I learnt an important lesson this weekend: panniers are floppy.

Now that the shopping bike has been rebuilt, and the panniers fitted, we decided that it was time to give it a proper run out, so we took it to the market with us on Saturday morning.

It was obvious there were going to be problems by the time we were half way there as first one and then both of the panniers curled around and snared in the back wheel.

Every time we undid it, it did it again, and it wasn’t much better on the way home. It didn’t curl around then as it was held down by the weight of the fruit and veg, but it did still rub in the spokes: not a good thing as it would ultimately wear down the stitching.

Fortunately when we had the front step rebuilt last year the builder left behind some hardboard, so I cut it to size and slipped a piece inside each pannier on the side where it rests on the bike frame. That’s much better. Now it doesn’t rub, and the hardboard is so thin that it doesn’t make any difference to the weight.

Why they don’t sell them with board in them already, though, I don’t know.

Related posts:

1. Fitting panniers to the shopping bike
2. How to fix bike brake cables
3. The rebuilt bike