Triumph Tiger 1200 XRT
Bigger trips mean bigger boxes make more sense
I’VE BEEN RIDING the Tiger 1200 with the official Triumph Expedition panniers (£605 plus £275 mounting kit) and they’re good. Sometimes after washing the bike with a pressure washer I’ve found a little water inside them but they’ve never leaked in use — and I’ve ridden through some truly terrible weather.
But then I improved my luggage life by acquiring a Kriega KS40 Travel Bag — basically a suitcase shrunk down to the dimensions of a top-loading pannier. It makes packing for trips a doddle… until trying to get it into a 37L Expedition pannier. Even zipped down to its most compact size, it’s a bit of a wiggly battle to get the KS40 into the pannier.
So I started looking for bigger alternatives, by asking an expert: Cliff at the Adventure Bike Shop. “The new Bumot ones are really good,” he advised. The capacity of 45/41L sounded ideal and there’s even a lockable toolbox built into the left-hand frame (echoing where the exhaust sits on the right-hand side.
Fitting them couldn’t be easier: two bolts in the subframe plus the footpegmounting bolts (fixed with awkwardsized T40 Torx bolts: that’s a trip to Halfords) come out, with longer Allan bolts passing through to hold the frames in place. It’s a 20-minute job.
The new panniers are really well finished and have sailed through an initial wash without any water getting inside. They close with two lockable claps,
hinging out sideways along their longer edge. Though bigger than the Triumph ones, they don’t affect the stability of the bike at all — just make me a bit more cautious when filtering. The toolbox is brilliant, a perfect size for the Kriega toolroll, Teng mini-socket set and puncture-repair kit I take everywhere. And the KS40 drops inside, even when fully expanded, without any effort. It’s ready for one final trip… SIMON WEIR
Bumot Defenders panniers are £825 plus £99 for the toolbox. You can specify sizes from 31l up to the 45l versions that we used here. www.adventurebikeshop.co.uk