Ortlieb bags rubbing their way thru alumn rack leg

[UpWrong]

Is this normal? Small Ortlieb panniers on Tortec Ultralite rack, around 1200 miles lightly loaded. The rear downward leg is being worn through by the hard adjustement slots for the anti-sway hook on the back of the pannier. This never happened with my Karrimor!

[Steve-W]

Same rack + panniers here. Mine are quite worn too where the plastic bits rub. They've done about 3500 miles or so.

[Redvee]

My Tortec velocity hybrid rack has been eaten by my Ortlieb bag too.

[Tiberius]

Same panniers...Topeak rack being eaten away nicely......

[reohn2]

They wear the the rack (and pannier) because they j-j-jiggle about stop them j-j-jiggling and you stop them wearing

[iviehoff]

While on a long tour, and not wanting the rack to fail, as the metal loss was getting significant, I wrapped the rubbed struts with cut-up inner tube. The long term solution is to use a tubular steel rack instead.

[Brucey]

I've protected racks using many turns of insulation tape. It doesn't last that long, but then it is easy to replace, so maybe that doesn't matter. For a more durable solution, I've slit pieces of ~1mm wall plastic air hose lengthwise, then bound those on with tape. This lasts a very long time.

Also see

http://forum.ctc.org.uk/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=99494&p=927768

cheers

[PJ520]

A mate of mine reckons those anti-sway things are a waste of time and doesn't use them. I've never plucked up the courage to do this and my front rack is worn to hell but I'm thinking of replacing it anyway. So you could try tossing the anti-sway clips and see how that works.

[geocycle]

I use the method Brucey describes. I got some waste 8mm clear plastic tubing from my lab spit it vertically and fastened it around the contact points with insulation tape. You'll probably find something similar in B and Q. This was on my second steel tubus cargo. The first wore through to a hole. The panniers played a part but rubbing and rust against the shed wall did the rest. I'm now on stainless steel which is holding up much better.

[UpWrong]

I'll have a look in B&Q next time I go. Thanks

[Brucey]

another similar product is spiral wrap for wiring harnesses; this is easy to apply (no slitting necessary) and you can use several layers if required. Again it can be secured with tape, away from where the rubbing happens.

http://www.maplin.co.uk/search?text=cable%20wrap

there, 8mm wrap is £3.79 for 10m; enough to last a lifetime!

cheers