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What's the problem with them?
I keep seeing comments along the lines of 'without having to fit a disc specific rack' when researching my next purchase, a touring bike. I had my mind set on pre-ordering a surly disc trucker (£1200, available in March) which has the disc brake mounted inside the rear triangle, but now I'm wondering why it makes the bike worth £500 more than the LHT on which it is based, and in surly's words is otherwise exactly the same in terms of geometry and spec.
Should I just get the new, lower geared (but still a double) Genesis Croix de Fer (£1100) and a disc specific rack and save myself a bit of money and have a bike which I might be able to throw about off-road a bit too?
I don't use disc specific racks anyway - just space 'em out a bit id needed. Disc specific racks I have seen are clunky and heavy
Topeak super tourist DX disc us what you want
heavy and klunky tho.
heavy and klunky tho
an issue on a heavy-ish old klunker of a tourer?
edit: silly question,ignore it
i was thinking about this today. the GF wants to do a little bike touring next year. i'll have the BOB and she'll have panniers, but her Sanderson HT hasn't got the necessaries to fit a normal rack.
and today i saw this (her old man already has one):
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which combined with these:
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gives you this:
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Depends entirely on the combination of rack / brakes / frame mounts combo. Chances are you'll get away with spacing the rack out using a washer from a v-brake - this has worked for 2 of my racks.
alpin,
without wanting to sound rude, what's the point of that? And how does it fix on at the bottom? No doubt it suits your purposes, but the bike i get will have rack bosses
alpin,
sorry that did sound rude. I can see the point of that rack, but it's not what I'm after
no worries...
but it suits me fine. niether of my hardtails (read gears) have rack bosses/mounting points.
good luck with your search...
I don't think you would even need a disc specific rack. I bought a cheap disc specific one for my commuter (26" hardtail). The only difference to a standard rack is a couple of black anodised spacers and long bolts for the bottom fixing point. I thought these were excessive, so got rid of them, and the rack fits perfectly with standard short bolts. Clearance around the brakes (fitted outside the rear triangle)is only a couple of mm, but everything works just fine and it looks a lot neater too.
Of course all bikes and racks are going to be a bit different, but you have a greater choice of racks if you don't get disc specific.
Alpin - word of caution on the weight... I managed to snap one of those side mounts (so not the rack; just the supports that allow it to carry panniers) by over loading it and then swinging it around while riding off road. Entirely my fault but when packing worth putting light bulkier stuff nearer the bottom of the pannier and heavier stuff near the support.
Plenty of ways to get proper panniers racks on bikes without rack mounts. P clips, tubus do various fitting kits as do old man mountain I believe and you can get seat clamps with mounting points
more info please TJ..
ghe one thing i like about the Topeak and BOB is that withing seconds you can remove all touring paraphernalia and take your bike onto the trails....
ThatPieface - Member
Depends entirely on the combination of rack / brakes / frame mounts combo.
I managed to fit a rack on an Inbred by using a stack of 4 washers. However, my little Ti Hrdtail and my Ti Tourer both needed the Super Tourist DX. I even tried the Tubus racks with their disk adapter and that couldn't be made to work.
alpin - that would be a good solution, until you load it up with any significant weight. 😆
If you're riding all day with panniers (if you go down that route) once you've unloaded the bike it'll come to life - you'll barely notice the weight of the rack.
Alpin
for the top mounting - available from a few places
http://www.parker-international.co.uk/5100/MPart-Seat-Clamp-Mount.html
for tubus racks a qr mounting - very stable
http://www.tubus.com/product.php?xn=33
seatstay mounting
http://www.tubus.com/product.php?xn=60
p clips
http://www.evanscycles.com/products/tortec/p-clips-ec006759
We have 4 bikes all with disc brakes all with standard racks of various sorts on them. All teh supertourist dx does is sapce it out a long way effectivly - for me it was far too far and just nasty an clunky.
I too reckon that the weight of the rack is mostly insignificant while riding without panniers. I think it's worth having a rack just as a mudguard, even when I'm not carrying stuff (though obviously /proper/ mountain bikers just get wet and muddy).
This is a SuperTourist DX.
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You might be able to see that I added a wee bit of plastic sheeting ahead of the carrier "deck" and between the stays. That extends the mudguardiness of it 🙂
I don't have a photo of it (yet) but I did a similar thing - I used a length of inner tube stretched between the two struts.
You should see the mudguard I made for my girlfriend's bike if you like a bodge. I used a length of an old tyre, attached to the rack with cable ties. Looks proper shoddy (which may be why her bike didn't get stolen from work yesterday when her colleague's bike parked next to it did).
I've got a Tortec Apex disc rack and I'm suitably impressed with it. I haven't tried any other racks so no idea how it ranks weigh-wise. But for £12.99 from [url= http://www.bikesyoulike.co.uk/product/5593/TorTec_Apex_Disc_Rear_Rack ]here[/url] it's definitely a bargain!