Fore to Aft Luggage--Panniers or saddlebags

Good morning this is the third in a series of reviews about luggage on your ride. We've already examined the Tank Bag in the previous review and I hope you found some of that information helpful The topic for this write up is hanging stuff off the sides of your bike.

As with the previous article, you are confronted with a number of questions and possible solutions when thinking about putting luggage on the sides of your bike.

• Material: What kind of material will the luggage be made out of? There seem to be four answers:- Leather--most favoured by the cruiser fans. This is most like your image of the saddlebags used when riding a horse. They tend to provide the light weight and some level of protection for the items you are toting around. They definately fit a look and style. You do have the option of buying something that looks like leather saddlebags, but is in fact a hard bag covered in leather. These bags come in a large variety of styles and motifes. It should be remembered that they are not truly lockable or secured to the bike, so you'll have to consider that when you leave your ride.

1. Ballistic--most favoured by the sport and UJM group. These bags are made out of the same material as textile jackets. They tend to be more water resistant then the leather bags, and because of the material they are made out of require less maintance. Like the leather bags above they tend to be easy off and easy onto your bike. They will tend to be temporily mounted and removable. They also tend to fit easily to a wide variety of rides.

1. Plastic--most favoured by the UJM, sport touring and adventure touring group. This is the first of the hard style bags. There are a number of brands from Shad, GIVI, Kappa, etc. Givi and Kapp are related companies with Kappa being the cheaper line. These types of bags require that you install a mounting system on your ride. This is not a particularly difficult process, but it does mean that even when you aren't using the bags for all intents and purposes the racks remain. These types of boxes are waterproof and lockable. They basically come in two weight ratings best exemplified by Givi's Monolock and Monokey systems. The Monolock system is more lightweight, with a weight restriction in the 3 kg range. The Monokey system has a far sturdier mounting system and is designed for larger bikes and larger loads. It can carry up to 10 kgs or 22 lbs. Both of these systems come with both pannier and top box options. We'll discuss topbox options later. These boxes come from 33 L to 52 L sizes and can hold varies sizes of helmets. The smallest 32 L will hold either a full face helmet and gloves or a briefcase, lunch bag and thermos. Once you've had a set it is hard not to have them for any trip of significant distance. The bike pictured below has two 42 L side bags plus a 55 L top box. This was the OEM option for this particular motorcycle.

1. Medal--most favoured by the adventure touring group. This is the ultimate type of hard luggage. They tend to have the most utilitarian look and are meant to. They will also be the most expensive option as well. They require special heavy weight racks or upgrades to the OEM racks to accept these big boys. There are a variety of makers, including independent shops that can fashion these from scratch. They are rugged, tough bags the allow for you to take the LONG WAY ROUND if you wish. They have become popular among the Urban Adventure Riders because of their style. They can carry considerable weight.

So those are the basics for saddlebags/panniers. They've been listed more or less by cost and level of difficulty for you to install them yourself. For the permanent racks, you should also know that the bag manufactures will have made a special rack for you model of bike for easy installation, but that for older models you might end up using a universal mounting system like on this 1987 CBX250.

Your judgement is going to have to be based on utility, cost, looks and how much you are going to use them. My self, after years of backpacking pain I've fallen in love with Panniers, and would put them on any bike I own.