Carradice Super C Rear Pannier Review

Most long-distance tour­ers seem to go for Ort­lieb pan­niers, or one of the numer­ous imit­a­tion brands. They are meant to be tough and water­proof. I decided (as with many things) to try some­thing a little different.

The Super C pan­niers are made from heavy-duty can­vas, which can with­stand a fair bit of rain but which is not truly water­proof. How­ever, I decided that it would be advant­age­ous to have pan­niers which would allow the con­tents to breathe in the heat and sun, when keep­ing sweaty cloth­ing and sleep­ing bags in a water­tight bag all day might not be par­tic­u­larly desir­able. This paid off in spades as I toured the Middle East and North East Africa, where I saw rain fall just twice in six months of travelling.

To pro­tect my stuff in the event of a down­pour or river cross­ing, I have a water­proof Exped bag liner for each pan­nier. This gives me the best of both worlds, as I can water­proof items at my dis­cre­tion, and so far it has worked very well, but after two years the liners  have both been patched numer­ous times with Gaffa Tape, and it is dubi­ous whether they would be effect­ive dur­ing total immer­sion — a river cross­ing, for example. I would sug­gest look­ing for a brand other than Exped, as I am not impressed with the dur­ab­il­ity of their water­proof bag liners.

I keep my multi-fuel stove and fuel bottle in one of the pan­niers but on the out­side of the liner. This pro­tects the remain­ing con­tents of the pan­nier (my food and cook­ing equip­ment) from unex­pec­ted fuel leaks, although this has not happened to date.

The can­vas is very tough, and has the advant­age that if dam­aged can be patched up eas­ily with a sew­ing kit. The same can­not be said for the water­proof, plastic-coated-type pan­niers, which if breached will take a lot more repair­ing to make them water­proof again. I have heard reports of one pair of these clas­sic Super C pan­niers being used reg­u­larly for over 20 years.

In their cur­rent state, they cer­tainly look well-used, as you would expect. After one crash, I found that the front corner of the rein­forced base of one pan­ner had come away. The alu­minium run­ner that held the secure plastic rack clamps was also bent a little out of shape after the acci­dent, but it doesn’t seem to have affected the use or sta­bil­ity of the pan­nier when attached to the rack. One of the two pan­niers received a small tear which seems to have been grow­ing slowly ever since the incid­ent. This is under­stand­able as I have not man­aged to find time or motiv­a­tion to patch it. How­ever, in gen­eral, the pan­niers seem to have taken an awful lot of abuse without any major func­tional degradation.

The clamps work well to securely attach the pan­niers to the rack, and are eas­ily removed for trans­port­a­tion. This is prob­ably a good idea to pre­vent them being dam­aged, as they do pro­trude and could be eas­ily dam­aged if knocked on some­thing. On the back of each pan­nier, there is also a retainer which can be posi­tioned to latch onto the rack’s tubing. I lost one of these retain­ers dur­ing a bus transit from Istan­bul to Ant­akya, but des­pite this, the sys­tem has held firm.

We also tried the Crosso Dry water­proof pan­niers, whose hook­ing attach­ment sys­tem relies on elastic ten­sion to pre­vent move­ment. This didn’t always work so well, des­pite it being much quicker and easier to mount and dis­mount the pan­niers, and bumpy tracks would often see the Crosso Dry pan­niers’ metal hooks slip­ping off the rack, and some­times fall­ing off the bike entirely — not ideal. The Car­radice Super C’s mount­ing sys­tem is far more secure.

The pan­niers each have little pock­ets on the rear side, which are quite small and have loose-fitting lids that are fastened with a plastic pinch-clasp. With the lids open, how­ever, they are just big enough to each accom­mod­ate two 1.5-litre water bottles, which is handy. If a few loose items are kept in the bag ends, though, they have a habit of jump­ing out on bumpy ter­rain, even with the lid done up and the strap of the lid fully shortened. It’s a minor flaw though — I just keep the con­tents of these bag ends in an addi­tional plastic bag, or pack them full to pre­vent movement.

I have to admit that it is con­veni­ent to be able to keep a clean­ing rag, some chain-lube, a pump, a multi-tool, knife and some snacks in these pock­ets in easy reach, but without clut­ter­ing up my bar bag (which I much prefer to use for easy access to one of the cam­eras, my diary, map, com­pass and music player). How­ever, in Egypt I fell foul of my own com­pla­cency and had stolen my bike pump and multi-tool while hav­ing lunch one day. Need­less to say, with Sudan a few days away I had to work hard to find a replace­ment pump, which was essen­tial, and a sub­sequent punc­ture in the middle of the desert rein­forced this sen­ti­ment! Since then I only keep water bottles in these pock­ets. I often find myself wish­ing that they were zipped, or at least fastened more securely.

The pan­niers are more than big enough for my needs so far, with a rated capa­city of 54 litres per pair. The fact that they are made from can­vas means that they col­lect mud and grime far more effect­ively than the smooth, wipe-clean sur­face of dry-bag-style pan­niers. This is great, as I think that the more ram­shackle, dirty and trav­elled I look, the better!

In con­clu­sion, these British-made can­vas pan­niers are very tough, and will last you a very long time if you look after them. They would be ideal as a long-term invest­ment if you plan to make many fair-weather tours over a num­ber of years. They are also suit­able for the long-haul, as long as you pair them up with water­proof liners for the wet weather that you’ll doubt­less be cyc­ling through at some point dur­ing your trip. You’ll then have the advant­age of breath­able pan­niers which are hard wear­ing, easy to repair, secure on the rack, roomy, and can be fully water­proofed. Car­radice also make a com­ple­ment­ary set of front pan­niers, if that’s your pre­ferred set-up.

It’s a mat­ter or per­sonal taste and of the pre­dicted weather con­di­tions of your tour, but after two years in a vari­ety of extreme con­di­tions, I have no regrets about my choice.

Ride Earth Rat­ing: 5/5

More inform­a­tion:

• Car­radice website’s Super C inform­a­tion page
• List of UK stockists

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