It’s great that there are all these different options, but how can all these bikepacking luggage companies make any money, there seems so many of them now. Wonder just how big the market is.
They seem to fall into three categories:
Revelate, alpkit, and now Aiguille making high end stuff in small batches that will probably last forever . Viable because it’s priced as a custom bag and ‘hand made’.
Topeak, Blackburn etc selling to the middle ground. Good stuff, made by the thousands in a factory somewhere in Asia.
Ibera etc selling £20 frame bags that will last forever if you only do a few nights a year.
So just set your budget and pick the price point your happy with and features your happy to live without (on the basis that if you’re paying >£100 for a bag they’ll put any feature you like on it).
I’ve been experimenting with making my own. It’s very cheap (75% of the cost was velcro!), but there’s a surprising amount of details to try and get right (I want the bag to taper to match the split top tubes to maximise volume). I also want to add little externally accessed pockets to the other side for things like pump, pegs, poles, battery.
[url=https://flic.kr/p/PUznEN]2018-10-14_06-33-22[/url] by thisisnotaspoon, on Flickr
[url=https://flic.kr/p/29gNW4m]2018-10-14_03-15-38[/url] by thisisnotaspoon, on Flickr