Tank Panniers

From Honda Trail Bike Wiki

I got the idea initially from a bike I saw at the 2006 Horizons Meet and thought I’d have a go myself. After a quick trip down to the Army Surplus in Darlington, and a bit of beard scratching this is what I came up with;

The bags are just simple wash bags with a shoulder strap each (Wynnster Armapouch TP304 £5.50). This is exactly what they were used for, along with sunglasses and anything else which could stand a bit of water.

They are by no means waterproof but they keep most of it out other than torrential downpours. I found them particularly useful for keeping the rain and wind off my legs, and as a leg rest!

Despite covering the vent in the side panel they caused no real problems with engine heat, even stationary in the middle of Madrid in 30+ mid day heat. The fan seems to work the air ok regardless. Besides, if using travel towels the zips can be left open slightly and the airflow and engine heat seems to do quite a good job of drying wash gear!

As these bags were used for 2up travelling around Europe they were at their most useful when it came to quick unloading. They are ideal to just unclip and take into the shower or carry into a hotel individually. Not having to dig in the main panniers and risk soap/shampoo contamination of anything in the vicinity of a broken bottle is one less worry. They should also provide a soft(er) landing for the plastics should the bike tip over on its stand. Not that I tried it!

Fitting the tank panniers couldn’t be easier. Each bag came with a shoulder strap, the usual web type with the quick release clips on. (Duraflex Stealth 25mm). One of these can be slid/worked under the air box cover and fed out through the upper vents of the side panels.

A little tape seems to stop the straps rubbing off paint. This strap actually carries very little load so no worries about it pulling unduly on the plastics and can be left in place when not in use. The second strap is merely slung over the tank and clipped in place with the right length to keep the bags the right height.

To keep the bags secure I merely used captive tent elastics and oversize key-rings to keep downwards tension in the straps. The elastics used were ones which fortunately had hooks in place, so the elastic hoop was trapped looping it through the lower panel fixing bolt.

The key-ring was threaded onto the bags clip anchor strap.

That was pretty much all that needed doing. I did find however, that the higher cruising speeds on the main roads caused the bags to ‘inflate’ a little. This was no cause for concern but I thought it looked naf, and so rigged a couple more elastics from the clip on the bottom of the bag to my crash bars. This pulled them down nicely and gave a more satisfactory visual result.

I use a baglux tank bag on the Africa Twin which sits nicely over the straps but I did initially play with the idea of just using a ‘bum bag’.

To fit this I merely rang around until I found someone with the male/female clips (actually managed to blag them as a sample but don’t tell!!) and made a short additional strap for the wash bag, turning one of the clips into a male half to correspond with the male/female clips of the ‘bum bag’.

In the end I opted for the tank bag and used the bum bag for visor cleaning kit and ear plugs, glasses, anything that I wanted to get my hands on quickly and could stand loosing it if someone wanted to steal a stinky cloth and visor spray!

I merely strung this around my screen and used cheapo bathroom shelf suckers to hold it down!!

All of these bags remained secure throughout the 6 week trip and up to speeds exceeding 90mph, so were useful additions to standard luggage and dramatically reduced the rummage factor!