FEATURES
The Big Debate by John Schubert
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Viewers Survey. Panniers or Trailer?
In the grand scheme of things, you might consider this burning issue to be more of a charcoal briquette than a raging forest fire, but it's
an issue that keeps coming up: Trailers versus Panniers...which should you use to haul your gear on your next tour? That's a question
bicycle tourists have been asking each other and asking us quite a lot over the past few years.
John Schubert, our Technical editor at Adventure Cyclist magazine, set out to find some answers for you:
For nearly 20 years, we've been telling people how to carry touring equipment on their bikes: front panniers, rear panniers, and keep the
rear load as light as you can. But now, riders have another option: the single-wheel cargo trailer.
Which should you choose: panniers or a trailer? We asked quite a few people who'd tried both, mostly on Adventure Cycling's Great Divide
trail. We talked to the leading trailer maker, Philip Novotny of BOB trailers, and to pannier maker par excellance Bob Beckman. And we
didn't get an answer.
Strike that. We got lots of answers. Pick the one you like. Here's the equivocal summation: Trailers and panniers each have conveniences
and inconveniences, and as you live with them, you learn which you prefer. And each has different durability concerns.
First a recap of what these products are. Panniers come from numerous manufacturers. Their configuration took a great leap forward in the
early 1980s, when rack maker Jim Blackburn figured out how to configure them so they didn't ruin the bike's handling. Blackburn
experimented with various combinations of front, rear, high and low placement of panniers, and concluded that low-mount front panniers,
combined with lightly loaded high-mount rear panniers, were the best setup.
Prior to Blackburn, the norm in touring circles was a large handlebar bag and large rear panniers. Thanks to Blackburn's leadership in this
area, numerous rack and pannier companies sell both front and rear racks, and encourage riders to buy four small panniers instead of two
large ones. A bike loaded with four panniers, plus stuff on the rear rack, can carry a large load and handle reasonably well. Still,
there's no mistaking its handling for that of an empty bike.
There wasn't any real alternative available until an aircraft maintenance inspector named Philip Novotny quit his day job, and took his
perfectionist mechanical standards with him, to found the BOB (Beast of Burden) trailer company. His first product, the BOB Yak trailer,
debuted to rave reviews in June 1996, and he's been quite pleased with their sales ever since.
Other single-wheel cargo trailers appeared. The Wheele, a lighter and cheaper trailer, came from Innovation Sports in southern California,
and one ACA member has told us it's terrific for conventional touring. Kool Stop has two models. One mimics the BOB Yak; the other is
radically different, providing mounting places for six panniers to carry its cargo. Rumor has it that other companies will enter the fray.
These trailers instantly had some captive markets. Full-suspension mountain bikes can't carry panniers without special racks, so trailers
make sense for them. Some recumbent bikes aren't designed for panniers, and their owners are avid trailer customers. "For over 90 percent
of our customers, the initial reason to buy the trailer is touring," Novotny said. "After that, we hear in letters from our customers, they
realize this is a very functional add-on for a bike, and they use it day to day."
Some have reported maintenance problems, but many of these reports came from trailers being used on the Great Divide Mountain Bike Route.
Marty Basch, who rode the trail in 1998, noted "The Great Divide Route is tough on equipment. I don't know that it's fair to single out
trailers. I met one person who started with panniers and switched to a trailer. His panniers failed him and he decided to switch in the
middle of the trip."
So what were the BOB's bending and breaking problems on the Great Divide? "Sometimes the skewer would bend, the dropouts would bend, and
the wheel would get out of true," reported Michael Close. (The BOB has dropouts that attach to the towing bicycle's rear end, via a special
quick release skewer you put on the towing bike. Those are the dropouts Close refers to.) "The dropouts could be beefier."
John Steel, also in Close's Great Divide group, observed two BOBs break in the center of the tubing, near the front joint. He was also
watching when a companion was walking his bike and BOB down a steep section. The bike tipped over, the trailer twisted, and it bent the
dropouts. His group sought out a welder in rural Montana to fix a broken part.
Were there other downsides for trailers not related to maintenance or durability? Some. They begin with attaching the trailer to the towing
bicycle. Several people commented that it was tricky to attach the loaded trailer to the bike without risking bending the trailer's front
dropouts. Next, there's the river crossing problem. "Sometimes I wished I had panniers, because when I was going through a river, the
trailer would get soaked," said Close. "Or I'd have to detach the trailer and walk it through."
A few people mentioned a need to get accustomed to towing the trailer. "If you turned too much, the weight of the BOB would throw you in
the direction you were turning," Close said, adding that he got used to the BOB's handling after a day. But one woman in his group never
got used to it, and switched to panniers for that reason.
"The BOB's wheel tracks the bicycle's rear wheel almost exactly," reported Larry Diskin, Events Coordinator at Adventure Cycling
Association. "The trailer creates a unique handling characteristic that is good on rough terrain. By standing and keeping your weight back
at speed, the front end of the bike becomes very light and is allowed to float over rough terrain quite easily. The rider can simply relax
the upper body and allow momentum to be his friend without risking damage to the wheels.
"The rider will almost never notice the negative 'wagging' effect that I've encountered with a BOB at paved road speeds of 30mph or more.
The trailer handles rough terrain very well, almost to the point where the rider may not even notice when it clears ruts, bumps, rocks or
potholes. It does start to bounce a bit on large washboard, but you are generally not going too fast then anyway." Diskin praised the
low-speed handling of the bike/trailer combination, attributing it to the trailer's low center of gravity. Close also praised the handling:
"When you're going downhill, you could almost forget it was back there."
Backcountry tourist Jonathan Baty saw backcountry-specific advantages to the trailer's carrying capacity: "The BOB can handle three to five
days of food and camping gear. If you want to show your friends a good time, have a tent over your head, and lots of fresh food, the BOB
trailer is a nifty way to really pack in some comfort."
Okay, what about panniers? Pannier maker Beckman simply said, "I've worked to make packs and racks work better for 25 years, to the point
where I don't feel the need to use a trailer on a tour." (Beckman's equipment is outstanding stuff, by the way.)
You can load and unload panniers inside your tent while it rains outside. Panniers have lots of compartments, but in the trailer's large
duffel, some users felt like the thing you wanted was somehow always at the bottom. The problem worsens when you have additional gear
lashed on top of your duffel. With panniers, you can just stop riding, turn around and grab something from them. Not so with the trailer,
which you have to park, walk around, and dig into the duffle.
Most of us have spent years getting to know our panniers. Diskin, a 30-plus mph guy on pavement, prefers the handling of a bike with
panniers on the road, noting that at high speeds, a pannier-laden bike is like "a tank that is easy to control." Off road, Diskin noted,
it's much harder to lift the front wheel over obstacles. But the bike is easier to walk. Pannier users on the Great Divide Expedition "had
frequent and severe problems with rear wheels," he noted. No surprise there.
I asked Marty Basch (author of bike touring books Against the Wind and Above the Circle) if he would take a BOB on his next paved-road
tour. "I'm undecided," he said. "They both work. Some days I feel like lobster; some days I feel like steak." 
John Schubert is the Technical Editor at Adventure Cyclist magazine. Reach him at schubley@aol.com If you want to toss in your two cents, go to our Forums page.
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