airlok-xtra-5-litre ]Here[/url] you go

thenorthwind, any pictures or info on your DIY solution?

The problem with the alpkit bags is they just turn into a ball if you stuff them full. Not enough length for their width. They need to make some proper bike packing ones that are 50% longer so we can size down and get a more useful shape, they would work so much better for attaching to things.

https://www.sjscycles.co.uk/bottles-cages/alloy-xl-bottle-cage/

£6 each.

Plus the xxs karrimor drybags are long and narrow, fit well

[quote=STATO ]The problem with the alpkit bags is they just turn into a ball if you stuff them full. Not enough length for their width. They need to make some proper bike packing ones that are 50% longer so we can size down and get a more useful shape, they would work so much better for attaching to things.

There's always the Salsa ones. They're only £35 each after all....

Beerbabe too - but also £35

Bike Bag Dude - $90 each

@Stato - I suspect that the bags are generic "Made in China" products that have their name imprinted rather than any specific design.

I know what you mean about proportions: I was looking for a larger volume bag to put on the handlebar harness, this was for a winter sleeping bag. The only way I could get a larger volume was to also increase the diameter, I just wanted a [i]longer[/i] bag. On a handlebar harness there's room to expand sideways but not so much up and down as you increase the risk of wheel rub.

Gorilla Cage bags - 5.5L £18.95

http://www.cyclemiles.co.uk/shop/accessories/gorilla-cage-dry-bag-5-5lts/#.WNERXCaLSHs

My forks only having a single (mid) fitting I'm still looking for an option . Nonetheless I finally got act together and managed (with some help from someone smarter!) to adjust the old Freeload racks to fit the Vagabond. The front deck is handy and I'm sure I could rig something to strap on the side-struts as long as it's just lightweight gear (clothing in long stuffsack etc)

[IMG] [/IMG]

Wow those airlok xtras have gone up in price. Now double what they cost last time I ordered!

@Stato - I suspect that the bags are generic "Made in China" products that have their name imprinted rather than any specific design.

I know what you mean about proportions: I was looking for a larger volume bag to put on the handlebar harness, this was for a winter sleeping bag. The only way I could get a larger volume was to also increase the diameter, I just wanted a longer bag. On a handlebar harness there's room to expand sideways but not so much up and down as you increase the risk of wheel rub.

Almost all alpkit stuff is their own, apart from possibly some of the cooking gear. The bags certainly are theirs though.

I went for a revelate bag for my handlebar hareness. With a 29er suspension fork an alpkit bag needs to be really high to clear the tyre, hence why their harness lifts the bag so much. Wildcat do a good handlebar bag too now, its a long tube, perfect really. I wonder if alpkit just dont realise there is a market for this?

I'm sure I've seen the cooking gear elsewhere, thought the bags were the same.

I've the Wildcat bag, the smaller 8L one. My occasional requirement is for a bag around 20L in size that is of similar diameter to the 13L Airlok.

With careful packing, I use a 13L Airlock in a Revelate Harness on my Amazon. Being fatter rather than long, I can get a useful capacity between the STIs. Of course, no suspension helps, as does sitting it in such a way that the widest part of the oval is in the "out front" position.

For use on my 29er/B+ with its flat bars or with Jones bars, the Revelate bags are a better shape.

I've had the mk2 Anything Cages for a while now, they don't get used every trip though. On the bars is always a Wildcat harness with a 13l Alpkit dry bag - this is enough for a short summer trip. In this pic I have the cages with a pair of Exped 5l bags, carrying the tarp, mat, jacket maybe - bulky but fairly light stuff. I doubt if there's much over a kilo each side.

[url= https://c1.staticflickr.com/1/621/31489532104_15d55ae4b5.jp g" target="_blank">https://c1.staticflickr.com/1/621/31489532104_15d55ae4b5.jp g"/> [/img][/url][url= https://flic.kr/p/PYC5Pj ]Untitled[/url] by [url= https://www.flickr.com/photos/107347896@N06/ ]Richard Picton[/url], on Flickr

Yeah light quick access is what you want in the fork bags. When i use them i carry first aid and emergency kit or bad weather kit such as waterproof trousers and poncho if the ride requires them.

Thanks for the Alpkit links. I think I was being thick and looking at the pictures of the Airlok Xtras and assuming they were all the bigger ones, without reading the capacity 😳

They are a bit pricey for a 5l dry bag though. I'd be willing to pay if they were the right shape though - long and thin is definitely what's required.

I'll try and look out some pictures. I might have posted about it a while ago. I'm warning you though, it's very Blue Peter!

Found the old thread but I must have deleted/moved the pictures and I can't find them 😳

Here's one in the meantime that shows it in action.

[url= https://c1.staticflickr.com/4/3741/32025867603_0ce4ab064c_c.jp g" target="_blank">https://c1.staticflickr.com/4/3741/32025867603_0ce4ab064c_c.jp g"/> [/img][/url][url= https://flic.kr/p/QN1WF6 ]IMGP2661[/url] by [url= https://www.flickr.com/photos/136120472@N08/ ]Dave W[/url], on Flickr

I'm committing a multitude of STW sins:
- Cable tying stuff to carbon forks
- Using cheap Karrimor dry bags from Sports Direct
- Riding an old-fashioned bike
- Making stuff out of shampoo bottles instead of spending a week's wages on something made by a bloke with a beard in a shed in Colorado

But they held on for a 7 day, 400-mile trail/gravel/road bikepacking trip through New Zealand, so I'm happy 😀

Edit: link to old thread

Well I c**ked that up. Not having a good day.

http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/diy-anything-cargo-cages

Thanks for that, I found a pic from the front at the end of your trip via [url= http://bearbonesbikepacking.co.uk/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=13&t=7719 ]bearbonesbikepacking[/url]. Tresemme bottles presumably.

Yup, Tresemme bottles. I have a bottle of PVA in fetching yellow that looks quite similar, but it takes me longer to use a litre of PVA than a litre of shampoo, for reasons that are probably obvious even in the pic with my helmet on.

Edit: I see what the problem is with the pictures on the BB thread at least: Dropbox stopped allowing hotlinking.

Right, reposted pics on the other STW thread, see link above

I,m using Ti King Anything cages with Salsa bags you can buy fasteners for the forks!
[url= https://c1.staticflickr.com/1/324/31923117694_d42149f291_k.jp g" target="_blank">https://c1.staticflickr.com/1/324/31923117694_d42149f291_k.jp g"/> [/img][/url][url= https://flic.kr/p/QCWjGW ]DSCF4894[/url] by [url= https://www.flickr.com/photos/nzrich/ ]Richard Munro[/url], on Flickr
https://www.ghyllside.co.uk/many-thing-cage-king-cage.html#.WNFxOWPpzFI

https://www.ghyllside.co.uk/salsa-anything-cage-bag.html#.WNFxz2PpzFI

Very nice but just a little pricey!

You might get a discount if you buy 2 i did 🙂

🙂 i do like ghyllside cycles.

[url= https://c1.staticflickr.com/1/751/32081799903_87b2e84792_c.jp g" target="_blank">https://c1.staticflickr.com/1/751/32081799903_87b2e84792_c.jp g"/> [/img][/url]

[url= https://flic.kr/p/QSXBp6 ]Day 25 on the trail[/url] by [url= https://www.flickr.com/photos/jimbosussexmtb/ ]Jim Barrow[/url], on Flickr

I have gorilla cages, I only use them when I'm doing something that needs me to carry extra water and I put a 1L bottle in each