Risk of injury with hardcases ?
 

I have seen a lot of hard-versus-soft-case discussions but haven't encountered any that deals with the risk of injury from the hardcases.

I have read a few stories where people got injured because the foot jammed behind a rock or was stuck in a rut then the case guillotined the foot/lower leg.

The case, on the other hand, could save your foot, in a slow crash, as it keeps the bike off your foot/leg when the bike is hitting the ground.

Is this a real risk or were these cases just freak accidents?

Hi!


I had never problems with the aluboxes. On one crash the boxes and the zylinder saved my foot... sliding under the machine ( around 10m...) on hard surface, stand up after that and everything was allright ( appart from scratches..).
Might be a lucky one :D

Yes, i heard the horrible story's too. But i never met someone who had an accident in which the box broke the leg.........

If i could i would prefer to travel with soft lugagge..less weight!
But i can't ..i'am still carrying fare to much stuff:innocent:


Werner

didnt ted simon break his ankle (the second time around) cause his foot got trapped?

just make sure you wear decent boots, but i think its pretty rare that something like this may happen (touch wood).

I had alu boxes on for a trip this summer that included more than 6,000 miles away from sealed roads, on loose tracks of dubious passability and quite a bit totally overland (or overswamps really!). Sibirsky Extreme

Invariably there were tumbles. Many, many tumbles. Fortunately all at slow speeds.

The boxes, being rigid, sometimes kept my bike sufficiently raised from the ground that my leg/foot was not damaged and I could pull it straight out (or once in very soft sand, I dug it out with my hands). However on a couple of occasions my foot/ankle was pinned to the ground by the box and I was immobilised, completely unable to drag it out and had to wait for assistance.

Despite wearing strong riding boots and double thickness waterproof socks I had a badly bruised and twisted ankle once - and on another occasion a damaged big toe, where the blackened nail eventually fell off.

Further pain often followed while the bike was being lifted to release me. The bike's weight was transmitted to the lower edge of the box as it cut down onto my ankle/foot.

On each occasion, on coming to rest, my first thought was to instantly assess my position in the realisation a box could so easily have broken a leg.

I think at higher speeds it would have been an unfortunate inevitability that would have destroyed my trip (possibly my life) and really inconvenienced my companions.

The only advantages of boxes are security and capacity - both unnecessary in the tundra and taiga. Small capacity had the advantage of enforcing less weight. Boxes are OK for road trips to the south of France - where security is paramount!

I now favour the idea of soft luggage for serious off road trips.

I've had good and bad with boxes. Good was when I was sideswiped by a car and the box took the impact. (Driver then wanted to know what I was going to do about the scratches on her car. When she drove off I saw a "drive carefully - baby on board" sticker in the back window :eek3:)

Bad was falling off in sand in Mauritania and having one of the box trap my leg. Fortunately my boxes are diy and, anticipating this problem, the edges are only semi hard. Even with mx boots it hurt and would have been a lot worse if the boxes were sharp edged ally.

For me, it`s soft luggage if I`m off road. Hard luggage if I`m sticking to the tarmac.
I`ve not been trapped under my hard luggage, but have been run over by it a few times when taking a life saver "dab"

Soft - Off
Hard -On:Beach:

I think it's important to buy the boxes without sharp corners .
Only Jesse boxes and Vern boxes seem to have this feature .
A sharp corner will snap a bone much more easily than a radiused corner .

Many people seem to think it's a good idea to make racks out of aluminium plate .They can be extremely dangerous in a spill [- think of a bacon slicer ].

But the best [worst ] idea has to be the tank top racks on fifties and sixties Triumphs - makes my eyes water just thinking about the possible damage you could do to yourself if you exited over the handlebars !!:eek3:

i went with hepco & becker alu standards. they are designed to come off if you knock them hard. if you drop the bike they will hold & stop the bike falling on your leg. the vertical corners have a good radius. i'm doing +70% road on my rtw though...

I would be more worried about falling off ....than about what panniers you are useing.

If you intend riding fast off road then fit soft panniers ,if however your just riding off road at a steady pace then it should be OK with alloy panniers.

Yes they can catch a rock and be a problem if you take a big Dab...but remember lot's of riers that don't have any luggage fitted get hurt riding on and off road.

I have done my leg in taking a big dab and catching the foot peg.

Don't worry about it

Dazzer

There is a thread here somewhere where Colebatch rants on soft vs. hard.
Tony was Colebatch's partner on that ride.

Lots of riders have broken legs and ankles due to hard panniers. Check out World Rider and his epic S.America ride report on ADV rider.

Ted Simon WAS wearing good boots. Broke his leg anyway. Cost him a few months stuck in Africa. After this he jettisoned all his TourTech bags, took
100 lbs. off the bike!

Hard bags add needless weight, rattle your stuff to pieces off road on washboard, mounting racks and hardware cracks or falls off. Hard bags are an out moded concept. Hard bags are not secure, this is an illusion. Most end up over packing.

I think there are pro's and con's to both set-up's and it should be up to the individual to decide on what the best set-up for them would be. We express our opinions here, and the readers should decide what to choose. There is no right or wrong, like what bike to take etc.:scooter:

So what is your opinion? After all, that is what the OP has asked for.
I suggest a re-read of the OP's 1st post:
How can one decide without pro/con input? He is asking for specific incidents of injury and opinions. But seems to me the OP has pretty much answered his own question.
I summarized my opinion of hard bags in my final sentence:

I believe many riders ask opinions to hear what other riders have to say. I'm following four or five ride reports on ADV at the moment. ALL are using hard bags ... and only ONE of these riders has any riding experience beyond a year. The fact is, new riders seem to use the copy cat method of travel and bike prep.

Very few have put in the hard miles on a variety of bikes using various luggage systems to really have an informed opinion. I always consider the source.

When I see guys like Colebatch (read his BAM road report on ADV) and TonyP, Austin Vince, Chris Scot and Ted Simon going with soft bags, that pretty much says it all. If one never goes off pavement then, by all means, hard bags are fine.

The other thing that sways me is a pic Ted magnum posted on another pannier thread. Since I've "been there, done that" I can admit I would not want to repeat riding in that sand carrying all that extra weight. Crashing sucks.

http://www.touringted.com/_gallery_/...serialNumber=2

"After this, I swapped to Cortech Softbags for the rest of the jouney and it was BLISS !!! Lightweight, easy to pack, totally waterproof, easy to load/unload and worked as a great buffer when the bike toppled !"

I've traveled approx 150kkm with boxes and crashed a lot of times and I've never got hurt.
In fact I've never met anyone personally who has been hurt, just heard/read the stories.

Most people I've met who are on long trips seem to prefer hard-boxes.

And I'm over 100k km on my current hard cases (front, rear and topbox) with no negatives yet, weight aside. I can work up a good rant as well as anyone, on almost any subject, but the objective facts seem to involve a small proportion of actual injury to actual riders due to hard cases....with a small proportion of presumed injuries avoided by actual riders due to hard cases. Put me in the later group.

Besides, where are you going to put all your stickers, fifty or sixty countries from now?

But that's just me. Mileage varies.

Mark

I have to second that point of view.

I have Vern's panniers.

Never got hurt by them: not saying it would never happen, but personally I value panniers keeping a heavy bike off my leg, keeping my luggage intact, keeping my luggage in my possession, more than the (I would say) realtively low risk of the bike catching my leg...

Like Mickey says.. Most people start off with hard boxes as it is copycat ! I did it... Expensive lesson. All the magazines, books, catalogues and loads of people on the hubb seems to tell you to buy them.

But what I found is all the people who told me "YOU MUST HAVE HARD ALU BOXES" had never travelled offroad or even out of western Europe. Of course, thats not true of everyone but you get my point.

It's very hard to guage good advice on the Hubb. It is all very well meant but very difficult to judge opinions. I think (and again just my opinion) that you can only listen to people who have actually been there, done that and got the broken expensive boxes (I mean Tshirt).

I used to recommend my Metal mules to anyone that would listen. That was before I actually really knew what it was like to drag them through sand or gravel roads or to try and bend them back to shape so they would close again. (IMPOSSIBLE)

A great deal of people who have travelled with big heavy metal boxes swear that the first thing they will do when they get the chance, is swap to a lighter, softer luggage system.

I think the biggest consideration is the road conditions. If you're riding tarmac or very easy trails then ANYTHING will work and it's not really a problem.

If you are really considering daring or challenging offroad where there is a high chance of multiple drops and tumbles, then IMO you'd be mad to have anything but the lightest, most flexible and easiest to repair luggage. And that means softbags.

I dont think people really realise just how big, wide, heavy and cumbersome these aluminium boxes are until they fit them, load them and then go for a test ride.. "HOLEY F**K" is the usual response !! :innocent:

Back to the point.... They are big heavy sharp metal things and they can and do fall on you in tumbles. I was trapped under my bike on the Ruta 40 by mine and I do believe that the only thing that saved a break was my massive Alpinestars Tech 10 boots.

Whatever you do.. BUY BIG PROTECTIVE MX BOOTS if you're offroading at all.

For some reason. that might have to do with documentation, it looks like someone is trying to remove the focus from the original topic and instead declare that boxes are for the people who never travel far or "real" offroad.
If you check the background of people posting here I would say it proves the opposite. You can also take a look on the HU-calendar.

What about the owner of this bike:
http://www.actiontouring.com/pic/hpm.jpg


He traveled with the G/S for 400.000 km and he went places nowhere else has gone (like Darien Gap). And the funny thing is that he still uses boxes. Conservative? No I don't think so he has used FI-bikes for almost 10 years and now I think he drives a HP2 (with boxes).

Yes, I'm pro boxes but will probably buy something soft for shorter rides.

HI Ted

I would have to disagree. As a source for information in English on bike travel there's no site better, IMHO. On every forum there are the travel-newbies, bullsh*tters and Touratwat types who think bling is alli king. It's not hard at all to suss out if they have been around and about in the world and what luggage they used.

IMHO Alli boxes are more dangerous for your legs/ankles. Despite this, if you go to a German bike travellers meet (our teutonic friends have been going RTW while we were in nappies and there's a lot more of them) like the Tesch Treffen or Gieboldehausen, most bikes, especially the travel scarred ones, have (scarred) alli boxes. Lots of Germans like it hard.

FWIW, for proper off-road I ride a 400cc single with soft and light luggage, for touring I've got an A/T with alli boxes. If I only had 1 travel bike, it'd be a 600 or 650cc single with soft bags.

Soft luggage technology has moved on a lot. It's now very sturdy and waterproof. In the past It may not have been.

I agree 100%. Also for onroad/easy gravel. Also for commuting. A couple of years ago a car tosser shunted me from the side. My Transalp became an accessory on his front bumper. The left footpeg and rack were attached to his car. My MX boot saved my left ankle from much worse damage.


Hang loose
Chris

I meant that it's hard to know what to do.. So many contrasting opinions ! For a newbie, its a mine field....

An experienced traveller/rider like yourself can smell the "doo doo" :rolleyes2:. When i started out, I was sucked into people telling me this and that and it was mostly just a waste of money and "bling".

I guess It always goes back to "whatever works for you" ! I suppose all one can do is learn through personal experience.


I actually have the same "fleet as you". DRZ400S for trail/offroad trips and an Africa twin with hard givi luggage !!

And yeah.. If I could have ONE bike it would probably be a DR650 or TTR600RE with soft bags :thumbup1:

I won't repeat my experiance and changed view. They are earlier in this thread, and elsewhere.

Another thought for a newbie - why not try the cheaper sytem first (£100 or so). Then, if not happy with them, write a cheque for 10 to 15 times as much.
Far cheaper than learning the other way round, which most (including me) seem intent on doing.

I never meant his thread to be for or against any type of luggage, as this type of discussion leads nowhere.
I wanted experience good or bad with both types and arguments for and against, so I can make my own decision according to my own needs and I think I am getting that ( with a few detours :cool4:)

I started this thread after reading a travel report where a guy caught his foot on a roadside rock and the hardcase broke his ankle.

One of my highest priorities, as I travel mostly alone, is selfsustainability, which to me means a light machine and light and easily removable luggage.

A horror scenario for me, would be to lie under a heavily loaded BMW in the middle of Mongolia , having to wait for someone to free me:frown: (sounds familiar?)

I am also contemplating ways of rounding/protecting edges of the case and maybe have release mechanism á la a ski release, maybe adjustable.

I think it's important to keep things in perspective .

[From their Blogs or diaries ]

Tedmagnum smashed his panniers to pieces riding fast on a gravel road that suddenly turned to sand .Using road biased tyres .

Ted Simon broke his leg against a pannier ,in a fall whilst riding a muddy road also on road biased tyres .

You could therefore conclude that the tyres were also to blame.
Or perhaps people called Ted are predisposed to aluminium pannier accidents .

Hard panniers aren't the only part of a bike that can cause injury ,motorcycling is a risky business at the best of times .
I've had my leg trapped under a bike that had no panniers ,big deal !

There are cheap strong aluminum panniers that cost about the same as a set of premium quality soft bags ,so you don't have to spend a fortune on either kind .

Tedmagnum summed it up very well , wear strong boots !:mchappy:

That was just one of the occassions. I crashed using Karoo's too ! :rofl:

Although, my rediculously overloaded, unbalanced bike didnt help with the handling.

I'm not saying that the boxes made me crash, although I do think the weight of the boxes certainly contribute to handling problems. The handling of my bike improved dramatically after ditching the weight (ie the boxes)

To get back to to the point of the thread. Yes, I was stuck under my bike by my box which was only protected by my massive boots. I had to wiggle my way free with difficulty. If it wasnt for my Tech 10 boots, my ankle and shin were sure to be badly injured. I don't think I could of wiggled free with a broken ankle.

Just to stir the pot, I know a Canadian guy who got wedged between a truck and a cliff my his metal boxes. Whilse overtaking, the truck moved in a little and he got stuck between them.

He said he would of made it if his bike was 1" slimmer lol. Also, his ankles were crushed as the box's folded in on him like a mousetrap.

He was wearing walking boots and enjoyed 2 months in a Colombian hospital as a result. He now wears big MX boots and has a slimmer, box free bike ! :D

He wasn't called Ted by any chance ?

It's all very well to say such things 'hard panniers broke my leg', however, when you consider the machinery they are covering (that spinning cheese-grater and amputation chain) then, being hurt by a box is going to be a better outcome than getting your leg/arm/head (I don't know have you seen how some folk crash!) stuck in the moving parts - isn't it ?

It's a balance of risk, correctly loaded, a metal pannier is not going to burst open in most cases, but the flipside is it has to be packed very firmly and therefore it can become heavy. On the other side soft luggage can be a complete liability if it is not packed correctly. It is, or can be lighter if you are riding certain terrain.

It all comes down to your own ability, assesment of the risks and where you are going.

Personally, I would preffer to come off a bike 10 time a day and be able to crawl from under it, that get pinned once. You can always rest if you wave the choice.

Then again you could argue that with soft luggage you are predisposed to have less accidents and therfore less likely to hurt yourself.

The point I'm tring to make it there are many factors that would cause you to choose your luggage - not least you ability to ride the bike and the level of safety equipment you wear.

I can't understand why this is such an emotive issue, in the end, just like your choice of bike, luggage is a choice of what best suits an individual

This thread reads to me like 'I take soft becasue it allows me to controll my weight', where 'hard luggage is more spacious and as we all know we expand to fill all available space' So it's not a case of hard v's soft, it's a case of heavy v's light..... :scooter:

I used Alu panniers RTW last year and they were great until I crashed in Mongolia and ripped a lock out, meaning I had to strap the box back on with a ratchet strap, thereby losing the convenience and relative security. But I'd rather have that than a bag ripped open and all my stuff strewn about the place. I'd like to think they protected other parts of the bike from damage on several occasions when I dropped it, but that's also just speculation.

They were very convenient for packing, swallowed a lot of stuff, and gave me somewhere to put all my stickers including my world map with my route marked on it, which was a great conversation starter. It made me less nervous about having stuff pinched, too.

They also were very useful as a table, a chair, and a bike stand. And not much more expensive than quality, waterproof, secure, robust soft bags.

On the other hand....

Security wasn't as much of a problem as I'd feared, and I was either near the bike or took everything off anyway.

I'm not sure what I would leave out, but having that space available probably meant I took too much stuff. I suspect I wouldn't have crashed anyway if the front hadn't been so light, and I certainly wouldn't have had so much drama on the trans-siberian with a broken frame and snapped pannier rails if I hadn't been carrying all that weight.

But...

I still can't decide what I'll use on the next trip.

I'm thinking about something halfway - maybe smaller, lighter boxes, perhaps even plastic ones. And less stuff (still struggle with that - all the stuff I never used on the last trip, I still tell myself that if I don't take it I'll need it, same goes for the stuff I ditched at the side of the road in Siberia...)

Perhaps a small lockable topbox for security/convenience/stickers, though I'd be equally concerned about weight up high and out back like that.

And definitely always wear proper boots!

Makes me cringe when I see someone riding in flip-flops or walking boots.

Sounds to me like more judgement would have helped him rather than fewer inches!!

Don't mess with 40 tons of steel!

OK, then.
Based on that I shall refine my previous response:

I have ridden Europe but also South America, on and off-road. Off-road may have been easy for an experienced off-roader but for me, a novice, 2-up on a BM 1150 GS, it was not.

We fell off, never fast, and the panniers never damaged neither myself nor my girlfriend (and I would say she was at greater risk).

The only injury I suffered was a rider's footpeg in the calf muscle (No puncture wound, just heavy bruising). I had touring boots on. MX boots would have protected me, hence a pair of Alpinestarts Tech 3s are now in the wardrobe. They have since protected me when a nice fiesta drive slammed my GS (RIP) and I into a crash barrier...

It easy to say that "my hard luggage hurt me" because one is there when it happens: very little room for misintrepretation.

What is harder to say, but equally valid is, "would harder luggage have protected me?" I am sure there are plenty of riders who have had a limb bruised, cut or worse by a bike landing on them.

I am sure that in some cases the added clearance of hard luggage would have avoided that. Saying which cases is a lot harder, and so the bias will be against hard luggage either way.

Best protection with soft or hard, as already mooted is wear beefy boots.

I can't speak from any experience of having ridden on off-road conditions with hard luggage and crashing a lot, but my thoughts are thus:

I think there is a a clear logical argument that hard boxes (even with rounded/sloped edges) are going to increase the chances of injury when crashing. But my guess at how much extra risk this amounts to would not be enough to disuade me from riding with hard boxes if that's what I wanted to do.

Example: No-one posting in this thread has ever seriously hurt themselves from crashing because of their hard panniers. Doesn't mean that it wont happen, but I think it's fair to say it's not that common or likely.

There's lots of arguments for or against hard luggage but I think the increased risk of injury in the event of crashing is a minor one against them.


Last thought, since people have mentioned boots. I thoroughly agree that wearing big mx style boots will reduce the chances of hurting yourself when crashing. But I still choose to wear military style boots for all types of riding, even when trailriding in rocky derbyshire. I wouldn't choose to ride with hard luggage again, but I wouldn't let any safety concerns disuade from it if I wanted to, because I think the risk is insignificant. Riding motorcycles is a dangerous activity, if you want to be 100% safe then don't do it. It's all about assessing risks and balancing them against other factors.

ffs...if your worried about hurting yourself....Dont ride bike's

there are 1000's of things that can hurt you when riding your bike...your luggage is way down the list.:rolleyes2:

And I met a New Yorker and a Frenchman at the Ecuador border, one of whom (I've forgotten which) got trapped precisely that way between a truck and a concrete guardrail in S.A. Guess what took the impact and scraping?

You know the quote about the plural of "anecdote" not being "data?" For every personal experience stated here, someone else can match an opposing experience. For every thirdhand anecdote, a matched contradictory anecdote. That doesn't make one or the other the "correct" answer; it just means there are a lot of data points to consider.

Someone nameless with whom I rode for a while in S.A. has written about the various advantages of riding fast across the tops of corrugations on ripio roads. However, he crashed a time or two when he hit gravel berms or sand unexpectedly. His conclusion was that the roads are terrible and difficult; I ride slowly on corrugations and conclude that I'm not very adventurous or skillful...but I don't fall, and I don't get my leg crushed by panniers either. So far. And my bike is way overloaded, with over 60kg of baggage in addition to my no-longer-exactly-sleek self.

I'll be sure and post if and when my personal set of anecdotal evidence changes drastically, possibly from a hospital somewhere while they assemble and pin my tibia and fibula.

Safe journeys and wise choices!

Mark

(time to leave Puerto Natales, I think, and confront the winds, cold, damp and ripio once again)

Nevertheless, luggage is a major purchase. It's worth a bit of thought about the pros and cons before splashing out.

Excellent comments, very well balanced!

Ah, stickers! Now we're getting somewhere! :innocent:

I have several sets of soft bags, most bought for $50 to $100US for the pair. Craig's List/Ebay good for this. Even older Givi plastic bags are quite expensive, usually over $200, for older 2nd hand pair, now add cost of the racks. The Alu panniers I've seen range from about $450 up to $1400 usd or so. Probably cheaper used. BMW and KTM factory ones are lighter but pretty expensive and dent pretty easy.

I struggle with over packing and hard bags means I for sure will end up with more junk than I need. Soft bags limit what you can carry, forces you to be more efficient/creative. Quite a challenge really.

The benefits of the bike riding SO MUCH better in sand & tough off road conditions is priceless, IMHO. Having dealt with serious injuries in remote places, I remain a fan of letting the bike be the best it can be off road. This at least gives the rider a fair chance making it through with fewer, less serious injuries. Also, with soft bags you have less chance of cracking a mounting rack on your hard bags, this, one of the most common mishaps. Riding thousands of miles of washboard has yet to bring any damage to my bikes frame, sub frame or soft bag racks.

I have left a lot of stuff behind in hotels or given to local friends, shop mechanics. Makes it better for the next rider coming along. Really hard to trim down the load. As time goes by on the road, gets easier.

I think most travelers don't weigh up all their stuff and rarely weigh their luggage alone, empty. Pretty amazing what a set of Ally panniers weigh, now add on the steel racks, steel (or Ally) brace pieces, nuts and bolts.

It's likely to add up to MORE than clothing & gear combined. Certainly a strong case for soft bags. Going from hard to soft I lost about 20 kgs. and best of all you could really feel this difference riding the bike in dirt.

Perhaps the big twins handle the big loads better? Seems extra weight does not have such a negative effect on handling on a 600 lbs.(272 kgs.) bike? On a lightweight single it really does have a bad effect, in my experience.

Well.... for me it's because it takes me back to when I was looking into luggage for overlanding. I was told over and over to get Metal Mules or equivalent as they were surely "The only way" etc etc etc and I would be a fool to take anything less. Maybe I just got unlucky with replies or timing.. Who knows !!

Well, I spent the best part of £900 on my Aluminium luggage. That was
15 % of my budget. :thumbdown:

I only rant on so much about it because there are a lot of new riders who will potentially blow a large chunk of their travel funds on something that is maybe inappropiate and also and more importantly, adding to the danger and weight to a probable "novice" offroad rider. It doesnt matter how much of a fantastic road rider you are (I've done motard racing and spent 10 years on silly sports bikes), it's a COMPLETELY different bag of tricks.

I just hope most are more savy than I was when it comes to spending money on luggage and prep.

Fine. You were told the same story over and over again, and time has told that it was not right for you. But the way you say it implies that hard luggage is simply not the way to go, full stop. And that just is not arbitrarily the case....

Again, you can feel entitled to rant given you spent money you later found that did not provide you with what you needed.

However, again, it is a stretch to say buying hard luggage is adding to danger, even if it does add to weight. You had a bad experience, so did someone else you spoke to. That only proves that in your "off" you got caught by a pannier. Not that panniers are an inherent danger....

As I suggested earlier, it is just as feasible that someone could crash without panniers, get injured by part of their bike, which would not have touched them had they had hard luggage... Like me.... I reckon I'd have a footpeg shaped scar on my left calf muscle were it not for hard luggage...

Additionally, as pointed out earlier, there are plenty of people with lots of experience of off-roading, fully loaded, that have had no such issues such as you described.

The only savvy one can wish on others is that, once they have the information they can choose the best kit for them hard or soft, rather than what peer pressure demands....

OK, but it's important to remember that "more dangerous" does not equal "dangerous", the same way "taller" does not mean "tall"....and it felt to me that this was where the general message was headed.

After all it's all relative: Had my old GS had soft luggage, it still would have been heavier than a DR650 with hard cases.

These are real risks.

I started a RTW trip in Jan. Came off my bike on day 3 in Spain :(

Front wheel slipped on a roundabout I was doing around 10mph and stuck my leg out (natural reaction) and the RHS case broke my ankle.

Result 1 week in hospital, 5 in cast and and end of trip.


Then again on day 1 of the trip I came off in the snow in Kent (it was the 8th Jan, the height of that snowy weather we had!). LHS pannier protected me from the bike (1150) as the engine bars and case meant that the bike didn't touch me.

So you win some you lose some. Just losing usually hurts more.

My leg was trapped under my metal boxes on a low speed drop. My heavily armoured motocross boot saved me from any injury..

I think decent MX boots will save you from your bike much more than an aluminium box which "could" actually hurt you.

I think the risk of injury is quite far down the list of why not to use hard luggage. The subject has been done to death, brought back to life and then done to death again more times than anyone can even count on this website.

I think Grant could do with a long, detailed, nuetral ,well researched article on the subject sorted out !! Not a "this is better than that" but just a page with all the info so people can make their own decisions.

Ted, I think its really pretty simple. No need for a "study".

The fact is, its really about :
1. Image. Hard bags look the part. Feck the extra 50 kgs.! :smartass:
2. Insecurity. Most don't trust 3 world situations and like to keep everything locked up tight, most would never trust a local to keep an eye out.
3. Stickers! It's all about Stickers! :D
This joins with #1 ... Image. Got to have a place for Stickers for Dog's sake!! :mchappy:

+1 :clap::thumbup1:

John

Heh heh.. Ain't that the truth !!

I think this is one of those freak kinds of accidents. Of course they can cause damage but I think it is rare and would not prevent me from using hard panniers. In fact in my experience they have helped from the bike's full weight being on my leg.

But consider the extra weight your carrying and how much affect that has on you falling down in the first place. Heavier bikes are harder to ride off road .... period.

Anybody dispute that statement?:innocent:

When you take 50 kgs. off your bike I think you'll find your previous Pig transform into something that is a delight to ride off road. (within reason of course and depends on which bike your on)

For those on large, tall and heavy bikes you may as well run hard bags and carry as much as you need and then some, because going off road won't be an option for you anyway. :oops2:

Which is better?
http://lh6.ggpht.com/_pXs6Z_85Tj8/S9...13_uX2cw-M.jpg
Ride the World ... and bring the World along with you on your bike! :rolleyes2:

http://lh4.ggpht.com/_pXs6Z_85Tj8/S9...0/P1000637.JPG
Or this? :thumbup1:

how much weight will you save by going from hard to soft ?

The weight of the panniers and mounting rack, minus the weight of the soft panniers, I would have thought.

The panniers should not affect what you pack, however tempted you might be to fill them! Plenty of souvenirs to stick in the empty spaces once on the road. :D

Ditto!

Lardy GS for the Americas:
http://i98.photobucket.com/albums/l2...a/IMG_2368.jpg

Lighter DR650 for Asia
http://i292.photobucket.com/albums/m...a/IMG_0110.jpg

Neutral is the operative word....

Thing is motorcycling is dangerous, overlanding probably more so. Any crash could be harmful. Soft, hard, no luggage....

If someone can isolate one type of luggage as a significant risk of the other, then good luck to them, but given the myriad of terrains and conditions people expose themselves to, I think it's a tall order.

If it's do-able, then great.

So far, I'm happy with my choice and I don't think less of those using soft luggage, just because I use aluminium.

The use of ridicule as a debating technique worked reasonably well in middle school, less well in high school. I've found it only marginally effective in my adult life, Sarah Palin's success with it notwithstanding.

I'm with Warthog; since it seems unlikely anyone will ever "prove" one side or the other, I'm inclined to respect any and all choices which appear to be based on clarity of perception, not myth. The fact that reasonable people can draw opposing conclusions from the same evidence is refreshing evidence of our shared humanity.

Besides, I happen to enjoy my sticker acreage!

Mark

(from the entirely surreal city of Brasilia)

I use both hard aluminum boxes and soft bags. Both hold aproximately 38 litres, so i carry the exact same amount of gear whether i use hard or soft bags. Is one better than the other? Not really IMHO, you just need to adapt to the short commings of each one, both have pro's and cons. Can boxes be more dangerous to your legs? I supose they could, depending on design, like sharp corners, where they are placed on the bike, rigidity, etc. Then again i'm sure there's lots of documentation of people breaking their ankles and have no bags what so ever. Bones break when you fall, regardless what bags you have, dress acordingly. Weight? I have read in this thread claims of 20kg-50kg for hard luggage which i find quite exagerated, maybe they were plated in gold and filled with ballast? I build my own boxes and racks to the same standard as your typical TT equipment, they have never weight more than 10-12kg. combined, probably less. When you have soft bags, you will most likely use a rack of some sort to keep your stuff off the exhaust, so the weight you have left over is probably equal to the amount of fuel you will burn in a day, or the food and water you will pack if going into the mountains to go camping, or maybe a lap top and camera/video gear, etc...It's all relative and not an issue IMHO. If you really want to save weight: go to the gym, stay in hotels, forget the lap top, use a point and shoot camera, eat out, buy tires on the way, don't bring tools you don't know how to use and leave the spares with a friend to ship out to you.. This will only leave you your clothes and toiletries, a small bag and very light.
One major disadvantage i find with hard bags is the ability to twist the sub-frame of some bikes in the event of a crash. Soft bags will just self destruct and leave your stuff skattered all over the road behind you, preserving your precious motorcycle kind of like an airgag in a car :innocent: . Soft bags are rarely waterproof, easly cut open and are less secure than locked aluminum boxes. Punching a lock makes noise and arouses suspicion, a razor blade is silent.
Aluminum boxes can be way more expensive, but there are cheap options out there if you look hard enough. My Steel Pony's cost me nearly $500 in the end, not cheap for canvas. Both aluminum boxes and soft bags are equally fixible, whether you need a hammer, drill and rivets, or a needle and thread, all of which are available anywhere in the world.
Finally, to the OP, please forgive all the childish bantering going on in this thread, instigated and followed through yet again by the same group of people. This got old along time ago, and i can't tell you how many interesting threads have been ruined by this same group, arguing with each other and taking things WAY :offtopic: . Give it a rest guy's, we're all tired of it. Take it to the Bar or go to Joe Mama.

Mr Ron sums this up pretty well, nice post!


I agree on this one... That's why I have stopped to respond to most of MollyDog/Mickey D's post to keep the spam-level down.

:thumbup1::thumbup1:

Hi
One or 2 posts on this thread have been removed. To those concerned, please feel free to continue your "interaction" via PM/email/phone/snail mail/in person or whatever, but please save us having to read it on this public forum.

Rgds
Chris

Weight is a huge factor whatever luggage system you use. Having a light bike raises the enjoyment factor off the scale and reduces the risk/fear factor equally.

My Metal mules with the rack added a huge amount of weight to my XT even when empty. They made the front wheel really light, the steering twitchy etc.

I rode the Ruta 40 like this and HATED the bike. I was cursing myself for buying such a crap bike with crap suspension etc etc etc ! I didn't want to think that the £1000 I spent on luggage was the reason.

When my Mules eventually gave up on me through some ligher and heavier crashes (all caused by the weight of these boxes Im sure) I switched to soft bags... WHAT A TRANSFORMATION !! I was ripping up the dust and dirt trails of Brazil, Venezuela and Colombia and the bike became a joy to ride again !

Surely we ride bikes because they are fun and enjoyable, otherwise we'd all be plodding along in landrovers. Why turn your bike into everything you're trying to get away from ???

Hard boxes are fine for cruising the highway on big heavy bikes and I think that's where they belong. On my Africa twin I dont really notice the difference between having my plastic Givi boxes or softbags so I always use my GIVI stuff as they are more practical for road trips.

It's been said a million times (just by me), But you will find that many people make the conversion from hard to soft luggage but not many the other way round (from what I can gather on here)

I think thats true, but only of Anglo-Saxon riders ... from UK - US - Australia. In these parts of the world there is a real debate about what luggage is suitable. And I agree that the default setting is people start with hard luggage. Once the first big trip is out of the way, they realise the advantages that soft luggage can bring.

In the Teutonic world there is NO debate. There is no variety of opinion. In Germany, Holland, Austria, Switzerland, Scandinavia, the default mentality is that you tour on a large bike (almost always a 200 kg + BMW boxer, KTM V-Twin or Honda Africa Twin.) The idea of doing a long trip on a lightweight bike (or using soft luggage) has not even occurred to many teutonic riders I have spoken with. I have met hundreds of German overlanders over the years. Not a single one of them had soft luggage, and only one of them was on a bike smaller than the ones listed above ... and he was on an F650GS ... still 180kgs.

In the Anglo Saxon world there are far more people doing long trips on much lighter bikes around 150 - 160 kgs. XT600s, DR650s, XR650s etc ... For the anglo saxon world, a BMW F650 Dakar is a mid size touring bike, for the Germanic world its the lower limit of sanity. Guys like Austin Vince swear by his 115kg DR350s, that have been round the world twice, having done pioneering routes each time. Mac Swinarski's pioneering trip to Chukotka this year was done on 110kg KTM 400s, obviously with soft luggage.

This is why you get two differing viewpoints on what gear you should take. It because there are two different mentalities. I am not saying one mentality is better than the other, but for certain, one mentality is better suited to certain objectives than others. It depends on what is your objective and what you want to get out of your ride.

We Anglo Saxons are however still swayed by the marketing material from overlanding gear suppliers, many if not most of who are German. Since they had a 10 year headstart on 'us' for motorcycle overlanding most of the big aftermarket parts suppliers are German. So what the Germans deemed appropriate aftermarket parts has become the default for the whole world. Its only in recent years that Anglo Saxon companies like Steel Pony, Andy Strapz, Wolfman etc have really emerged, and begun making quality products that dont conform to the Germanic stereotypes.

I agree that there is not much debate.
Mostly because we don't really care. If someone wants to use hard or soft, Suzuki or BMW it's up to them. We don't need other people to validate our choices.

Personally I had my first soft-bags catching fire in 1986 when driving a light bike so I guess the equipment has been around for a while.
I can't see that I recognize your opinion about scandic countries.

I am just trying to point out why there are two opinions on it for those who dont understand the origins of this split in philosophy. It may help other people reading this debate why you as a Norwegian are inherently inclined to belong to the "Hard boxes can do everything" school of thought and why you seem to believe that there is no need to consider anything but hard boxes.

I didnt say the Teutonic philosophy is worse, but I do think the debate and thought we put into the choice of bags is healthier in the english speaking world BECAUSE there is debate about it. And because people on forums like this say that "sure you can take hard boxes, if you are sticking to graded dirt roads and asphalt, but if you are try to do a more challenging riding program, then soft bags are better" or something to that effect. Rather than just talking about whether Hepco and Becker is better than Tesch or Zega.

I actually suspect the reason is the opposite. Its all done the same way in the Germanic countries - big bikes and hard boxes - precisely because everyone else there does it that way - therefore by not thinking about it and simply going the same direction as everyone else, they ARE using everyone elses opinions as their own, and thus using all the other Germanic bikers to validate their own choices. So in fact they DO need to validate their choices by choosing what everyone else chooses: big bike + metal boxes.

I hope I will one day meet a German touring around the world off road, on a light bike (sub 150 kgs) with soft bags, as it will force me to rethink. But that day has not come.

I will say it again for clarity because you seem to love taking me out of context ... you can take any bike around the world. You can take any luggage around the world ... if you are sticking to roads you will see in a world atlas. If you want to do 3000 km off piste in Mongolia on a 220 kg bike, with 20 kgs of boxes and rack (most aluminium boxes weight between 4 and 6 kgs each - 3 boxes plus heavy steel rack = 20 kgs), and 25 kgs of fuel, then you are probably not going to enjoy it as much as a guy on a bike half the weight, with gear that hea has bothered to think about. If you want to across Russia on the highway, or up and down the Americas on any road that appears in a world atlas, with maximum confort, carrying maximum amout of gear, then take any bike and any luggage. It doesnt really matter. Goldwing, Harley, KTM Adventure, HP2.... whatever.

If you want to be more adventurous, then you DO need to think a lot more about every choice you make. You DO need to think about what size and weight of bike is more suitable. You DO need to think about the reliability of the machine you propose to take. There is no point some guy taking his favourite WR450 around the world if he needs a full engine rebuild every 150 hours is it?

Like every Norwegian, you are probably a die-hard nationalist, so I will will give you a Norwegian example ... Amundsen was successful while Scott was not, because he DID think about the suitability of every detail regarding his trip, while Scott went along with the default settings for polar exploration. If they were going for a race to Tierra del Fuego, all the choices of equipment would not have been critical (but careful thinking can make life easier). If you are going to the South Pole, then you DO need to think about every detail. And you DO need to care.

And for people who are new to this game, then that decision making process WILL involve listening to other peoples opinions.

Yes colebatch it's all about preparations.

If you are prepared you can move your limits and do remarkable stuff. I'm a big fan of preparations and by preparing trips I have done things that I thought was impossible (for me).

There are two things that have made that I have avoided a couple of destinations on my travels and it has been the ability of carrying water and petrol. The bike or luggagesystem itself has never been a limiting factor. The limiting factor has been that I don't feel comfortable with carrying petrol for more then 700 km and 20 liters of water.

But what are preparations? For me this thread has sadly nothing to do with preparations, it's just a mess. Sadly this mess have spread all over this place, which I find sad.
It looks like some people should know all about everything and even if they have almost no experience they go out really hard. A few times I have been asked if the 650 Xchallenge is a good travelers bike and I have simply told them that I don't fancy singles for traveling so I don't know, then I have given them the link to your page. There is no need for me to try to convert him to buy a twin. Why should I?
For the record I also have two singles but I don't use them for traveling.

When you refer to "English-speaking" it looks like you mean people from US or UK. Well, of course it's easier to argue in your own language but if you look at the users here they are from all over the world but it's not much Germans here. I have traveled with Germans (even a group with DR350s in Algeria) and I think it's completely wrong to compare people from Scandinavia and Germany.

I do think about the choices I take, but I don't give much for discussions like this.
As I said my luggage-system has never been a limiting factor. I have used it north of the polar-circle in the winter-time, I have crossed various deserts (incl Sahara in the summer) and I have been in situations where a major mechanical breakdown would have killed me in few days (thirst). I have been on trips up to a year and 50kkm duration and the system works.
I always work on doing things better and I have a few plans.


Sure, I do it all the time.

In a few weeks time we will do a test 1200GS VS SuperTenere and even if they are not the right bikes for me I look forward to it because they are both (probably) great bikes for thousands of people. What's right for me isn't necessarily right for other people.

Till date I have traveled a lot, and did most of my journeys and holidays with the hard cases. I had never a problem with them, encountered as such no injuries or accidents with them. Thee might be a very low possibility of getting hurt accidentally by them, but that too is very feeble.

I`ve used hard luggage on my KTM 990 Adventure
And soft luggage on my KTM 690 Enduro

If there's any hint of serious off road, soft luggage every time.

http://i924.photobucket.com/albums/a...d/P7190731.jpg