Favourite bar system, and dropper seat bag?

[FLV]

Two questions in one

What's your favourite bar system?
I've used a few now, all have their plusses and minuses.

Wildcat, stable light, great for smaller bags yet lifts bag about lights, compresses cables, rubs unless you tape everything thoroughly. (Same category for straight cut)

Salsa anything cradle, only fits standard stems (some are too wide) puts the mass out front and can make steering feel a little odd, heavy in itself. Stable, can be angled under lights more or less, doesn't rub stuff.

Acepac integrated harness drybag. Reasonably stable, a bit bouncy on rough stuff, a bit heavy too, simple, rubs the frame.

What do you use?


Onto seatpacks.
I know if you apply inner tube and tape to a dropper you can use most. I also know and have used a longer version of a Valais, printed.
This limits the dropper use to about 30mm. Non preferred.

Now I've also used an apidura dropper rack. It's incredibly waggly and pretty small.

I've got a mini rack I intend to play with, which may work

What else is out there? Anyone have any success with anything?

[ScotRoutes]

I bought a Revelate Sweetroll many moons ago. Loved it. Good fit. Stable. Well made. My only dislike was having repacking it when fitted to the bike or trying to fit it when already loaded. The Harness/Saltyroll system sorted that out

Similarly with my original Viscacha seatpack and my eventual replacement of that with the equivalent Revelate harness system. The latest version looks even better but I don't think I have any real reason to "upgrade"

[Shewie]

I've got a Restrap set which is nice, pretty bomber and plenty of capacity, also got some Wildcat bags to trim a bit of fat and force me to carry less.

I run Confucious bars on my bikepacking mtb so don't get any of the cable squash or rubbing issues with the bar bag mounted on the loop.

Would like to try some Revelate gear one day when it's more easily available over here, also got half an eye on a Tailfin.

[thenorthwind]

Loop bars. I had some Jones loops for a while and didn't get on with the massive sweep, but replaced them with the Alpkit Confucius (flat bars with a small backsweep and a loop) simply because you can strap a bag to them with no harness and it's completely stable. Only downsides are slightly more hassle to re-attach, and you need something to space it off the bar if you still want to hold it.

[Lazarus]

Ike the alpkit kanga for proper MTB riding not light but stable
Apidura for drop bars
Just got some Jones as find having nowhere to put lights a pain in winter so hoping to get stability with no weight penalty.

Seatpack
Blackburn very stable separate dry bag really like but not the lightest
Wildcat small is it the tiger ?
Yet to use with my dropper but seems stable ( 7l capacity though)

[Bearbonesnorm]

Acepac integrated harness drybag. Reasonably stable, a bit bouncy on rough stuff, a bit heavy too, simple, rubs the frame.

The harness is considerably more stable Dave. However, most stable front system I've ever tried is the Alpamayo but sadly short lived and no longer available.

[lune ranger]

Bar system: A Restrap harness mod’ed with a R&K Clickfix quick release attachement. Has the benefit of a Salsa Anything Cradle but comes off my bike in seconds.
I have a Clickfix on each of my bikepacking bikes so it swaps super easily.
I often here people talk about the weight being too far forward with such a system but I have big bikes with long head tubes and high stems so am able to angle the harness down and have the weight closed to the bikes c of g.

Dropper bag: Rockgeist Gondola. Superbly made and very simple solution and because it’s only 5L capacity it hones the mind for TLS.

[In Reverse]

Ended up using a Miss Grape bar bag (think it's this one) after trying a similar list to yours. I just like the way the straps and spacers work and it's as stable as anything I've used. Properly waterproof too. It's fairly heavy so for summer when I'm using less kit I tend not to bother with anything on the bars at all if I'm just doing one or two nights.

Seat pack's one of two Apiduras, one waterproof and one not.

[fatbikephil]

Rev sweetroll for a good few years now (on my second.) Pretty stable but you need to re-tension the straps from time to time. Mounting them on a Jones truss fork helps. Those who are members of that exclusive club will know what I mean On my dropper I've used an old pika and a terrapin which allows the post to go down 2". The limitation is wheel (or mudhugger) to bag clearance. I just use a bit of foam for the strap although I have one of Karls long valais-a-likes which works OK on the Rock Shox post. Dropping the seat 2" is actually just enough to get ones derriere over the seat pack for those hairy drop-ins.

[Chrisps]

I mainly use the Alpkit Kanga and one of their lightweight dry bags with strap loops. Bomber stable and a pretty light combination. Have also tried the Salsa Anything handlebar mount and Specialised handlebar cradle. The Salsa is a bit porky and far forward and the specialised a bit fiddly, but I still occasionally use both (the Salsa is particularly good for a packraft)

Saddlebag I normally use a 17L Specialised Burra Burra with a stabiliser bar. It's massive, but I just roll it down and gives spare food capacity. If done properly, it's extremely stable.

I used to use an Alpkit dropper rail off my saddle and their 13L bag. Could use the full dropper range without the bag touching the dropper at all. But recently realised that a non dropper post and ditching the rail saved about 800g... I'm not a particular weight weenie, but that is a big saving!

Did the Lakeland 200 and a made up route including the West Highland Way over the summer with that setup, and I didn't really miss the dropper once I had got used to it. I think I lowered the saddle for a couple of the really tech descents on the L200 and for Devil's Staircase. Probably went slightly slower on the downs than if I had a dropper, but didn't spoil the enjoyment. I'm riding all my local XC stuff dropper less now too just to practice... Although it does stop me going down the super steep downhill courses on my doorstep, which is irritating

[Charliecres]

I use MYOG harnesses for the bars. One is loosely based on an Alpkit Kanga but with additional straps for cinching the bag. It’s rock solid. The other is simpler and makes use of the double bars of a loop bar. Again, it has an additional cinching strap.

For the dropper post, it’s a +1 for the Rockgeist Gondola. Hard to improve on, I reckon.

[Mart]

I like both my revelate harness and my Salsa cradle
Both work extremely well

I’ve not noticed any ‘out front’ weight with the cradle.
Not sure if that’s because I angle mine downwards
Although saying that, I don’t put heavy things up front either

[slarge]

I have a Wildcat harness for the front, which I really like once it's fitted, but it has worn the paint on my fork crown. I then got a Salsa anything cradle but it is too heavy and too far forward. What I want to do is shorten the Salsa brackets to reduce the standoff by around 20mm, and have a less robust cradle to support the bag - a bigger Dr Jon cradle thing would be ideal, or I probably need to either talk to a 3d printer person or make something out of a plastic drum......

[Bearbonesnorm]

Didn't someone make something from a length of plastic soil pipe a while ago?

[fatbikephil]

I've tried a few things to keep the bar roll off the head tube as I use short stems. On the fat bike I used one of those cheapo carbon fiber accessory tube / bracket things to hang the roll off the handlebars below the light level. I had a short bit of plastic waste pipe between the carbon tube and the headset spacer stack, zip tied in place to support the bracket. For the bottom mount I used a bit of welded up tube in a t shape bolted to the fork crown. On the straggler which has a high rise stem I've used an orleib light bracket (a bit of plastic rod) bolted to an extra thick headset spacer with a thread tapped into it. My latest plan is to get a thorn accessory bracket from SJS cycles which will go in place of a headset spacer and keep the bar roll nicely secure between it and the bars for both the strag and the ICT.

If you have low bars and a short head tube then some kind of T shaped mount off the fork crown is the way forward (so to speak) if you have a rigid fork. With a suss fork this won't work. I'd be tempted to tap threaded holes into the fork crown to mount a bracket of some kind but it might make the warranty a bit suspect..... Or use 8mm zip ties to attach some kind of bracket / mount to the crown?? Will have to clear the lower leg brace at full compression obviously.

[faustus]

Currently using Dr Jon's G-funk clamps and large or 'triple' strap deck. I've found it really good, and really stable. It can be angled down and made to play nicely with cables if they're the right length, and no rubbing of headtube, which I really hate. I tend to use a fairly small bag at the front though, and the main improvement to avoid wobble, is I use voile straps (with strapkeepers) to hold the bag, and a single XL voile strap round the bag and handlebar. The straps are a bit less faff and tidier than buckles and nylon straps...

[FLV]

Thanks all.

I used a Salsa Cradle for a couple of days out this week. Its quite good, so long as it not too heavily loaded.

I've ended up plumping for a sweetroll, which does look a little big generally, but I can put bulky / warm stuff in there