Author Topic: Dahon front luggage solutions  (Read 2995 times)

tyreon

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Dahon front luggage solutions
« on: September 05, 2022, 08:53:20 am »
Conundrums. Conudrums!

I am wanting a light basket to carry clothing and such,and am looking to attach it to my front Dahon truss and folding bike. What do you think carrier would be lighter: that of metal or one made of wicker? At the moment I have the Dahon truss to which must be attached a metalled front carrier to then add a largish bag...and which then must be attached and secured by straps. It all seems a bit of a palaver. By putting,say,a wicker basket directly on the truss with the help of  Klikfix back plate fitting I can stuff my clothes in a light waterproof bag in the basket. This method brings the weight and recepticle closer to the bike and lloos as if would cut weight. It also appears to be less of a faff?

I hope I have described my conundrum.

I could of course go for the Brompton carrying system,but this would involve (maybe)some adaption to the initial truss adaption system,the purchase of the Brompton skeletal carrying frame and one of their bags(might as well go for their largest?) Cost £200?

I dont think I want too much faff theseadays,and to spend too much: my days of moving-on touring are coming to an end because of age and growing fatigue. I think I might have 1.5 overseas trips left in me. And that might be my finish line!

Thoughts,comments appreciated

Matt2matt2002

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Re: Dahon front luggage solutions
« Reply #1 on: September 05, 2022, 03:19:07 pm »
I can't help with your luggage problem but hope you manage to continue touring.
I always fly in and out. Stressful with a bike but satisfying when it all comes together.

At 70 I hope my own touring abroad continues for a few more years.

Best

Matt
Never drink and drive. You may hit a bump  and spill your drink

Andre Jute

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Re: Dahon front luggage solutions
« Reply #2 on: September 05, 2022, 06:15:19 pm »
I use pannier baskets on a full-size bike, open topped with just a hessian shopping bag in them to shield my stuff from envious eyes, but it must be said I live in a relatively crime-free area. The baskets I use are made by Basil, a Dutch firm which I've always found to make the best baskets and at a very reasonable price. The particular Basil basket I use is the Cardiff, which over the years has been fitted every I bought a new bike. My experience is that the Basil metal baskets are light enough (balancing durability and barrier capability in an incident with a badly driven Range Rover against weight), and the wicker baskets are heavier (I don't have a wicker basket but ladies among the pedal pals do). I mention Basil because they offer Klickfix on their more expensive gear. I've had Klickfix or Chinese copies on other gear like handlebar bags and found it perfectly satisfactory, though I rarely take e.g. the phone bag off the bike, just taking the phone out when I leave the bike.

If you buy a basket which fixes by a U-shaped rod on rack rails or handlebars or other bicycle tubes, you can both protect the bike's paint and plating and polish by wrapping a length of velcro, fixing to itself, around the tube where the Basil basket will fit, and stabilise and silence the basket with the velcro. It also makes it bloody difficult for a thief -- and the owner -- to take the Basil basket off, an effect I aggravate by applying a large visegrip gently to the rod. Crude but effective. When I have stuff to carry, I take out the hessian bag and use that.

The Basel Cardiff baskets I use have no bottom fixing because they're intended to be lifted off the bike and carried into the supermarket or the house by Dutch housewives, maximum daily convenience. I tie my semi-permanent installation to the bottom of the rack supports by a repurposed luminous Sam Brown belt with some bits cut of -- it goes around the basket and is seen from both the front and the rear by motorists, giving them an idea of how wide my bike is. When I don't need the visibility I use a military green canvas belt with rings for tightening it against itself; my bike is green.

After 30 plus years with them, need I say that I recommend Basil baskets? The ones on my daily bike, thirteen years old this coming December, are pretty tatty from winning arguments with cars and handy poles for leaning the bike against, so thank you for reminding me to get new ones.

Basil baskets:
https://www.basil.com/en/bicycle-baskets/
Here is the Cardiff I chose and have found such a good multipurpose carrier that I've across several bikes replaced it like for like, and intend to do the same on my daily bike:
https://www.basil.com/en/cardiff-basket-black.html

Don't know whether or how it would work on a folder, but Basil also makes fold-flat baskets, some of them very large, so if you're interested in a basket that doesn't take a lot of space when not being a basket, you should check the weight of the folding baskets. I'm not a weight weenie, and I have a requirement for a hefty load (I think nothing of carrying a painter's solid wood rotary easel, guaranteed not to blow over just as I finish the painting) so I decided, rightly or wrongly, not to take a chance on the hinges of a folding basket being a week point when abused week in and week out by overloads: basically I concluded on no evidence back then that the lighter, fixed Cardiff would be stronger for longer and think I've been proved right.

Trivia: Old cyclists can remember when Basil's Cardiff pannier basket cost Euro 16.99, delivered, and a Bob Jackson custom-built road bike, fully fitted out with aspirational parts, left a lot of change out of a thousand pounds.
« Last Edit: September 05, 2022, 06:40:02 pm by Andre Jute »

PH

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Re: Dahon front luggage solutions
« Reply #3 on: September 06, 2022, 01:17:19 pm »
I could of course go for the Brompton carrying system,but this would involve (maybe)some adaption to the initial truss adaption system,the purchase of the Brompton skeletal carrying frame and one of their bags(might as well go for their largest?) Cost £200?
I don't know anything about half the parts you ask about, and Andre has done a good job of selling the idea of a basket - But if you want to go down the Brompton luggage option, they've been around long enough for there to be plenty of secondhand options, or third party imitations, or information on just about every hack possible.  From eBay, I bought a fairly large old model Brompton bag and a genuine Brompton luggage block and had change from £50.
For though who use Bromptons for proper cycle touring (A group I'm never likely to belong to) fitting an Ortlieb roll top pannier to a front frame bracket seems popular. The hacks vary from re-building the frame to match the pannier to zip tying them together. No shortage on instructions all over the internet.

tyreon

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Re: Dahon front luggage solutions
« Reply #4 on: September 06, 2022, 01:17:32 pm »
Thanks both for the replies. Appreciated.

Soon after I had posted the query I resolved the problem myself. I had a pair of Carradice panniers so took a Klikfix fitting plate and drilled 4 holes into the back of one of my panniers. This then fitted onto the truss thingame-bob that attaches to the bicycle bottom front stem. I think the pannier might be one advertising itself as to carry 24 litres,anyways,plently big enough for me to carry clothing and some food with the addition of my Carradice rear saddlebag(name excapes me. The largest Carradice bag,with attachments for yet more stuff to be carried). There were many calculations in my calculations as to what better fitted,looked right and weighed less in making my decision. If I could post a picture,I would. Cant,not techno educated,alas.

What I jetisoned was the Klikfix or Agu or Dahon front rack which attached to the Klikfix adapter which attached to the bikes front stem(hope you are with me on this. This is where a picture paints a thousand words!) If this all sounds a faff,its because it could become a faff...and I've yet to describle how additional straps would have to hold the luggage to the carrier!! Thus my new set up just looks as like the Bromton luggage system carries itself on their front of bike.

I was at once a tent-camper touring cyclist. Now I am a moving-on cycle tourist but staying in humble pensions or the like. Now its more like staying in a town,hamlet,city for several days whilst cycling afar before loading up to move on to another location to cycle about. Like Matt, I fly in to fly out,but usually cycle on and out to differnt places now using the folder to get areas I wouldnt be able to reach by pedal cycle unless I stayed longer.

I guess I could continue to cycle by regular bicycle,but the faff of going through security and getting to airports with a regular bike is now beyond me. I also wish to stay married! Too much stress or endless physical exertion would not only exhaust me but sends me cranky.

I cant do what I did do. And I'm still trying to accept it. The learning is slow. Time went all too quickly.

Now a suburban cyclist with some cycling forays abroad.

Electrical assist might be of interest. But I'm trapped in England,on an island. And flying or going by train with such a bike ..too much. I think I would have a breakdown ;)

Enjoy reading and looking at others a-touring. And just love occasionally looking at new touring bikes,whilst knowing I now no longer need one.

Stay well all. Thanks for replies. Best wishes.

Sorry PH. Your post crossed my own. Thanks. Your solution echoes my own
« Last Edit: September 06, 2022, 01:22:41 pm by tyreon »

Andre Jute

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Re: Dahon front luggage solutions
« Reply #5 on: September 06, 2022, 03:48:14 pm »
Well done, sir. I know how you feel. I've always been a credit card tourer because for historical reasons I'm not a keen camper. And by the third day I'm bored, which my family will tell you is an incredible span of concentration for me, and my laptop is on the breakfast table and I'm saying, "Let's get a move on then so we can finish today's schedule early and I can write a chapter before dinner." As a consequence, Andre's world tour of his patch of West Cork is twenty kilometres to the North and the East and sixty kilometres along the coast Southwestwards, which can easily be stretched to many more than three days on the country lanes; further explorations I've written about in years gone by started with the bikes on the back of a car. And now that the process of aging is drawing in those horizons, I'm sorry I didn't ride well beyond them when I could, for instance up the Wild West Coast of Ireland.

On the other hand, I've always been a keen consumer of the tour reports here, feeling that I was vicariously riding along with more adventurous tourers than me. Don't forget to send a description and photographs of even short trips to the "Rides" thread!
http://thorncyclesforum.co.uk/index.php?topic=14555.0

tyreon

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Re: Dahon front luggage solutions
« Reply #6 on: September 07, 2022, 01:16:26 pm »
Thanks Andre.

Once I did try to upload some pictures and some details to the forum. Then things disappeared,got lost,or somehow things went awry. I am not that techno savvy. I then gave up. I shall endeavour to try again,at some time.

My horizons are now as expansive or as limited as my fitness levels and fluctuating levels of health allow. As well as getting slower in my olde age I also find myself getting more cranky or more easily stressed. Thus the mathematical calculations I have to do to get where I want without too much cussing or stress might test Oxford. The ease of getting myself and my bike to the starting point is one priority. Next comes cost,terrain,climate whilst keeping the whole lot in balance. I do ad hoc touring but with some general plan. Some recent travels have made me re-learn what I had once known but then forgotten. I like to travel backroads or those non too busy - so far,so obvious. But at some stops I've then found the next stop too far,or limited accoommodation. On a recent Spanish trip I found there was only one accommodation between the town I found myself in and the next I wanted to go,to then find the accommodation was some £200 for the one night,and was in tepees...it was too much for me. Having said that it did have 8 beds. But I only wanted one!

Weather has a place,too. Tho I have often seen there is no such thing as bad weather for cycling,only the clothes you choose to cycle in,I dont have it in me to cycle all day in pouring rain unless I have to. I'd rather sit it out. I am not featuring in any tv programme nor planning to publish any book.

When I was younger and fitter I could have slept on the surface of a tennis court. Those days are far behind me. I'm more than pooped theseadays. Anyways,I think it better to cycle more appreciatively than to hammer through country to gain achievments. Priorites change as you get older. So,too,preferences. Mind you, I think I was a strange  hybrid: cross beteen a tortoise and a hare. I am now almost all completely tortoise.

I now have my folding bike all ready for my next off,if I can make it. Have espied a nice place around Espejo,Spain. Fairly easy to get to. Stay 4 days,cycle or bus onto next place of interest whilst in the meantime taking day rides out into more removed places of interest.

The main thing is to remain above ground at the moment. And this sans too many aches and pains.  ;)

Best wishes
« Last Edit: September 07, 2022, 01:30:19 pm by tyreon »