Equipment - The Good, the Bad and the Unlovely

Introduction

I've taken three bikepacking trips with the current set-up, having made all sorts of modifications to what was originally my mountain bike, transforming it into my touring bike. I've acquired a variety of bits and pieces of kit to support my trips or to simply make them more enjoyable.

So, what's working well? What has not worked well or just not worked? What am I intending to change?

The Good

We'll start with The Good, the items that I'm pleased or even delighted with.

Ortlieb Panniers and Rack-Pack

It's perhaps no surprise that I'm pleased with my Ortlieb panniers. They're incredibly popular and I don't believe I've ever read a bad word about them. They're tough, easy to quickly mount and unmount and they're most definitely waterproof.

The Rack-Pack is probably less well known though. This is a relatively large bag, made from the same tough PVC material as the panniers and in the same roll-top dry bag design. It sits across a pair of panniers and clips onto them and is perfect for carrying longer items like a tent. Mine carries my tent, ground sheet, Thermarest sleeping mat, Alpkit sleeping bag, inflatable pillow, peg mallet and more. In short it carries my camping equipment and various other small bits and pieces I choose to throw in there. I don't know what I'd do without it to be honest.

Two Ortlieb panniers and across the top, the Rack-Pack

The panniers clip onto a Tortec Epic Alloy Rear rack which I'm very happy with too. It's absolutely solid.

Since my first couple of trips I've made one improvement to my luggage system. As mentioned, the Rack-Pack clips to the panniers under it. You can tighten by pulling on straps. But I felt there was scope for either end to move forwards or backwards and so had thrown a bungee cord around the bag, clipping it to my bike's frame to help stabilise the bag. But I had still found that one side or the other sometimes moved forwards, probably pulled by the bungee cord. So to balance the forwards pull of the bungee cord, I added some Sea to Summit Accessory Straps to anchor the bag in the other direction. There's nothing special about these straps and you could probably improvise something just as good for less money, but they do the job. I used the straps for the first time on my last trip and the Rack-Pack did not move.

Rack-Pack anchored with bungee and two accessory straps

MSR Hubba Hubba NX Tent

I love this tent. It's a two-person tent and therefore arguably bigger than I need for my solo bikepacking trips. But I wanted a tent that had room for my luggage and which I could stretch out in and be comfortable. The Hubba Hubba is perfect in this respect and only weighs 1.6Kg. It's also really easy to put up and can free-stand without being pegged out if you want.   

The MSR Hubba Hubba tent

Alpkit Pipedream 200 Sleeping Bag

The Alpkit Pipedream 200 is a down sleeping bag for summer. When packed in its integral bag, it's really small (15cm x 12cm), weighs little (575g) and I can throw it into the Rack-Pack and it take up almost no space. When I first used the Alpkit, I wasn't happy with it. I had a cold first night, not exactly something to generate rave reviews of a sleeping bag. The product description states that the bag will be comfortable to sleep in as long as the temperature is 7˚C or more but I'm not convinced it performs as specified. It's probably more like 9˚C.

But I've used it twice since that initial experience, the first time on a very windy autumn night and the second during a couple of cool summer nights. On the first of these occasions I used a silk liner and slept in a thermal vest and tights and was very warm all night. The extra nightwear and the silk liner add hardly any weight to my load and take up little room so they're worth packing just in case. On the two summer nights, during the season for which the bag is designed I didn't have to wear any additional thermal clothing and was very comfortable. So as long as you use it in the season it's intended for and stay a degree or two above the stated minimum, it works very well and the low weight and highly compact packing make it ideal for summer bikepacking.

Nuke Proof Sam Hill Enduro Pedals

Of all the changes I've made to the bike itself, this is my favourite. These are amazing pedals and provide a comfortably large surface area to place your feet on with incredible grip, thanks to the 10 pins on each side.

The Sam Hill Enduro Pedals are great!

Latrigg Bum Bag from Tuffbag

I was originally using a small Lowe Alpine bum bag for easy access to a few essential items or items I wanted to make sure were with me at all times, including when I stepped off the bike for a while such as to go into a shop. But the original bag was a little too small and I had concerns it might not be completely waterproof (it was pretty old). 

Thinking ahead to the day when I might be able to take a longer trip, maybe to Europe for example, and the need to keep documents like my passport safe and dry, I decided to replace the old bumbag with a Latrigg Bum Bag instead. This is an excellent piece of kit. I initially felt it was larger than I would have ideally liked and had concerns it might be uncomfortable. But both concerns were misplaced because it's so comfortable, you completely forget that it's there and the extra capacity means I can now get rid of the useless non-waterproof waterproof frame bag that I hate. I have 100% confidence that the dry bag style design of the Tuffbag is completely waterproof and in fact in its one outing so far, it survived torrential rain without letting in so much as a drop. This was an excellent purchase.

Aikove 30000mAh Power Bank

Purists would argue that electronic gadgets are not essential. And they'd be right. But many of them are really, really useful, convenient or enjoyable to have with you on a long trip. I have various that use rechargeable batteries.

• Smartphone
• GPS sports watch
• Kindle
• Front bike light
• Rear bike light
• Laptop (actually a Chromebook)

Of the devices on this list, all can be charged over USB except for the Chromebook. The battery in the Kindle lasts for weeks usually but the bike lights last for about 6 hours during normal continuous use and the GPS watch needs charging pretty much every day. 

Given an expectation that on long, multi-day trips I might have access to electricity no more than say once a week, I bought myself an Aikove 30000mAh power bank which also has solar panels which allow it to be recharged (very slowly) using sunlight. I've used it about 4 times now and all I can say is that it works. I'm not sure how many times I  can recharge my phone from it yet but estimate that at least 5 full recharges are probably possible, which is really good.

Anyway, the Aikove power bank makes the Good List.

Entertainment and Information

Rest and relaxation is an essential ingredient in bikepacking! After a hard day of cycling or six days in a row without rest, lying down and chilling out with some music, a good book or a movie is something I can't do without. Yes, this means more things to carry and more weight but on balance I feel my choices have been worth it. 

Information too is also an essential ingredient. Planning, research and yet more planning are daily activities.

So what do I carry?

1. Acer Chromebook   

My Chromebook is relatively light and the battery lasts around 8 hours, depending on what I'm doing. Arguably I could use my smartphone for everything and leave the computer at home but some things are still hard to do on a smartphone and a larger screen with real keyboard and mouse are what you need. At least that's my view. I use the Chromebook mostly for web access including my use of Google apps, for researching accommodation and planning routes using Plotaroute and I use it for watching movies that I copy in advance onto an SD card. I hang it from the roof of the tent as well so I can lie back, relax and watch with the screen at exactly the right height. It's awesome.

2. Smartphone

This probably should have been first on the list because it's the go to device for almost everything. I use it for in-ride navigation using the Organic Maps app, research, messaging, listening to music and taking photos and video. Right now I'm using a Oneplus 8 Pro which has an excellent battery life, only needing to be charged once every couple of days.

3. Kindle Paperwhite

My Kindle is loaded up with books of many sorts. Funnily enough, it doesn't seem to get any heavier with more books loaded either!

4. 1MORE Quad Driver In-Ear Earphones

I listen to music when relaxing but never when cycling. It's a great way to unwind or to block out unwanted noise. My phone carries an enormous amount of music and I use a pair of wired 1MORE Quad Driver In-Ear Earphones. I selected these earphones after extensive research and I'm really pleased with my choice. The quality is excellent. But why wired? Isn't wireless better? Well, in some ways it is, yes. But wireless devices need charging and there are only so many devices I can keep charged, so wired was the way I went.

5. Sea to Summit Aeros Premium Pillow

A pillow? Really? Yes! You need as good a night's sleep as you can get and sleeping in a tent is not renowned for providing the best sleep experience! I've tried improvising pillows by filling the bag my sleeping mat goes in with clothes or using one of my panniers but I'm never comfortable so I researched inflatable pillows and settled upon the Sea to Summit Aeros Premium. It's excellent. I've used it once so far but it made an enormous difference to my comfort. And it packs down very small too. Result.

The Just Not Good Enough

Schwalbe G-One Allround RaceGuard Folding Road Tyres

I'm surprised to find myself including these tyres in the not good enough category and yet here they are. I'd researched and read reviews and they seemed to tick all the boxes. Most of all, I wanted a fast rolling MTB tyre that would work well on the road and handle dry trails and which were reasonably puncture resistant. And they certainly generated a lot less friction than the original Specialized MTB tyres that the bike came with.

But consider these facts; I've ridden well over 11,000 miles on my road bike and in all that time and all those miles I've only had about 4 punctures. A pretty good record. And yet I've been on only three bikepacking trips on the tourer which is equipped with these tyres and I got a puncture on two them, the first in the front tyre and the second in the rear. Not a good record. Maybe I was just unlucky. And we must not forget that the tourer is carrying a lot of weight, weight that bears down on sharp objects with far more force than the lighter road bike will generate. But still. Fair or not, I've lost confidence in these tyres and intend to find something better.

The "Waterproof" frame bag

I've already moaned about this piece of junk. For some reason I persevered with it. But the last trip marked the end of the road as it once again proved itself to be worse than useless in the wet. I need to see my phone at least occasionally for navigation and this thing lets in water and the supposedly transparent sleeve the phone sits in.... stops being transparent. Absolute rubbish.

Spa Cycles Aire Titanium Leather Saddle

A comfy saddle is so important! Once again, I'd researched. Read reviews. Weighed up the pros and cons and.... decided a leather saddle was the way to go. A Brooks saddle looked very appealing and they have a great reputation but they seemed so heavy I decided to avoid a sprung saddle and instead went with the Aire Titanium from Spa Cycles. 

I've sat on the thing over a good few hundreds of miles now. I've lovingly massaged leather care products into it. And it's broken in. I remember the ride where I definitely noticed that it had changed shape, fitting perfectly to my posterior. But you know what? It's still not exactly comfortable. It's OK, by no means bad. But I was expecting to be impressed and to be telling all my friends how amazingly comfortable the saddle was on long rides. But.... it's been a bit of a damp squib. Ah well. 

Ch ch ch ch ... Changes!

So, there are winners and there are losers. What changes, if any am I making?

New Tyres and Armour Inserts

I've ordered new tyres. I went with Continental Ride Tour tyres which I'm hoping will fare better than the Schwalbe tyres. And to make my tyres as resistant to punctures as possible, I'm also going to try Tannus Armour inserts. These are a radical step for me but I've read good things about them. I've also read they're difficult to fit. I'll let you know how I get on with them.

I almost decided to try the Tannus Airless tyres which are most definitely puncture proof. But regardless of what Tannus claim, I still had concerns about grip and.... they're not exactly cheap. Maybe I'l revisit this decision one day but for now I'm pinning my hope on the Continentals and the Tannus Armour.

Smartphone handlebar mounted drybag

My frame bag sucks and the surprisingly comfortable Tuffbag bum bag has given me more carrying capacity. So the frame bag is being ditched and for my phone to be visible and usable for navigation, I've bought a handlebar mounted drybag style holder. I've not tested it out yet but will report back when I've had it out in the rain.