Panniers for Mercury

[Mart75]

Hi All
Planning to take the Mercury I bought last year on a 2 week trip this summer - not quite sure where yet - planning either B&B or light camping.

Any thoughts on Panniers - I've got the Tubus Vega Carrier on the rear. I think I remember either reading or Andy saying when I got the bike that having smaller capacity rear and front panniers was better on the Mercury than just panniers on the rear.

I've had both Ortleibs and Carradice on bikes in the past but need new ones now.

Any thoughts?

[Mike Ayling]

The Mercury has quite short chain stays so you may have heel strike problems with some large panniers.

Mike ( Mercury owner)

[mickeg]

I am a firm believer in the Ortlieb Backrollers and Frontrollers.  I have had a couple of other pairs of panniers that I used very little, always went back to the Ortliebs.

Do you have a good idea on the volume you need?  The backrollers are about 40 liter for the pair, 25 liter in a pair of frontrollers, thus total of 65 liters if they are full.  One nice thing about the rollers is that they work well if less than full because you can roll the top a few more turns.

Carradry rear panniers are larger.  I bought a pair for a trip because of their size but to make a long story short the trip did not work out so I have not used them, but that was not the fault of the Carradry.  They were rated at something like 56 liters but I think they are closer to 48 liters. I also got the front Carradry panniers but I do not like them and would not recommend them.

My Ortliebs are about 10 years old, assuming that they have not changed the hook design very much, you can easily adjust the hooks fore and aft to make sure you get enough clearance to avoid heel strike, but not too much clearance as you move panniers further back the handling often suffers.  The Carradry hooks also had good fore and aft adjustment.

I do not know if your rack is black or gray, if black you can use black fingernail polish when you get home to replace any wear spots on the rack.

CLARIFICATION ADDED NEXT DAY.
Where I said I "did not like them and would not recommend them" I was talking only about the front Carradry panniers, the rear I may use on a future trip.

[PH]

I think the brochure says 16 kg on the back will still handle "Sweet"
I haven't carried that much on mine, neither do I intend to, around 12kg certainly becomes noticeable to me,  it's OK most of the time but out of the saddle becomes borderline unpleasant. 
I'm using Ortlieb front rollers and a Carradice saddlebag.  Both of which pre-date the  Mercury as does the Tubus rack with lower rails.  Heel clearance is tight, but even with my size 11's there's enough with the panniers on the upper rail and obviously more on the lower.  I think the larger rollers, for me, would be too much both in capacity and size. 
My tent is an inner first pitch and packs into two stuffsacks, these are normally inside a pannier but can be attached to the tops (As photo below, not on Merc) this frees up about 2/3 of a pannier if I need it for something else.

Panniers by Paul, on Flickr

Couple of photos of my Mercury loaded in this thread
http://thorncyclesforum.co.uk/index.php?topic=12921.msg96745#msg96745

[mickeg]

The photo PH posted shows some stuff strapped on top of a pannier.  I usually strap my rain gear on top of my front loaders (which I put up front) also using that center strap, that way my rain gear is handy very quickly if I need it suddenly.  The city version of the Ortliebs lacks that center strap.

[John Saxby]

having smaller capacity rear and front panniers was better on the Mercury than just panniers on the rear.

Hi Mart,

On the matter of rear panniers for light camping or B & B's, you might be interested in my recent experience with Arkel Dry-Lites for light camping -- I've just posted an account on "Rides of 2018". 

On this trip, I had a rearward load of: tent (3 lbs); Dry-lites (12 lbs); rear rack (1 lb 4 oz); seat bag (2 lbs), total 18 lbs 4 oz.  The Raven didn't feel unbalanced, but I wouldn't want to add more weight to the rear part of the bike.

For longer tours with more gear, I'd keep the Dry-Lites on the rear, and then use either my 32-ltr Arkel Dolphins on the front, or my Arkel T-28s.

I haven't used my Raven with panniers only on the front, and with (say) my tent on the rear rack.

Cheers,  John

[Mart75]

Thanks for the thoughts - the Arkel's look interesting - though looking at their video you seem to have to velcro them together?

So it looks like panniers the size of the Ortleib Front rollers - 25 - 30l for the rear and keeping this below 16kg - and if more is needed use similar panniers on the front as well, rather than more weight at the back.